Uncovering the Truth Behind Lab Dogs with Author Melanie Kaplan

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Mariann Sullivan: Yeah, and as Jasmin mentioned, our guest today, Melanie Kaplan, is the author of this wonderful new book, which I'm holding up. So if you're watching this on YouTube, you can see it, uh, Lab Dog. And she is also a longtime independent journalist whose travel and science writing has appeared in The Atlantic, the Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal, national Parks Magazine.

And welcome, Melanie. I'm so excited to talk to you about this book. I was just saying before we started that is such a hard topic to talk about and to write about and centering it around this particular dog, I think really makes a big difference. And so the book covers a lot of territory, political and science and whatever, but at the center, it's very much about this particular dog, Alexander Hamilton, AKA Hammy.

Um, so can you tell us a, a start the story where it begins, and tell us a little bit about how Hammy came into your life?

Melanie Kaplan: Hi. Yes, and, uh, Mariann and Jasmin, it's so nice to be here. Um, you know, Hammy came into my life in 2013. I adopted him from the Beagle Freedom Project, and I really didn't know anything about dogs in labs, but a friend of mine gave me one of BFP's calendars and it was filled with dogs who'd been used in research.

And immediately I signed up to be a foster. And so the day that this group of seven, and they were, they were all named after founding fathers, the day that they got out of the lab, there were seven foster families that went to meet them in somebody's yard in Maryland. And after a few hours, we all left with a dog.

And about a month later, I adopted him.

Jasmin Singer: Wow, that's so fascinating to me, like just the story of how people adopt their animals. It seems a little bit like you might have adopted Hammy, somewhat impulsively and without any deep realization of, of what you were really getting into, which is, if this is true, I love it. Uh, is that, is that right? And once he was in your life, what eventually inspired you to investigate his past and the world of animal research?

Melanie Kaplan: That is absolutely right. In fact, I was totally planning on just fostering him because I had lost another beagle three and a half years before and I was really enjoying being able to travel. I was doing a lot of travel writing, going to national parks and writing birdwatching stories. You cannot have a beagle while you're birdwatching.

Um, and, and so I really thought this was gonna be short term. Right?

Mariann Sullivan: Yeah.

Melanie Kaplan: And, um. And then, you know, he, he was so scared when I brought him home. I also thought like, I can't put him in a car. I can't, you know, we can't go have adventures. This is just not gonna work. And then there was a day that we were visiting a friend and we were in a neighborhood that neither one of us really knew.

And he ran away. And when I got back, I mean, it was just, I, I was like, I can't ever let this guy go. And, and I started really falling in love with him and bonding with him. And instead of looking at like, oh, someone else is gonna help him with his trauma, it was like, that's gonna be me.

I gotta be patient. We're gonna go through this together. And, um, you know, to answer your second question, it, it really was many years before I started digging into his past. For a long time I would just introduce him to people and say, Hammy was in a lab in Virginia, which is all that I knew. And I showed them the tattoo in his ear 'cause all these dogs are tattooed. Um, and that was it.

And people are like, Oh my God, I had no idea. Or is this legal? Or, I can't believe we're still doing this. And um, and that's really what, what prompted me to need to write about it.

Mariann Sullivan: Yeah, I, these dogs are such ambassadors and, but it's still so, just completely freaks me out how little people know about what's really happening to animals out there. Alright, so your book makes clear that this is a question without a simple answer. And I've gotten simple answers to this question before, and the question is why and how beagles became the dog of choice for animal research.

And I'm usually told it's because they have good personalities, which I'm sure has something to do, but a lot of dogs have good personality. You know, it's not like beagles are the only relatively docile dog out there. And your book makes clear, it's a little, it's more complicated than that. There's this whole backstory there.

Melanie Kaplan: Right. So that, that is the easy answer. I mean, they're docile, they're compliant. Um, and another thing that we don't hear too much is that, you know, they're small. And so think about feeding a smaller dog versus a much larger dog. They take up less space. So just from an economics point of view, they're, they're cheaper to house and feed.

