An Ethical Problem Part 11

"The present pamphlet calls for our strongest reprobation as a record of the most wanton and stupidest cruelty we have ever seen chronicled under the guise of scientific experiments.... Apart from the utterly useless nature of the observations, so far as regards human pathology, there is a callous indifference shown in the description of the suffering of the poor brutes which is positively revolting.... WE TRUST THAT NO ONE, IN THE PROFESSION OR OUT OF IT, will be tempted by the fancy that these or such-like experiments are scientific or justifiable."

It will be seen that concerning Watson's most cruel vivisections Sir Victor Horsley was not in agreement with the British Medical Journal, the official organ of the a.s.sociation of which, before the Commission, he appeared as the representative!

The final report of the Royal Commission occupies a volume. The long period over which the inquiry extended, the generally apparent desire to permit every phase of opinion to have a hearing, all tended toward views which, if not unanimous, at any rate indicated a desire to be fair. Taken as a whole, the evidence and the final decisions of the Commission const.i.tute an important contribution to the literature of animal experimentation which has appeared during the present century.

The conclusions of the Commission are almost, yet not quite, unanimous. All of the eight members signed the final report, three of them, however, making their a.s.sent subject to a qualifying memorandum that in certain respects indicated a considerable divergence of opinion. The following are the conclusions of the Commission, the words in italics and parentheses being the qualifying additions of one of their number, Dr. George Wilson.

"Altogether, apart from the moral and ethical questions involved in the employment of experiments on living animals for scientific purposes, we are, after full consideration, inclined to think--

"1. That certain results, claimed from time to time have been proved by experiments upon living animals, and alleged to have been beneficial in preventing and curing disease, have, upon further investigation, been found to be fallacious or useless. (INDEED, THE FALLACIES AND FAILURES ARE, IN MY OPINION, FAR MORE CONSPICUOUS THAN SUCCESSFUL RESULTS.)

"2. That notwithstanding such failures, valuable knowledge has been acquired in regard to physiological processes and the causation of disease, and that (SOME) methods for the prevention, cure, and treatment of certain diseases (OTHER THAN BACTERIAL), have resulted from experimental investigations upon living animals.

"3. That, as far as we can judge, it is highly improbable that, without experiments made upon animals, mankind would by now have been in possession of such knowledge.

"4. That in so far as disease has been successfully prevented, or its mortality reduced, suffering has been diminished in man and the lower animals.

"5. That there is ground for believing that similar methods of investigation, if pursued in the future, will be attended with similar results." (FAILURES PLENTIFUL ENOUGH STILL, BUT SUCCESSFUL RESULTS FEWER AND FEWER AS THE FIELD OF LEGITIMATE RESEARCH MUST BECOME GRADUALLY MORE AND MORE RESTRICTED.)

Other conclusions appear to be as follows:

"We strongly hold that limits should be placed to animal suffering in the search for physiological or pathological knowledge."

How far interference with experimentation should extend appears to have been a matter of divergent views. Five of the Commissioners took the following position:

"An Inspector should have the power to order the painless destruction of any animal which, having been the subject of any experiment, shows signs of obvious suffering or considerable pain, even though the object of the experiment may not have been obtained; and

"That in all cases in which, in the opinion of the experimenter, the animal is suffering severe pain which is likely to endure, it shall be his duty to cause painless death, even though the object of the experiment has not been attained."

Three of the Commissioners--Sir William J. Collins, M.D., Dr. George Wilson, and Colonel Lockwood--do not agree with this clause. They cannot approve of a rule which leaves to the discretion of the vivisector the right of keeping alive for an indefinite period, a suffering creature. They recommend that all observations, "likely to cause pain and suffering shall be conducted under adequate anaesthetics, skilfully and humanely administered, or if the nature of the investigation render this impracticable, then, that on the supervention of real or obvious suffering the animal shall be forthwith painlessly killed."

The Commission recommended that, in certain cases, immediate or special records or reports of results should be furnished by the experimenter. The three members just named agree with this, but would have such reports the rule, and not the exception. With this view I am personally in emphatic accord. Every experiment should have its complete record, available for publication if so desired.

