What are the ethics of using animals as a means for human ends?
While we deplore the word “animal” since it reduces other living organisms to
objects, we’ll use it for shorthand. As for medical experiments, in this
context we mean advancing “humanity” at the expense of animals. In the
never-ending periods of political turmoil, civil unrest, and war, it’s easy to
ignore the inherent rights of animals. Nevertheless, we cannot luxuriate in
humanity while the rest of the world – wildlife and animals raised as food or
for human experimentation – suffer and die for our pleasure or gain. Recently,
we noticed an article in Wired1 entitled “A Monkey Got a New
Kidney from a Pig – and lived for 2 Years.” The article prompts us to question
our moral duty toward animals.
Let’s take a closer look at the article under consideration.
For instance, the word “got” appears in the title. That word makes it sound as
if the monkey just reached into the pig’s body to procure an organ willingly
relinquished. Or, “got” as in gotcha! Or, as in “got” what was deserved. Language
about animals shapes our perceptions of them. Additionally, what’s meant by “a
monkey” – just any monkey? Did he or she not have a name or personality like
your dog or cat? The monkey surely had an identity – they, like pigs, are
genetically close to humans. The expression “new kidney” is equally puzzling.
That kidney was not new – it belonged to the pig. What makes the kidney “new”
in the eyes of the reporter and scientists is that it was artificially
engineered to function in a monkey; this is not natural selection. Finally, we
are supposed to revel in how the monkey recipient lived for two years after the
jerry-rigged transplant. The primate in question was a cynomolgus monkey with
an average lifespan of twenty-five years. Considering that the transplant was
not made on an aged monkey, years were erased from his or her life. This
species of monkey’s small size and compliance render them desirable for lab
experimentation. Of course, as our readers might know, monkeys used for lab tests
are produced like cabbages and shipped globally, as if disposable and
replaceable commodities. Worth noting, these primates often live confined and
barren lives in university and medical laboratory cages.
Certainly, humans benefit financially and socially from
animals in a multitude of ways. Consider our long history of using horses,
whether in work or war. There are dogs who guide the blind and enhance law
enforcement. Rabbits and a host of rodents used in the cosmetic or
pharmaceutical industries help us smell sweet or live comfortably. Since we’ve
been using animals as objects, and not recognizing them as subjects of their
own lives, it only seems reasonable, so the logic goes, to harvest their organs
for human transplant. The argument is that we can artificially engineer pig
organs and experiment on primates because they are “like us”; but that likeness
claim should be a reason for us to treat them humanely. Have we learned nothing
since the dark days of Old Testament animal sacrifices or Descartes’
vivisections? The pig kidney in question, otherwise fully functional for its
owner, was genetically re-engineered using Crispr2 to make the organ
compatible for xenotransplantation. The kidney of the Yucatan miniature pig is
similar in size to a human’s organ, and the genomic edits promoted graft endurance
and minimized rejection in a primate body like ours.
The scientists who managed this complex process provide some
interesting language in the title of their paper. They state to have “designed”
a “humanized” pig donor. Humanized design seems rather strange phraseology but
suggests that the gene-editing protocol on animals is only for human advantage;
or, it’s as if other species that evolved adaptations over eons to survive and
reproduce in their own ecological niches don’t even really exist for
themselves. We doubt medical ethicists would condone performing these
procedures on herds of humans confined to a research facility. More to the
point, one sees the word “plantation” in the language of this animal medical
research, conjuring expansive farms of donor pigs bred to lose their internal
organs.
Without having to cite sources, it’s well known that like
many animals, monkeys and pigs are extremely sapient and sentient, so it seems
unethical and cruel to conduct Frankenstein experiments on them solely for the
benefit of “humanity,” especially in this highly technical era assisted by
artificial intelligence and computer-generated imaging. We realize that medical
research is dependent to some extent on animal experimentation, but where are
the lines to be drawn and at what cost to nonhuman life? The Hippocratic Oath3
reads, in part, as follows: “I will soothe the pain of anyone…. Never will I
betray them…. Under no circumstances I will use his body to advance my
knowledge or fame…” Not surprisingly, the oath and much medical research is
anthropocentric: there are few limits to the breeding of and experimentation on
multitudes of test animals if the results benefit humans.
- Gregory
F. Tague, Ph.D. and Fredericka Jacks, Editors, ASEBL (animal studies
ethical behavior literacy)
References and Notes
1. Mullen, Emily.
2023. “A Monkey Got a New Kidney from a Pig – and Lived for 2 Years.” 11
October, Wired. https://www.wired.com/story/a-monkey-got-a-new-kidney-from-a-pig-and-lived-for-2-years/
2. Anand,
Ranjith, et al. 2023. “Design and Testing of a Humanized Porcine Donor for
Xenotransplantation.” Nature 622: 393-401. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-023-06594-4
3. Arenas,
Amelia, trans. 2010. “Hippocrates’ Oath.” Arion 17.3. https://www.bu.edu/arion/files/2010/03/Arenas_05Feb2010_Layout-3.pdf
Biospecimen monkey
image from IQ Biosciences https://iqbiosciences.com/blog/serious-monkey-business-short-take-cynomolgus-monkeys-research/
Biospecimen pig
image from Sinclair Bio Resources https://sinclairbioresources.com/miniature-swine-production/micro-yucatan-miniature-swine/
Copyright©2023 by Gregory F. Tague and ASEBL. All Rights
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