But what I learned, and, um, and historian Brad Bolman has really done a really deep dive into this topic on the history of beagles specifically, but they were being used, they were being bred for hunting when they first came to this country from England. And there was this sport called beagling, which is chasing rabbits with your beagle.

And so there were a bunch of kennels and they were trying to breed a better beagle for hunting. And so when the shift happened, you know, whether it was in the 1950s or slightly before when pharmaceutical companies were starting to test on dogs, and you know, were making that shift to using dogs as a model.

The beagles were already in this big infrastructure. There was a system of breeding them and using them and selling 'em. So that, that to me was really interesting. It's, it's not the only dog, but it's the majority of the dogs.

Jasmin Singer: So you write about the, the psychological scars of both the animals and the researchers that, that you encountered. What about yours? What about your own? Like how, how did writing this book impact you personally and, and, and how did you cope and, and, and are continuing to cope with the emotional toll of dwelling on stories of terrible harm done to dogs?

Melanie Kaplan: Yeah, I learned pretty quickly that you have to turn a part of yourself off when you're doing this, and so I, I assume that researchers and animal caretakers and technicians have to do this at some level. I would be deep into reading this stuff and I'd have to just put it aside and spend some time with Hammy.

But eventually I had to go back to it because I had to understand so much, I mean, so much more than I included in the book in order to understand, you know, what had to be shared with readers and how to tell this story. Um, you know, I think in terms of compartmentalizing, it was too painful to imagine Hammy in all these different scenarios that I was reading.

So I get how researchers can experiment on these animals during the day. I mean, I don't get it, but I see that part of it, where they do that and then they go home at night to the dogs that they love. Right. We hear that. And thinking about Hammy in those situations was just too painful. So, you know, I think in terms of coping, um, I, I felt so driven to tell this story.

I didn't feel like there was an option. Um, but Hammy, I mean, he totally inspired this and he helped me get through it.

Mariann Sullivan: Yeah, I, I got that feeling and, and, uh, it's a related question really. It's not just how you managed to get through it, but how did you set out to write it so that readers would get through it and wouldn't, you know, because our big problem with animal, writing about anything that's happening to animals is that it's so bad nobody wants to know. And so they don't, uh, you know they let themselves off the hook. So was was one of your tricks, so to say, or, or techniques, in, in how to, you know, allow, people to continue reading it without them just wanting to put it down to incorporate Hammy into the story?

Because that really seemed like you not just talked about what was happening to dogs, but you also just kind of, kind of incorporated him into your stories of your road trips and your, and, and, and that his, his presence, you know, that he was frequently there was, or, or were there other ways as well that you tried to, uh, to soften the blow?

Melanie Kaplan: You know, I had done, like I said, I'd done a lot of travel writing before and. And Hammy was part of a lot of those trips. I mean, we did go to national parks together. We went to, there's a giant beagle in Idaho and you can stay in the Beagle. It's like a little inn. So, you know, he was constantly in the car with me.

And so I had years of first person writing, you know, these narratives with hammy. And so that's what I knew how to do. That was

Mariann Sullivan: Yeah.

Melanie Kaplan: comfortable. So there was never any question, this is going to be with Hammy and Hammy and my story. and the other thing is I really wanted Hammy to be part of meeting all these people.

I mean, I wanted him with me, but I wanted him to meet. The people who'd spent their careers researching on dogs. I wanted him to meet the ethicists and the animal activists. And, you know, even we spoke at a conference for early career scientists at one point, and, and they're all working on these non-animal methods, but they met him and they're like, Oh my gosh, this is who we're doing this work for.

Because a lot of people have never met an animal who had been used in a lab before so that felt really profound and helpful. And um, you know, just hearing that, seeing their reactions. And then of course, you know, writing it. I mean, this was my first book and so I was aware as I was starting to write, like, okay, this, this part's really heavy and we gotta bring Hammy in somehow.

