Veterinary Medical Ethics

Ethical question of the month — July 2020

Some posit that zoos provide a unique opportunity for people to observe and appreciate wild animals. They believe that zoos create a deeper appreciation of the natural world and the animals that live there. Displaying animals in zoologic parks may also inspire the public to work to conserve and protect wild animals, especially those that are endangered. Others argue that there can never be any justification for keeping wild animals in captivity for public enjoyment. Do zoos provide a net benefit to wild animals as a result of their educational value or is their only benefit one of providing human entertainment at the animals’ expense?

An ethicist’s commentary on the role of zoos

The simple but ambivalent answer to this query is “both.” I had a student who got a summer job at the National Zoo in Washington, D.C. His primary task was to shadow visitors and determine how they spent their time. Much to his surprise, most visitors spent more time in the souvenir shop than reading the information signs, by a major order of magnitude, even though the signage had recently been updated! This experience is replicated in the experience of many others. On the other hand, there are some zoologists who were first inspired to their careers by zoo visits.

As a young and ignorant man, I visited many zoos and was struck by the extent to which the animals were listless and depressed — simply lying around in their cages. I was drawn to visit zoos when I was myself depressed. Years later, I realized that my attraction to zoos came from seeing creatures worse off than I was. At one zoo I visited, the giraffes were housed in cages too low for them stand up.

Such deplorable situations have happily been rectified in the course of society developing greater concern for animal welfare. Outrageous roadside zoos have shrunk in number as visitors grow increasingly disgusted by the animals’ living situations. Zoological societies now accredit and rate zoos, even as televised nature programs provide viewers with a glimpse of the animals’ natural lives.

I know this from personal experience. A few years ago, I began to serve on the American Humane Association’s newly formed committee for carefully accrediting zoos. There is no question that the bad publicity generated by negative reports have affected both zoo managers and the general public.

To return to our original question, it appears that the general public will not tolerate small, cramped quarters for animals that do nothing to respect their needs and natures. It is for this reason that many zoos have updated their animal facilities. For members of the general public who increasingly care about animals, learning about animals is an important component of visiting zoos. On the other hand, there is still a large contingent of “yahoos” who tease, bait, and make fun of the animals. One can fervently hope that as animal welfare occupies a greater component of public consciousness, the educational component of zoos will assume greater prominence as people realize that learning about the animals is as important as watching them. This, in turn, can provide a major boost to concern about threatened species, and lead to greater welfare and conservation thinking in the minds of subsequent generations.

Ethical question of the month — October 2020

Male chicks are a by-product of the modern egg industry. Unable to lay eggs and unsuitable for the broiler industry, male layer chicks are incubated and hatched out, only to be culled as day-olds. In Canada and the United States, maceration is the most common method of euthanasia, providing instantaneous death. While this may provide a humane death, the practice is cited as a welfare concern among animal activists, consumers, and industry. Significant efforts have been made in Canada and the United States to develop commercial egg sexing technologies that would allow for the elimination of this practice, but none have proven economically feasible. Is it ethical to hatch out chicks with the intention of euthanizing half of them? If dual-purpose breeds are less efficient as both layers and broilers, is it ethical to raise these despite the associated additional inputs/costs?

Submitted by Megan Allore, Montreal, Quebec

Responses to the case presented are welcome. Please limit your reply to approximately 50 words and forward along with your name and address to: Ethical Choices, c/o Dr. Tim Blackwell, 6486 E. Garafraxa, Townline, Belwood, Ontario N0B 1J0; telephone: 519-846-3413; fax: 519-846-8178; e-mail: tim.e.blackwell@gmail.com

Suggested ethical questions of the month are also welcome! All ethical questions or scenarios in the ethics column are based on actual events, which are changed, including names, locations, species, etc., to protect the confidentiality of the parties involved.