That part of the final report which in certain respects is more valuable than all the rest, is the reservation memorandum of Dr. George Wilson, one of the Commissioners. He is not an anti- vivisectionist, for he agrees with the unanimous conclusion of his a.s.sociates that "experiments upon animals, adequately safeguarded by laws faithfully administered, are morally justifiable." Regarding the practice as now carried on, he maintains the only scientific position, that which more inclines to doubt than to credulity. The a.s.surances of witnesses, that in certain experimental operations no pain was inflicted, Dr. Wilson accepts "as opinions to which the greatest weight should be attached, and not as statements of absolute fact, so far as specific instances are concerned." That insensibility to pain is invariably maintained is by no means sure; "however confident the operator may be that he has abolished all pain, VIVISECTIONAL ANAESTHESIA, WITH ALL ITS VARIETIES OF AGENTS AND METHODS OF INDUCTION, CAN NEVER BE DIVESTED OF AN ELEMENT OF UNCERTAINTY."

What are we to say of the results, either to science or the art of healing, which modern vivisection has contributed? It is regarding this point that Dr. Wilson has brought together a ma.s.s of evidence of unquestionable value, in a field of inquiry peculiarly his own. For more than thirty years he had been a writer upon topics pertaining to the Public Health. One by one, in his memorandum, Dr. Wilson has examined the claims of vivisection regarding the chief forms of disease which have occupied the attention of experimenters--cancer, which still maintains its advance in fatality; tuberculosis, which began to decline in England more than forty years ago, before it was a.s.sociated with experimentation; hydrophobia, diphtheria, teta.n.u.s, typhoid fever, snake-poison, sleeping-sickness, and certain animal ailments of an infectious character. What is his conclusion regarding all the claims of vastly increased potency of modern medicine over these powers of darkness and death? That experiments have been utterly valueless? No; some useful knowledge has been acquired, in certain directions. "But I still contend, and have endeavored to prove, that the useful results which have been claimed, or may still be claimed, HAVE BEEN ENORMOUSLY OVER-ESTIMATED." And the final conclusion of this keen observer and lifelong student of medicine is this: "That experiments on animals, no matter with what prospective gain to humanity, are repellant to the ethical sense; and that those who persistently advocate them as beneficial to human or animal life MUST JUSTIFY THEIR CLAIMS BY RESULTS.... Even admitting that experiments on animals have contributed to the relief of human suffering, such measure of relief is infinitesimal compared with the pain which has been inflicted to secure it."

What changes to the existing law of England regarding animal experimentation, or in the administration of the Act, did this Commission recommend?

FIRST. AN INCREASE IN THE NUMBER OF INSPECTORS. "The inspectors should be sufficiently numerous and should have at their command ample time to afford to the public reasonable a.s.surance that the law is faithfully administered."

SECOND. RESTRICTIONS IN THE USE OF CURARE. "We are all agreed, that if its use is to be permitted at all, an inspector, or some person nominated by the Secretary of State, should be present from the commencement of the experiment, who should satisfy himself that the animal is throughout the whole experiment and UNTIL ITS DEATH IN A STATE OF COMPLETE ANAESTHESIA."

This is a most remarkable recommendation. Can it imply anything else than distrust of the experimenter?

THIRD. "STRICTER PROVISIONS REGARDING THE PRACTICE OF PITHING." The operation must be complete; performed only under an adequate anaesthetic; and by a licensed person when made on a warm-blooded animal.

FOURTH. "ADDITIONAL RESTRICTIONS REGULATING THE PAINLESS DESTRUCTION OF ANIMALS which show signs of suffering after the experiment."

To this recommendation and its suggested amendment by three of the Commissioners, reference has already been made.

FIFTH. "A CHANGE IN THE METHOD OF SELECTING and in the const.i.tution of the Advisory body to the Secretary of State."

SIXTH. "SPECIAL RECORDS BY EXPERIMENTERS IN CERTAIN CASES." On this point we have seen that three of the Commissioners went yet farther, and believed that in ALL cases of painful experiment--and, possibly, in all cases whatsoever, such reports should be made.