And I was weaving together the history of dog research, but also chronologically what was happening with Hammy and me is I was learning more and he was aging and I was aging. So somehow it came together.

Jasmin Singer: Well, I wanna kind of dig a little deeper into that because as you mentioned, Hammy was with you during many of the road trips for your research. Can you tell us a little bit more about that working relationship, like specifically, how did his reactions and presence influence your perspective on the places you were investigating?

Melanie Kaplan: You know, I think that I set out on this, you know, epic road trip, this journey, hoping for something very specific. I really wanted to meet the people who experimented on him and the people who made the decisions to breed him. And I had no idea that that was just impossible. Um, and even though I knew pretty early on I wasn't going to get exactly what I wanted, I wanted something, I wanted something like that.

I mean, I wanted to have some connection. I wanted people to apologize to Hammy and. I wanted to, you know, I was curious whether they would change by meeting him. So it really was all through this Hammy lens. You know, I was trying to understand why were... why was he and beagles like him, bred in the first place?

Um, you know, why are we still testing on dogs? So, I mean, does that answer your question?

Jasmin Singer: No, totally. I, I like the idea of looking at things from, I mean, obviously I love the idea of looking at things from the perspective of the animal. It makes me think like of many, many years ago, like maybe 20 years ago, or almost 20 years ago, Mariann had a cat who died suddenly. And I remember, I'm sorry to talk about you, like you're not in the room, Mariann, but, uh, your grieving process with that. And you just kept saying, all her little thoughts or all his little thoughts. And, and, and obviously... or, or giant thoughts like we, we don't know.

Um, and that always stuck with me, just that sentence, like all his little thoughts because it's like their entire world. And, and so yeah, I mean, when you're on a trip like that and you're looking at it from the perspective of the animal and all, all their little thoughts, all their big thoughts, whatever, it, it really does fundamentally change your experience and, you.

Melanie Kaplan: Yeah, and and Hammy became so much more to me. I mean, I loved him from early on. But I think that we did this, the fact that we did this together and we set out to do this, we were so bonded. And I, I was looking at him differently. I mean, of course, I, I know that these animals all have their own personalities.

They're all individuals. They have fears and likes and dislikes. And, you know, even among the group of seven that came outta the lab together, they were very different. And they went to different homes and some went with other animals and some didn't. And so, but I think all this time we spent together, I was, I was really, I mean, I knew him so well.

I knew what scared him. Um, you know, I was just, I was so much more attentive to the point that I was like, wow, I mean, how, how can I love this being anymore? And, and yet, I, I did.

Mariann Sullivan: Yeah. It's, it really is unbelievable how much we love them. It's just sometimes I, I, I...

well, uh, let's not go down that road because I wanna talk a little bit about, um, about the subject of the book too, and the people who were the subject of the book. And you said you wanted to, you wanted apology, an apology or something akin to that.

And, and you wanted to know what had really happened. And all of this became much more difficult to, to accomplish than you thought, but you did... like, tell me what your initial assumptions were about, about the people you would be meeting, who were involved in animal research, and how maybe some of them were true and in what ways maybe they became a little bit more complicated.

And, and can you just, can you just go through that process a bit?

Melanie Kaplan: Yeah, I mean, I, like I said, I really didn't know much going into this. And I have friends who are animal activists and I've, I've seen and read and heard, um, all about that perspective. And I, I knew going into this that these were not monsters working in the labs. I knew that generally, you know, these are, are not, um, not these big terrible things that happen or exceptions to... you know, this is just like the every day terrible that happens to these animals.

So I knew that these were humans. I thought I might find kind people on both sides of this debate, which of course I did. And, you know, in terms of the researchers, I, I did get some insight into where they were coming from and they, they generally are really concerned with bettering human health. Um, sometimes they've got somebody in their family who's been sick or has an incurable illness.

Um, you know, they're all inspired in different ways, just like animal activists are. But, you know, I, I definitely understood better that messy gray area in the middle because, look, I talked to a mom whose son has muscular dystrophy and she said, if dog research can help 5% or advance this 5%, like I'm all in.

