Progress! California Passes Law to Expand Use of Non-animal Alternatives in Testing Labs
Image by Robert Owen-Wahl from Pixabay
We are very pleased to be able to share the good news below from the Humane Society of the United States about progressive California legislation that supports the use of non-animal alternatives in research.
By Kitty Block and Sara Amundson
Fewer animals will suffer in experiments in California laboratories thanks to a bill sponsored by the Humane Society of the United States and signed into law by Governor Gavin Newsom on Sunday. AB 357 was authored by Assemblymember Brian Maienschein, D-San Diego, and received wide bipartisan support throughout the legislative process.
The new law builds on one passed in 2000 that requires laboratories that test products such as pesticides, household products and industrial chemicals to replace animal tests with non-animal alternatives.
By expanding the list of non-animal alternatives that laboratories are required to use, the new law ensures that more animal experiments will be replaced. But getting government regulators to formally accept non-animal methods and companies to use them is another essential piece of the puzzle. To ensure compliance and to better understand the true scope of animals used in experiments, the law includes a first of its kind mandate that laboratories submit an annual report to the state with the number and type of animals and alternatives they have used to test pesticides, food additives and chemicals.
