We shared our work with EU agencies and member states in new European collaboration
CP-AAT will boost efforts to phase-out animal testing
We were part of the launch of the European Chemicals Agency’s (ECHA’s) new Collaboration Platform on Alternatives to Animal Testing (CP-AAT), at which we shared updates on our work to reduce animal testing.
CP-AAT is a new forum for regulators, EU agencies and experts from across Europe to collaborate. It is being hosted by the European Chemicals Agency (ECHA) in line with the European Commission’s Roadmap towards phasing out animal testing for chemical safety assessments, which was published on 1 June.
Together with ECHA, the agencies taking part were the European Medicines Agency (EMA) and the European Food Standards Agency (EFSA). This cross-agency collaboration, as well as the involvement of regulatory authorities from individual European member states, will help the sharing of knowledge and best practice in adopting non-animal testing methods and eliminating animal tests.
We gave a presentation on our Replace Animal Tests (RAT) List, which identifies animal tests that are still conducted despite there being reliable non-animal replacements available, and our recent collaboration with the OECD to create their new online Test Guidelines Explorer. As well as having the potential to help reduce animal testing today, these two tools could also help to direct new efforts in the transition away from the use of animals in regulatory toxicity tests.
Our Director of Science and Regulatory Affairs, Dr Emma Grange, said: “The EU’s new Roadmap promises to speed-up progress in the transition to non-animal approaches and the progressive phase-out of tests on animals. In line with that ambition, CP-AAT is a great way to foster collaboration between regulators, agencies and experts. We were happy to share our RAT List and the new OECD Test Methods Explorer as valuable tools for evaluating the current state-of-the-art of regulatory toxicity testing and for helping to direct efforts to move forward.
“The Roadmap can bring about the transformative change that European citizens want, but only if it is implemented effectively. Initiatives like CP-AAT are a good step in the right direction.”