I don't have human children and I, I can imagine what it's like for her, but you know, even when you're not talking about something that extreme, I mean, we are all benefiting from advances, um, from animals. We all have taken drugs and been the beneficiaries of medical devices. So, you know, I don't think we can go out and say like, we are never going to engage in this because it's just impossible.

I mean, the, the big question is now is like, why is it not shifting more? Because we've been talking about alternatives for generations. We've been doing this, we've learned a lot over centuries about the human body and illnesses. It, it just seems like we are stuck. The animal researchers train young scientists to do animal research and there's a lot of money, billions of dollars, that goes into that, and it seems like it's time to make a shift.

Jasmin Singer: Yeah. Uh, and what would you say is the current status of non-animal testing methods? Like, uh, organ chips and AI modeling, and what, what do you see as the future of these technologies in impacting the use of animals?

Melanie Kaplan: I think that there's some really exciting things going on. I went to visit the Emulate lab that makes the organ chips. Um, there's organoids and AI and computer modeling and so much human data, and it seems like a combination of these different methods is, is pretty effective and, and really promising.

It's not gonna happen overnight, and I think we need to direct a lot more funding to develop these methods. Um, you know, it's encouraging that this administration is talking about it, whether or not that's going to lead to new policy and new regulations. Um, you know, maybe a change in Animal Welfare Act, which needs to be updated.

It's, um, you know, it's, it's really hard to say, but at least it's part of the dialogue now more than it has been. Do you, do you agree with that?

Mariann Sullivan: Absolutely, I think there are people fighting for it and there are people fighting against it, and, the people fighting for it are making some progress. But you know, like in everything in changing behavior towards animals, it's a long haul. I mean, there's obviously money. There's also habit. And there's this framing and if we can go back to what you were saying before, I, I don't know whether we're gonna move past this framing of human lives are more important than animal lives, and that's why this is okay.

I don't think most people wanna argue that no animal lives are exactly the same as you. I mean, even if they believe that, it's not a great argument, but there's gotta be a number that's too high. I mean, that can't be just the framing.

If we had to kill every animal on the planet and torture and kill them to save one human being from dying right now, of course they will soon they will die of something else. Obviously nobody's gonna say that's okay. So somewhere in between there, there's a line over which it's not okay. And it's just the way we frame that argument, that, that I think always makes the answer, Yes, whatever the research is, it's justified 'cause it might help a human.

I don't know what this question is, but, do you have an idea of where that line is?

Melanie Kaplan: Well, I, I thought about that so much

Mariann Sullivan: Yeah.

Melanie Kaplan: I kind of go through these mental gymnastics on like, well, you know, what if Hammy was used for something that helped a million people? Like, would that be okay? And um, and, and it was just so hard to get my head around it. So I'm, I'm thankful that there are ethicists who deal with us every day because, you know, I was like, don't use him for anything, you know, um, because I'd gotten to know him and I loved him so much.

But, um, you know, certainly we can update what the three Rs are now, which, you know, came into being in 1959, which is reduce, replace, refine animal research. And, you know, there are, there are really good arguments for having an upper limit of pain, for example, or requiring researchers to use alternatives if they're available instead of, of just saying, Oh, maybe it's not good enough, you know? No, you have to use that instead of the animal. So there are so many improvements that could be made there. I mean, as you said, the research, if the researcher can justify any amount of pain in his or her protocol, then then that's acceptable.

Mariann Sullivan: I don't know whether you have the same feeling, but I always think it's hard to have that argument with people who also eat animals. I mean, I don't know whether you've met researchers who don't eat animals or don't use animals for any purpose other than absolutely necessary, but I don't think there are a lot of them.