It is now upwards of thirty-five years since the Act regulating the practice of vivisection in England came into effect. During all that period, in the United States, the law has never ceased to be an object of misrepresentation and attack. Before Legislatures and Senate Committees, on the platform and in the press, by men of good reputation but a.s.sociated with laboratory interests, the English law has been denounced as a hindrance to scientific progress and a warning against similar legislation in the United States. And yet nothing can be more evident that all these attacks were based upon ignorance and misstatement. We find a Royal Commission in England, composed almost entirely of scientific men, everyone of them favourable to animal experimentation, devoting years to an inquiry concerning not vivisection only, but the working of the law by which it is regulated. And the conclusions reached are in every respect opposed to the statements made by the laboratory interests here. THEY FULLY ENDORSE THE PRINCIPLE OF STATE REGULATION, WHICH EVERYWHERE IN AMERICA IS SO STRENUOUSLY OPPOSED. But this is not all. Every recommendation made for modification of the Act is in the direction of animal protection, and toward an increased stringency of the regulations relating to animal experimentation. In not a single instance was there recommendation that the regulations should be less stringent; not an instance in which it was suggested that privileges of the vivisector should be enlarged. That this should be the result of an inquiry in this twentieth century, extending over five years, is remarkable indeed. Perhaps there is no reason for surprise that all these conclusions of the Royal Commission were never made known to the American public by the periodicals of the day. Is it possible for anyone to believe that such conclusions would ever have been attained if the denunciations of State regulation of vivisection, proceeding from the American laboratory, had been grounded in truth?

CHAPTER XI

THE GREAT ANAESTHETIC DELUSION

A popular delusion is often the basis of a great abuse. If at one time witches were burnt by countless thousands, it was at a period when implicit faith in the reality of diabolic conspiracy was undisturbed by sceptical questionings. Human slavery existed for centuries, not only because it was profitable, but because it came to be regarded as the only conceivable permanent relation between the negro and the white man. The Spanish Inquisition existed for ages, because the pious Spaniard could not believe that the good men who upheld, encouraged, and promoted its activity could be liable to error, or actuated by other than the loftiest principles. Men find themselves deluded not merely because of their faith in the integrity of their fellow-men, but because they have also extended that faith to the accuracy of their opinions.

There can be no doubt of the fact that public apathy regarding the abuses of vivisection as now carried on without limitations or restrictions is grounded upon the great anaesthetic delusion. This misinterpretation of facts, this misunderstanding of scientific statements, const.i.tutes the most singular delusion of the present time.

What is anaesthesia? It has been defined as a state of insensibility to external impressions, sometimes introduced by disease, but more generally in modern surgery by the inhalation of the vapours of ether or chloroform. The discovery of the properties of these drugs const.i.tutes a very interesting chapter in the story of scientific achievement; but in this connection the chief point of interest lies in the fact that the most wonderful of all advances in medicine was made without resort to the vivisection of animals. Sir Benjamin Ward Richardson, an English scientist who had much to do with its various methods, tells us that "the instauration of general anaesthesia came from experiments on man alone; there is no suspicion of any experiment on a lower animal in connection with it"; and Professor Bigelow, of Harvard Medical School, as we have seen, makes the same statement.

The extent to which insensibility may be carried depends entirely on the amount of the vapour inhaled. Suppose the quant.i.ty to be very small. Then the result will be a diminished sensibility, without entire loss of consciousness. Let the quant.i.ty inhaled be considerably increase, and we may produce a profound stupor with muscular relaxation, the eyes are fixed, and the eyelids do not respond when the eyeball is touched. There is now deep anaesthesia, and complete unconsciousness to the surgeon's knife. The borderline between life and death is not distant; and if still more of the anaesthetic is administered, we may reach a condition from which there is no awakening. The skill of the anaesthetist is not unlike that of a pilot, who needs to know just how far the s.h.i.+p may be steered in a difficult channel without running upon the rocks.

For a slight operation, a very little of the drug will often suffice.

In some hospitals abroad--and perhaps in America--it is the custom not to give anaesthetics to charity patients when the pain is not greater than the extraction of a tooth. Between a light anaesthesia and the deep insensibility required for some capital operation, THERE IS EVERY CONCEIVABLE DEGREE. We see the same thing in ordinary sleep. The deep unconsciousness of a thoroughly exhausted man is vastly different from the light slumber of an anxious mother, who is aroused by a word or touch. Yet both conditions are what we call "sleep."

Now, one of the popular delusions regarding what is called "anaesthesia" arises from ignorance of its innumerable degrees. We are told, for instance, "anaesthetics were used" in certain vivisections. That a.s.sertion alone, in a majority of cases, will quiet any criticism. If "anaesthetics were used," then the average reader a.s.sumes that of course there was no pain. The experimenter may know better. But if ignorance persists in misinterpreting statements of fact, it is possible that he may think he is not obliged to make the truth plain, to his positive disadvantage. If such method of reasoning ever obtains, it may explain very much.

