Objective To explore the effectiveness of the application of laboratory animal ethics education in general surgery laboratory course and to provide a reference for improving laboratory animal ethics education. Methods In October 2022, clinical medicine students in the 2019 class and clinical medicine students in the 2020 class of the Second Clinical College of Wuhan University were used as the subjects of the study, and students in the 2019 class had received laboratory animal ethics education as the experimental group, while students in the 2020 class had not received laboratory animal ethics education as the control group, and were evaluated through questionnaires.The data were analyzed using chi-square test, and a symposium was organized to further understand students′ views on laboratory animal ethics education. Results The results of the questionnaire survey showed that 94(95.9%) and 119(86.2%) of the 98 students in the experimental group and 138 students in the control group, respectively, thought that strengthening laboratory animal ethics education was conducive to the cultivation of good medical ethics, with a statistically significant difference (P=0.013), 42(42.9%) and 55(39.9%) students were aware of the relevant regulations on laboratory animals, 38(38.8%) and 44(31.9%) students were aware of laboratory animal welfare issues, and 73(74.5%) and 102(73.9%) students thought it was necessary for the school to offer courses related to laboratory animal ethics, with no statistically significant differences (all P>0.05). After the analysis of the symposium, students were basically satisfied with the laboratory animal ethics education. Conclusions The laboratory animal ethics education contributes to the development of ethical literacy of students, and the knowledge of students about ethics of laboratory animals and the construction of our laboratory animal ethics curriculum system need to be improved.