And obviously if you eat them, you think that their lives are not worth much anyway, and their treatment isn't worth much anyway. It just all becomes complicated. All right. This isn't a question either. I don't know why I'm going on, but, um, I do think that, uh, I, well, actually, I am curious, did you, did you ever run into researchers who defended it? But were able to say we shouldn't use animals for any other purpose unless it's absolutely necessary and we should dramatically improve the way they're treated in every way other than the experimentation that their lives are actually as good as we can make them. I've never heard anybody say, well, human lives are on the, on the line, so we should do that for the animals.

Have you, I'm just curious, does anybody go there or is it just always, well, human lives are more important than animals?

Melanie Kaplan: No, I have, I have not heard that. I think that it's just kind of understood it's a given and those, those conversations that human lives are more important than animals. I mean, that's, I think that's just where they're coming from.

Mariann Sullivan: Right. But the, they don't go to this new place of, and therefore we should spend enormous amounts of money to care for the animals since we have to do this to them.

Melanie Kaplan: Yeah, no, they will say, you know, researchers in the research community told me so many times, you know, if we didn't have to do this, we wouldn't. Um, we, we all hope to move to non-animal methods, but I also, you know, did not have as much access to the research community as I would've liked.

Mariann Sullivan: Of course, it's hard.

Melanie Kaplan: Wouldn't talk to me.

There were a lot of closed doors before I got anywhere. Um, so I would've, liked to have told a more in depth, um, side of that story. But, you know, I met with these two dog researchers and they have to represent all the others that I didn't talk to.

Jasmin Singer: Yeah, I mean, and then there's the, the people who are against testing on dogs, but don't care about testing on rats. I mean, it's just, it's like a whack-a-mole, and why are we whacking the mole? Okay, I digress. Um, so one of the extraordinary things about our current political situation is that animal welfare, at least in some contexts, and particularly in the animal research realm, has very strangely become something of a Trump administration issue.

Do you agree with that? And how is that resulting in change?

Melanie Kaplan: Yeah, it's, it's very interesting. Um, I just wrote an article that touched on that and, you know, it's, it's encouraging and I'm optimistic. I think some of these issues, um, you know, just haven't been talked about before publicly. The fact that these drug tests are so bad at predicting, um, the drug tests on animals are so bad at predicting how the drugs will do in human health.

I mean, nine out of 10 fail and, um, you know, and the government coming out and saying through NIH, FDA that these are not ethical effective tests. So that feels huge.

Mariann Sullivan: Yeah, it really, I mean like strange bedfellows indeed. But, but, uh, you know, the animals need whatever bedfellows they can get. So, so it is really encouraging that there is this progress. You know, another thing I really wanna talk to you about is the breeders. Um, and you, you talk about it, though you don't actually, I mean, your book was published a little bit before.

Some of the story has since unfolded, like with, um, Ridglan and, um, and Envigo and, but because of the work of Direct Action Everywhere, which we cover a lot, and Dane for Dogs, which is the local, um, the local organization, uh, that dealt with Ridgland, uh, a lot of light has been shown on the horrific conditions of the beagles in the breeding facilities, not in the research itself, but, but which, you know, brings us back to this question of like, if we're, if we are forced, forced, forced to use them for the benefit of humans, we could probably treat them a little better.

Um, and of course Ridgland has recently settled cruelty charges by agreeing to go out of the breeding business, which is great news. And, Envigo had this, had to pay this huge fine. The biggest one, Marshall Bio Resources, we're in Rochester, New York, and it is right down the road, which is very disturbing. So what do you think the impact of these developments will be on the continued use, specifically on beagles? I, guess even more so on dogs, um, in general.

'Cause it's doubtful they'll just switch to another, uh, another breed. Um, and maybe even, even more broadly, animals in general. Do you think these are, these are big, big developments.

Melanie Kaplan: I, I think they're huge. And you know, I was just a few months into reporting when the PETA undercover investigation at Envigo came out. And so this whole thing unfolded as I was reporting, and it was really, it was quite amazing. Um, in fact, I, I took a, I was an animal law fellow at Vermont Law School and Delci Winders taught this two week class.

