Live Dissections on the Hopkins Campus

In Hopkins’ anatomy class, students learn about cardiac function through live frog dissections. Frogs are taken from a terrarium, dipped in tricaine (an anesthetic to numb them), then pithed by inserting a needle through the base of the skull to destroy the central nervous system. These steps ensure the frog cannot sense any external stimuli before the dissection begins. A preserved heart does not beat. A computer simulation of a frog does not pulse with the same irregular, living rhythm. In fact, after conducting a quick survey in a Hopkins ninth-grade biology classroom, 60% of students felt that dissection deepened their engagement with class material. 

By every scientific measure we trust, the frog cannot feel pain after that. For some students, that distinction matters. For the frog, probably less so. The frog isn't alive by any scientific definition, but it is still alive enough to make us question the ethics of this practice. The anatomy curriculum does not ignore this tension. Students spend several class periods leading up to the lab discussing the ethics of animal use and this procedure specifically. However, live animal dissections are no longer common in most high schools; most programs have retired the scalpel in favor of simulations and models.

Ripley Chance '26, a student in the class, described the lab as having "an emotional weight of ethical hang-ups." She noted how divided the room felt. "I'm going straight to hell," one student said. Another whispered, "Oh, the frog is pregnant, I feel so bad." But just a few feet away, someone else leaned in: "Whoa, its heart is actually beating — that's so cool," and simply, "This was such a cool experience."

A similar dynamic arose when I spoke to my cousin, who is in medical school. She agreed on the necessity of these dissections but refused to view them simply as a process. She said she cannot “thank them for their sacrifice,” because nothing about it feels voluntary. Every animal she has worked with resists with full strength. It struggles, it fights, in whatever way it can, to stay alive.

There is a strange paradox at the heart of this lab. Many of these students have pets. Some have rescued injured animals. They would never cause unnecessary harm to a living creature. Yet here they are, scalpel in hand, watching a frog's heart beat outside its chest. That tension is not hypocrisy, but proximity. The live dissection feels different from a dead one not because the frog suffers more, but because students are closer to the moment of death.

Most people eat burgers without thinking about the slaughterhouse. But put them in the slaughterhouse, and suddenly the burger sits differently. That does not make the burger eater a hypocrite — not because the animal died any differently, but because they watched. The anatomy lab removes that buffer. And that removal leaves students with a question most of us avoid: Is our respect for animals real, or does it only go as far as our discomfort allows?

As I write, I find myself unable to answer this question. But I do know this: Humans depend on animals in ways we will not abandon soon, whether in research, labs, or classrooms. And like most problems in this world, the issue is grey. Total acceptance or total rejection rarely brings meaningful change. So as long as this dependency on animals exists, so does our obligation. It is our responsibility to minimize their suffering — to ensure this, before their deaths, those animals lived with as little pain and as much care as we can manage.

They do not speak our language, but silence is never consent. This world does not belong only to those who can name their pain. The trouble is, we often do the opposite. These experimental animals are often treated with the bare minimum because they are seen as destined to die, and their quality of life becomes easier to ignore in that mindset. I am not urging you to walk away from these practices; I am calling for more deliberation — to be more honest about the standards we set, how we treat them, how we use them, how we dispose of them and what we are willing to call acceptable. 

So no, Tiana’s prince does not get his kiss. Instead, he gets a needle through the base of his skull, a scalpel to his chest and a group of teenagers trying to see his heartbeat on a tray. But hopefully, those students learned from his heart — not just the anatomy, but also the discomfort it forces us to confront.