And yet it would seem that only very ignorant people could be so blinded by authority as not to perceive where the fallacy lies. A slight amount of ether or chloroform may mean to a vivisected animal no protection whatever from extreme pain. The fact has long been known. Many years ago Dr. George Hoggan declared that "complete and conscientious anaesthesia is seldom even attempted, the animal getting at most a slight whiff of chloroform by way of satisfying the conscience of the operator, OR OF ENABLING HIM TO MAKE STATEMENTS OF A HUMANE CHARACTER." In other words, it enables him to say, "Anaesthetics are always used." Shall we always be blind to the insignificance of that phrase?

That chloroform or ether will suppress the consciousness of pain during a surgical operation, every reader is aware. But when we speak of certain vivisections, we are on different ground. The pains to be inflicted are sometimes far more excruciating than any surgical operation. In the stimulation of sensory nerves, and in various operations upon these nerves, there may be excited agonies so great that they break through the limited unconsciousness induced by chloroform. One of the most experienced vivisectors in America has given his testimony on this point. Speaking of his experiments upon some of the most exquisitely sensitive nerves, Dr. Flint says: "WHEN we have used anaesthetics"--not the significance of the phrase--"WE COULD NEVER PUSH THE EFFECTS SUFFICIENTLY TO ABOLISH THE SENSIBILITY OF THE ROOT OF THE NERVE. If an animal, brought so fully under the influence of ether that the conjunctiva had become absolutely insensible" (the degree of insensibility required by the surgeon), "the instant the instrument touched the root of the nerve in the cranium, THERE WERE EVIDENCES OF ACUTE PAIN."[1] Of other experiments upon the same nerves he tells us that "in using anaesthetics, we have never been able to bring an animal under their influence SO COMPLETELY AS TO ABOLISH THE SENSIBILITY.... In cats that appear to be thoroughly etherized, as soon as the instrument touches the nerve, there is more or less struggling."[2]

[1] Flint's "Physiology," vol. iv., p. 97.

[2] Flint's "Physiology," vol. iv., p. 193.

This statement needs to be remembered. The agony may be so keen, so exquisite, so far beyond the pain of a surgical operation, that it makes itself felt. Pain, then, conquers the anaesthetic, exactly as the anaesthetic usually conquers the pain.

What, then, is the value of the phrase, "ANAESTHETICS WERE USED"?

Dr. Hoggan has told us. It has no value whatever.

Sir Thornley Stoker, President of the Royal Academy of Medicine in Ireland, and an inspector of laboratories under the Act, was questioned about the pain endured by an animal in course of a prolonged vivisection, and he frankly admitted that a vivisector "could do no more than give an opinion. He could have no CERTAINTY as to the entire absence, the continuous absence, of pain."[2] Dr. Thane, a professor at University Medical College, London, and a Government inspector, being asked whether one might not be able to distinguish between painful and painless experiments, replied that "the inspector never could distinguish exactly which experiments were painless and which were painful, AND THE EXPERIMENTERS AND OBSERVERS THEMSELVES cannot distinguish IN A VERY LARGE NUMBER OF CASES."[3]

[2] Evidence before Royal Commission, Question 1,064.

[3] Ibid., Question 1,335.

These are the opinions of experts. This att.i.tude of uncertainty is the only ground possible for a scientific man who aims at stating the whole truth. When a professional vivisector gives us a.s.surance that no pain was felt during the severest operations, he is only putting forth an opinion. He is but mortal. We are not obliged to a.s.sume his infallibility in a region where experts are in doubt, and where there may be a desire for concealment.

During the last decade of the nineteenth century, a work was published describing in detail experiments upon surgical shock--so termed to distinguish it from a similar condition arising from overwhelming emotions. These experiments were almost exclusively made upon dogs, man's faithful friend and companion; and their number was so great and their character so horrible that their publication at first excited general criticism and condemnation. At one the suggestion was put forth that the experiments were painless, because "anaesthetics were employed." The vivisector had said:

"In all cases the animals were anaesthetized, usually by the use of ether, occasionally by chloroform, either alone or with ether. In a few cases CURARE AND MORPHINE WERE USED."