Image by Cornell Frühauf from Pixabay

We have posted about recent changes in U.S. policy initiatives to replace animal testing with human-centric methods previously. Check out: U.S. National Institute of Health’s Initiative to Prioritize Human-Based Research: Canada Should Follow their Lead and also FDA Announces Plan to Phase Out Animal Testing Requirement for Monoclonal Antibodies and Other Drugs.

But we liked a recent summary about these developments put out by Citizens for Alternatives to Animal Research and Experimentation (Caare). We are posting their summary below along with a “read more” link to their newsletter that also highlights three new studies that demonstrate the kind of biomedical advances that can be made with alternatives to animal models.

If the U.S. can move in this modern, human-centric approach to research, Canada can also. Canada has allowed the recent shut-down, due to lack of funds, of the pioneering Canadian Centre for Alternatives to Animal Methods (CCAAM). We encourage you to write to the Prime Minister, the Minister of Health and to your MP, asking them to fund CCAAM and move in the progressive direction other countries like the U.S. are taking.

• Please contact The Office of the Prime Minister of Canada at: https://www.pm.gc.ca/en/connect/contact
• Please contact The Honourable Kamal Khera, Minister of Health at: hcminister.ministresc@hc-sc.gc.ca.
• Also write to your local Member of Parliament. You can look them up at: https://www.ourcommons.ca/members/en.

From Caare:

Last month, the ground shifted in the world of science. After 25 years of admission by scientists and government that animal testing fails more than 90% of the time, we finally saw that recognition turn into action.

Both the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the National Institutes of Health (NIH) announced major policy initiatives to start phasing out animal experiments in favor of human-centered methods for safety testing and biomedical research.

As part of the phase-out, the FDA will encourage companies to submit data from experiments using tools like AI and lab-grown human tissue models for new drug approvals. In the next 3-5 years, the FDA states they will “aim to make animal studies the exception rather than the norm for pre-clinical safety and toxicity testing.”

The NIH plan to reduce animal experiments includes the creation of the Office of Research Innovation, Validation, and Application (ORIVA), to help advance the widespread adoption of non-animal methods like organoids and AI.

On behalf of animals, thank you!