In light of today's global marketplace, a meaningful reduction in animal testing can only occur if different countries are prepared to recognize and accept the results of validated alternative methods. Otherwise, companies will be forced to perform different tests to satisfy different national requirements, which wastes not only time and money, but can actually increase the amount of animal testing that is done.
Through the efforts of European Centre for the Validation of Alternative Methods (ECVAM) and similar bodies throughout the European Union, Europe has become the unrivaled world leader in the development and acceptance of alternatives to animal testing. More than two dozen such methods have already been endorsed as scientifically valid, and a number of these have also been adopted into European Union testing regulations. Yet, to date, only five of these methods have been formally endorsed by the U.S. validation authority, the Interagency Coordinating Committee on the Validation of Alternative Methods (ICCVAM) and accepted by relevant U.S. federal agencies. Without a clear endorsement by ICCVAM, American regulators have been disinclined to accept alternative methods pioneered in the European Union.
As a consequence, companies on both sides of the Atlantic are increasingly being forced to double-test their products in order to market them internationally (e.g., because European Union law prohibits animal use when an alternative approach is reasonably or practicably available, while U.S. regulators remain skeptical of alternative methods, preferring to stick to familiar animal tests).
The Humane Society Legislative Fund and Humane Society International are providing political and scientific support for bilateral discussions aimed at improving transatlantic regulatory cooperation in a number of areas. In particular, we are lobbying the U.S. and European Union to sign a formal Mutual Recognition Agreement concerning alternative test methods in order to expedite international acceptance and use of these life-saving technologies and prevent duplicate testing.