And one of our guest speakers was Mary Hollingsworth, who argued the Envigo case for DOJ. And so she, you know, spoke to our class virtually and she couldn't say anything about it, but I was just, it was amazing to hear from her. And one thing that stuck with me, because this was so early in my reporting, I didn't have a contract, I didn't have an agent. She said many of her DOJ colleagues didn't know that dogs were used for research. I'm like, Oh my God, if they don't know, like I am, I'm on the right path. I gotta just keep moving forward.

Mariann Sullivan: Yeah. Seriously.

Melanie Kaplan: Um, yeah, so I, I got to see the, the whole arc of Envigo close and then Hammy and I visited the facility on the last day that the, um, or visited just outside the last day that the beagles left.

Um, I think it's huge. And I was talking to somebody recently who said that the other breeders did not start breeding more because Envigo closed. And I know there was concern about that. It's like, oh, one will close and they're gonna be bred somewhere else.

Mariann Sullivan: Great news for Marshall, right?

Melanie Kaplan: Yeah, exactly. So, um, and then I was about to drive up to the Ridgeland trial in Madison and, and that was called off at the 11th hour.

So I reported as much as I could. And then, you know, as you said, this year the, um, animal cruelty charges were, were dropped in exchange for closing the breeding operation, which is very exciting. So, you know, I think this definitely will impact people who and labs who buy these dogs. I mean, they will either have to switch to what they might call a lesser animal.

Um, you know, maybe they start doing more mice or rat experiments, or they're like, well, maybe this is a good time to see what we can do that's not an alive animal. So I don't know exactly how that's gonna play out. But, um, I do think that these breeders, it's, you know, when you've got thousands or tens of thousands of beagles, stuff's gonna go wrong.

I mean, they're understaffed. These, you know, it's, it's just an industrial facility. It's a farm. And, none of that

Mariann Sullivan: A factory farm. Factory farm for dogs.

Melanie Kaplan: Yeah. Yeah, it's awful.

Mariann Sullivan: So could you come up here and like, get Marshall closed down? Because it really haunts me that it's right, uh, down the road and they're called Marshall Bio Resources. I just wanna make clear the bio resource is dogs. They call their dogs bio resources, that's what they think of them.

Melanie Kaplan: Yeah, hammy and I drove, we drove by there. We drove up to the security gate

Mariann Sullivan: Yeah. That story is in your, that story is actually very funny.

Jasmin Singer: Tell us about the story, if you don't mind.

Melanie Kaplan: Yeah, so we, well, we went to stay with a friend, um, another beagle who was in his group whose named James Madison. Um, her name, her name is Maddie, was Maddie. And we stayed nearby and I just, I knew I had to drive by Marshall. I mean, it's just like the others. It's on a country road, it's hidden by trees.

You would never know it's back there. You don't hear the dogs barking. But I'm like, we're driving by. Um, and, and yeah, I drive up to the security gate having no idea what I'm gonna say because I'm used to writing travel stories and everybody wants to talk to a travel writer. And, um, and of course they didn't wanna talk to me.

And then I see cameras everywhere and the guy's on a walkie-talkie and, um, yeah, I end up, you know, turning around, but I just felt like I had to be there. You know, there's 20,000 dogs beyond that, that gate and, um,

Mariann Sullivan: All of whom are doomed to

Melanie Kaplan: Yeah.

Mariann Sullivan: pretty horrible lives.

Melanie Kaplan: And so few will get out into homes like Hammy did.

Jasmin Singer: Tell us about the current status of adoptions of lab animals. How many get out?

Melanie Kaplan: You know, that's one of the problems with the state laws. So I think it's 16 or 17 states have now passed laws saying the dogs, and sometimes cats, have to be adopted out after the research is done. But, um, in passing these bills, a lot of states have wanted to have something about the re the recording of numbers and, you know, how many dogs to begin with, how many dogs are euthanized, how many are adopted out, and then what's the, what's the bar for adopting a dog out?

