Laps, not labs

Suffering, not science

Approximately 60,000 dogs are used to test drugs, pesticides and other substances, or used for research, such as heart or neurological experiments, in the United States each year. Nearly all of them, including those healthy enough for adoption, die after their study concludes. 

During a seven-month-long investigation at an Inotiv testing laboratory in Indiana, released in April 2022, our undercover investigator encountered nearly 6,000 animals—including dogs, primates and mice—nearly all of whom ultimately died. The investigator documented the suffering of at least 80 dogs, including puppies, who were regularly force-fed chemicals as part of a toxicity test commissioned by Crinetics Pharmaceuticals and scheduled to be euthanized. The laboratory has refused to respond to intense public and political pressure to release the dogs, making it highly unlikely they will ever make it out of the laboratory alive. 

The plight of these animals is a heartbreaking reality of inaccurate and unnecessary animal testing, says Kathleen Conlee, HSUS vice president of Animal Research Issues. According to scientific reports, nearly 90% of drugs tested in animals ultimately fail in human trials, largely because animal tests didn’t predict the drugs’ toxicity in people.

“These animals are not mini-humans,” Conlee says. “Companies and federal regulatory agencies have a responsibility to ensure drugs, chemicals and consumer products are safe for humans, but our continuing reliance on animal testing creates a false sense of security.” 

Despite their extremely high failure rate, animal tests continue to be the surest path to regulatory approval, so their use continues. Why? Mainly because of the status quo, says Barry Londeree, program manager of Animal Research Issues for the HSUS. There hasn’t been a strong impetus to pressure federal agencies to act on non-animal alternatives. But the HSUS and fellow advocates continue to push the FDA to play a stronger role in moving away from animal testing by incentivizing non-animal alternatives. 

The benefit goes beyond eliminating unnecessary animal suffering, Londeree says. Scientific, non-animal testing methods—such as human organs on chips and next-generation computer modeling—can provide results that are faster, more accurate and more relevant to human biology. A recent academic study found that organ chips detected toxicity in nearly seven out of eight drugs that proved toxic in patients but had been approved through animal tests. That is an 87% success rate, far better than the roughly 10% success rate of those drugs approved using animal tests.

“We want to set a much higher bar for accuracy and animal welfare. Many alternatives exist; we just need to increase agencies’ confidence in using them,” Conlee says. 

In addition to working with the FDA, the HSUS is pushing the National Institutes of Health, which supports research on animals at thousands of institutions around the country, to stop funding studies that use dogs and other animals and instead grant money for non-animal alternatives. The HSUS is also encouraging the Environmental Protection Agency, which has already committed to ending all mammal testing by 2035, to end tests such as the 90-day toxicity test for pesticides and other chemicals, similar to the unnecessary one-year test, immediately.