HSI Europe’s campaign to end animal testing combines political and grassroots advocacy, corporate outreach, and a strong science foundation to drive government institutions and corporations to become more accepting of new technologies and alternatives to animal use. The following are some of our current initiatives (click on links at bottom of page for more information):
Human Toxicology Project
HSI Europe is actively working to end animal testing—permanently. We are working on a global level to promote greater reliance on available non-animal testing methods, and are actively supporting the vision of “twenty-first century toxicology” articulated by the U.S. National Research Council, which would see animal tests that are decades old, costly, slow and of dubious relevance to people replaced by ultra-modern, efficient and human-relevant non-animal methods.
Revise EU Experiments Law to Replace Animal Use
More than 12 million animals suffer and die each year in research and testing laboratories across the European Union, yet many are denied even minimal protection under the EU’s 20-year-old law governing animal experiments. HSI Europe is campaigning for major improvements to the current law, including paying increased attention to the replacement of animal experiments with humane and more scientifically valid research methods.
Hop To It, Europe!
For more than 60 years, rabbits have suffered and died to test and label consumer products and chemicals for their irritating potential. But burned bunnies may soon be a thing of the past, thanks to lab-grown human skin, which can be used as a valid and complete replacement for skin irritation testing.
EU Test Methods Regulation
European law requires the use of alternatives to animal testing when available, yet a new EU regulation outlining recognised methods for product safety testing fails to include a number of scientifically proven animal replacement and reduction methods. HSI Europe is campaigning to ensure that all available, non-animal methods are accepted by EU regulators, and used by corporations, in lieu of cruel and obsolete animal poisoning tests.
Transatlantic Regulatory Co-operation
HSI Europe, together with the Humane Society Legislative Fund, is providing technical and political support for bilateral discussions between Europe and the United States aimed at achieving the mutual recognition of validated alternative test methods in order to expedite international acceptance and use of these life-saving technologies.
International Councils on Animal Protection in OECD and Pharmaceutical Programmes
The Humane Society is a founding member of ICAPO and ICAPPP—umbrella associations through which animal protection organisations interact with international chemical and pharmaceutical manufacturers and regulators to promote a truly global transition to alternative methods and testing strategies that replace, reduce or refine animal use.
Humane Cosmetics Standard
The Coalition for Consumer Information on Cosmetics is an international federation of animal protection organisations, including the Humane Society, whose goal is to urge cosmetics and household products manufacturers to sign on to our internationally recognised Corporate Standard of Compassion of Animals—a rigorous policy that ensures manufacturers and suppliers will not conduct or commission animal tests and will not use any ingredient or formulation that is tested on animals. Companies that sign the standard may portray the coalition's "leaping bunny" logo on all of their products as proof of their commitment to the manufacturing of truly "cruelty-free" products.