I mean, who gets to decide if they're adoptable? Well, that's the lab. You know, it's all decided internally. We don't know what those numbers are, and so there's no way to track it. The only time I ever heard a number is when Johns Hopkins was, somebody from there was speaking in a hearing in Maryland for a bill, and they said 6% of their dogs had been adopted out over a several year period, I think.

Um, and so that means, you know, the, the 94% were euthanized and you know, so if that's across the board, if that's standard, that's a very small percentage.

Mariann Sullivan: Yeah. it really reminds me of the old days, which is, this is probably true in many places still, but when, when, like city shelters used to decide who was adoptable and who wasn't and who, who they could kill. And, and, you know, their adoption rates looked great because they were adopting out a hundred percent of their quote unquote adoptable animals because they were the ones who were deciding that they were or weren't adoptable.

It sounds very similar. Uh, and that's even in states where they actually do require that if they're adoptable, they would be adopted out. I didn't know even know that was the requirement in some states 'cause in some states it's, it's just optional. They can, but they don't have to. Do you worry at all that, that the existence of these programs, um, can create this idea in people's minds that, you know, okay, they go through two bad years, but then they all get adopted out and don't realize that most of the vast majority of them don't?

Melanie Kaplan: Yeah. Yeah. Well, I mean, that's why they have to read the book because it's just such a small part

Mariann Sullivan: Yeah.

Melanie Kaplan: part of the picture. And, you know, I think that some of these institutions have been doing it for much longer. Um, before there were state laws, but you know, they adopted out to friends and family, students, instructors.

They, they tried to kind of keep it internal because again, they don't want this getting out. They don't want friends and neighbors and donors necessarily knowing we experiment on dogs at this university, which so many of them still do. So, you know, they've, they've tried to keep it quiet.

Mariann Sullivan: Yeah.

Not surprising. I.

Jasmin Singer: Uh, so often the, the messaging about whether what we do to lab animals is, you know, quote unquote worth it revolves around science and, and non-scientists are always at a disadvantage in such conversations. So this is a, a question very much geared toward our listeners. What is your advice to animal activists in this situation?

Like, how do you have a conversation with a scientist who's like, well it's, you know, look at all, all of the things that come from this. Or not even just scientists, but like someone who just genuinely believes that and they're like, yeah, it, it's too bad, but this is,

Mariann Sullivan: absolutely necessary

Jasmin Singer: yeah, we have to.

Mariann Sullivan: And not, and not other methods.

Melanie Kaplan: Yeah, I think it's important to arm yourself with information, and I mean, like the statistic that nine out of 10 drugs fail. So you know, you need to be able to talk back to somebody like that and provide your own information about how it really hasn't been that helpful recently. I mean, sometimes I would talk to people in the animal research community and they'd say, you know, we wouldn't have insulin.

Well, insulin was discovered a hundred years ago, and Jessica Pierce is a bioethicist, and she said, You know, are you kidding me? Like, we would've figured it out another way if we didn't have dogs to f, you know, to discover insulin. So if we're putting resources into the right place, I think we will be making more progress without animals. just a question of are we gonna continue, know, this somewhat outdated way of researching, or are we going to, you know, switch gears? And, I don't think it's a question of like, do we believe in science or not? I mean, it's, it's better science to not use animals.

Mariann Sullivan: Yeah, I, you know, I always, um, have brought up a thought experiment when I've taught about this or thought about it and like, if, if humans had, like long ago come to believe that experimenting on animals was just wrong or that God wouldn't allow it or something, and we just decided not to do it 'cause we haven't been doing it for that long.

I, it seems to me that we would still have come up with cures and science and treatments for diseases and biological sciences and, and medicine. We wouldn't have just... I mean, we're humans. Like that's what we do. We wouldn't have just shrugged and said, oh, oh, okay, we'll just all die. Uh, 'cause we can't figure anything out without using animals.

I it

Melanie Kaplan: Right.

No, that's a great experiment.

Mariann Sullivan: Yeah. Another, another thing where I don't really have a question, but, uh, I do think that, um, one thing that I also thought about that if we had done that, I think medicine might be better. What do you think? We might... an awful lot we do in medicine that's really stupid.

