Protecting animals

We have recently been shocked by what can be described as a barbaric act towards animals - two horses burned alive in their stable.

Such an act reflects the lack of respect people show towards animal rights; some people seem to escape the principle that guides them towards dealing with other dependent creatures which share the planet.

I recently attended a political conference in Lija, where a Labour representative pointed out this fact, something which alas is becoming more frequent.

Further to this, I feel the need to point out what is really meant by the term 'animal rights', with regard to the well-being of animals, which is something which really ought to be given attention.

Certain people seem not to show respect towards these living creatures, only a dominant attitude.

The concept of animal rights has come to play an important role in several areas of concern over humane treatment of animals.

These areas range from the hunting and trapping of animals, to cases of maltreatment of work animals, those used for sport and pets, to the widely accepted practice of animal experimentation for scientific purposes and factory farming.

The question of whether or not animals have any inherent rights has often been raised in religion and philosophy.

The cultural history of the relationship between humans and animals is complex, but a basic contrast might be made between cultural attitudes that have emphasised the unity of being and those which have placed humanity at the centre of creation.

The view of animals as non-feeling creatures of reflex has long since been undercut by other philosophical approaches and by better understanding of evolution and animal behaviour.

Animal rights activists in the 20th century have sought, with some success, to obtain better control over the use of animals in laboratories for scientific research and the testing of products.

A number of activists would eventually ban such use altogether and would also promote vegetarianism.

Animal experimentation

The scientific study of life processes in animals to advance biological knowledge is used primarily in research and teaching in such areas as product safety and effectiveness, disease states and possible cures, and anatomy and physiology.

The number of animals used each year in experiments is not known with certainty. Drugs, cosmetics, chemicals, and medical devices are tested on animals for toxicity, the presence of irritants, and usefulness.

Animals are used in vitamin studies to test symptoms of deficiency. They are also used to test life-support systems in spacecraft. Primates are valuable for studies on the eye and blood.

Studies are also conducted using animals to test the effects of long-term exposure to toxic agents (including pesticides), smoking, marijuana, and drugs. Rabbits are widely used in toxicology and to help develop oral contraceptives.

Sometimes animals are selected because of their unique susceptibility to disease organisms.

Certain animals are also more susceptible to metabolic diseases (chickens and gout); skin diseases (primates and balding); respiratory diseases (horses and emphysema); and eye diseases (cocker spaniels and glaucoma).

Animal experimentation has become increasingly controversial, as the animal rights movement has grown.

Researchers are seeking alternatives to animal experimentation, using techniques such as cell and tissue culture, computer modelling, and non-living replicas.

Factory farming

Factory farming, or confinement rearing, is a method of raising large numbers of poultry or livestock in relatively small areas, under conditions that ensure rapid growth.

Confinement practices include bringing feed to the animals rather than allowing them to forage, and controlling feed rations often through computerisation and automation to attain the most efficient ratio of growth-time to feed cost.

The large concentrations of animals in confinement pens or feedlots would once inevitably have caused lethal epidemics of disease. To prevent such epidemics, and to improve feed/weight-gain efficiency ratios, minute quantities of various growth stimulants and of antibiotics and other drugs are added to feed, or injected directly into the animals.

The female hormone oestrogen promotes growth in livestock. Several outbreaks of food poisoning in the mid-Eighties involved antibiotic-immune strains of salmonella bacteria. Factory farming has greatly reduced the labour required to raise farm animals.

Nevertheless, some farmers are beginning to question the fundamental economics of factory farming. Some studies suggest that although production of meat, poultry, milk, and eggs is greatly enhanced by factory farming practices, the high costs of erecting buildings and buying equipment and the expenses of chemically maintaining herds and flocks may erode profits to a level comparable with conventional rearing practices.

Endangered species

Some animal populations have been so greatly reduced that they are threatened with extinction. Thousands of species are included in this category.

The International Union for the Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources publishes a list of threatened mammals, birds, reptiles, and amphibians. This list is growing at an alarming rate, as is the number of endangered species of fish, invertebrates, and plants.

Many endangered species received a measure of relief in 1973, when the 80 nations that originally participated in the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Flora and Fauna in Washington, DC, agreed to halt imports of endangered species.

Also in 1973, the US Congress passed the Endangered Species Act, protecting the vital habitat of any endangered species. The act has been extended repeatedly since then.

In 1973 the 14 nations in the International Whaling Commission, which sets quotas, rejected the recommendation but did reduce quotas, introduced area quotas for sperm whales, and continued to forbid the hunting of blue, bowhead, humpback, grey, and right whales; quotas continue to this day. National parks throughout the world are often havens for threatened organisms.

Anyone who observes how animals are treated today cannot help being confused. Hunters cherish their hunting dogs, but kill and trap wildlife without conscience or regret and stylish women cuddle furry house pets, but think nothing of wearing the skins of animals.

At animal farms and zoos, parents introduce their children to a world of innocence and beauty, but see no harm in exposing them to circus acts which degrade animals, and rodeos, which brutalise them.

It is not surprising that countless contradictions exist in our relationship to animals, because never has there been a consistent humane principle to guide us in dealing with those dependent creatures who share our planet.

What is surprising is that animals have not been accorded any decent treatment at all, considering the overwhelmingly dominant attitude, from the earliest of times, that animals could be used, abused, and even tormented, at the utterly capricious will of man.