The Protection of Animal Experimentation 



455 



bered my previous difficulties and 

 failures with some of their congeners. 

 As regards hardiness, both the second 

 and the third generations have had 

 ample tests on our ground and passed 

 them without the slightest signs of 

 discomfort. The drought and high 

 temperature of the summer of 1918 



was the severest in memory of even 

 the oldest inhabitant, yet no individual 

 in the entire third generation, of more 

 than 900 plants, showed the slightest 

 distress. The summer of 1919, has 

 become noted for the opposite extreme, 

 yet no deaths, or even diseases, have 

 occurred among these plants. 



FOR THE PROTECTION OF ANIMAL EXPERIMENTATION 



THE Journal of Heredity wishes 

 to call attention to the recent 

 organization of the Committee for 

 the Protection of Animal Experimenta- 

 tion. It is the intention to form a per- 

 manent organization of laymen and 

 scientists. The purpose is "to protect 

 the public against all measures which 

 tend to lower the standards of medical 

 education and to combat the mischie- 

 vous propaganda of all the various cults 

 whose activities jeopardize the public 

 health, including of course, especially 

 the anti-vivisectionists and anti-vacci- 

 nationists." 



It is hardly necessary to say that the 

 editorial board of the Journal of 

 Heredity is in hearty sympathy with 

 this movement. 



It is an incontrovertible fact that 

 the past progress in methods of curing 

 diseases has been dependent, in the 

 majority of cases, on experiments with 

 lower animals; and in the nature of 

 the case, the same must be true in the 

 future. The alternative is progress by 

 experimentation on human beings, sick 

 or otherwise. Any form of treatment 

 of sick persons is to some extent an 

 experiment, but we naturally object 

 to drastic experiments, made in ignor- 

 ance, which mean almost certain death 

 to the immediate subjects, even though 

 there is a chance that in time knowledge 

 may be obtained which will save many 

 lives. Such experiments must be done 

 with animals, with the elimination, of 

 course, of all unnecessary suffering. 



The modern theory of infectious 

 diseases and the successful methods 

 of prevention and cure to which it 

 has lead in numerous cases, trace 

 back directly to the experiments 

 of Pasteur, Toch, Ehrlich and others 

 with animals. Animal experimentation 

 has also lead to better understanding 

 and cure of deficiency diseases such as 

 beriberi, and to the alleviation of 

 functional disorders such as diabetes. 

 Thousands owe their lives to surgical 

 methods worked out at first with 

 animals. Animals must be used in the 

 standardization of useful but dangerous 

 drugs, such as adrenalin and pituitary 

 extract. 



As geneticists, we believe that knowl- 

 edge of the principles of heredity with 

 respect not only to domestic animals 

 and plants but especially to man him- 

 self is of the utmost of importance to 

 mankind. It is very difficult to make 

 progress in the direct study of human 

 heredity. Eugenics must lean on ex- 

 periments with the higher animals. 



A number of statements have been 

 issued by the above mentioned com- 

 mittee in which an illustration of the 

 value of animal experimentation in the 

 past is discussed at some length, and 

 the importance to mankind of safe- 

 guarding it in the future is brought 

 out by quotations from prominent men. 

 The chairman of the Committee is 

 Thomas Barbour, Boston Society of 

 Natural History, 234 Berkeley St., 

 Boston, Mass. 