Melanie Kaplan: Yeah. I mean that's, that's so interesting to think about. I, yeah. I would love if that were true. Um, yeah. There's so many things that, that we've, that we have made progress with on animals. But you know, it's like where we are today. We are, we are creating an environment that makes us sick. We've got all these chemicals, we've got the forever chemicals and the microplastics.

Um, you know, a lot of people don't take care of themselves. And then we need more medical care. We need more medical devices. And then, you know, every bit of those drugs is tested on dogs. Um, the pesticides like made me crazy 'cause those have to be tested on dogs still. I mean, every pesticide goes through a 90 day dog test. We're putting

Mariann Sullivan: That's insane. I did not know that. That's insane.

Melanie Kaplan: Yeah. So every, you know, the crops, unless it's organic, the crops all are treated with pesticides and we're consuming those and, and those are making us sick. And then we need to go to the doctor. And so it's like, wow, let's just pull back from that and take care of ourselves.

You know, imagine a world that we didn't need as much medical care.

I mean, of course some people really rely on that, right? But, um, yeah, I, I think that

Mariann Sullivan: It's like we could do so much to improve people's health that we don't bother doing, but when it comes to researching on animals, oh, absolutely necessary.

Melanie Kaplan: yeah, yeah. It makes me sad.

Jasmin Singer: I have just one final question for you before we go to our bonus content. What message do you hope that readers take away from Lab Dog?

Melanie Kaplan: I hope that it becomes part of the discussion. I hope that this, the discussion happens, you know, people who are consumers and voters, I would like for them to understand more about this. And then our lawmakers and legislators, I mean, a lot of them still don't know. So I think that I would want this to become just part of the conversation that we're having and be awesome if people were talking about it and learning from it and just making, making different choices.

Jasmin Singer: I love that.

Mariann Sullivan: I think it will because I think that, uh, that. It's a really good book. You're, I mean, you're a writer, you know, so often you're either an animal rights activist or you're a writer, and you're both, that's really hard to, uh, put together. And it's got an unbelievably beautiful dog on the cover. So like,

Melanie Kaplan: He's

Jasmin Singer: a hundred percent.

Mariann Sullivan: Look at him.

What a face.

Jasmin Singer: That a fun photo shoot?

Melanie Kaplan: So full disclosure, that is not Hammy, but

Jasmin Singer: Oh, okay.

Melanie Kaplan: he's still a handsome boy.

Mariann Sullivan: Still beautiful.

Melanie Kaplan: Yeah.

Jasmin Singer: That's okay. That's all right.

Melanie Kaplan: Hammy's on the inside though.

Jasmin Singer: Love it. Awesome. How can people find out more about your work and get a copy of your book?

Melanie Kaplan: So my website is MelanieDGKaplan.com and um, if you go there, there's links to buy the book right now. For the next couple weeks, my publisher's offering 20% off and the code's on my website. And then you can also read, um, I have a whole section on dogs and you can read my other writing about animals.

And, um, yeah, and anyone feel free to reach out. I always like hearing from people.

Jasmin Singer: Thank you so much for joining us today, Melanie, and congratulations on everything. It's just, it's so important that this is out there and we're so grateful that, that you are really leading the charge for this. And It's it's a beautiful, harrowing, important book. Uh, and and we're super grateful to you for sharing a bit of this today on Our Hen House.

Melanie Kaplan: Thank you. It's been really nice being here and I appreciate all the great questions.

Jasmin Singer: And for those of you listening, thank you so much for tuning in. Don't forget to subscribe on your favorite pod catcher or on YouTube. And on YouTube perhaps. And this is our big time of year for donating because, uh, we are a nonprofit and we do like 95% of our fundraising at the very end of the year. So if you are able to join us as a Flock member, you'll have access to bonus content such as what we're about to record with Melanie.

You can join us over at ourhenhouse.org/support. Talk to you next time. ​