Second Workshop on the Roadmap for phasing out animal testing in chemical safety assessments

Posted on: 01/11/2024

On the 25th of October 2024, the European Commission (EC) organised a second workshop in Brussels to discuss the roadmap to phase out animal testing for chemical safety assessment following the original workshop in December 2023. The workshop gathered more than 170 participants from the EC (DG SANTE, DG GROW, JRC), Universities, Industry associations, Contract Research Organisations (CROs), EU regulatory agencies (ECHA, EFSA and EMA), and Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs).

 

Aim of the Roadmap

The Roadmap was announced by the EC in response to the European Citizen’s Initiative (ECI) ‘Save cruelty-free cosmetics – Commit to a Europe without animal testing’. It will provide a guiding plan to accelerate the phasing out animal testing for chemical safety assessment and outline clear milestones and actions to reach this goal. For this, the roadmap aims at expanding and accelerating the development, validation and implementation of New Approach Methodologies (NAMs). The development of the roadmap is conducted by 3 working groups (Human health, Environmental Safety Assessment and Change Management) together with the EC partnerships and stakeholders (NGOs, academia, industry, EU agencies...). The workshop started with presentations from representatives of each working group who gave an update on their current activities and tasks.

 

Contributions from Stakeholders

After the presentations of the working groups, stakeholders provided their feedback to help the advancement of the roadmap and define its structure. First, Matthias Herzler (Bfr) provided an update on the progress of the ‘NGRA route’ conducted within the Partnership for the Assessment of Risks from Chemicals (PARC) project. Then, Julia Pochat (Eurogroup for animals) summarized the main elements provided during the multistakeholder roundtable organised in June 2024. Key elements included, amongst others, a better coordination of the roadmap via the implementation of a steering committee, improving collaboration and communication between stakeholders and the allocation of fundings. Next, Gavin Maxwell (Unilever) presented the initiatives of the European Partnership for alternatives to animal testing (EPAA), such as the EPAA NAM Designathon for systemic toxicity. His presentation was followed by an update on the ASPA framework aiming at developing a workflow for chemical safety assessment and a presentation of the VICT3R project on developing virtual control groups to reduce animal use in toxicology research.

 

Example of Transitional Initiatives

One of the examples of the transitional initiatives given during the workshop was the ‘three-basket approach’ proposed by the European Federation of Pharmaceutical Industries and Associations (EFPIA) to phase in NAMs in the pharmaceutical industry. This approach sorts animal tests in three categories. Basket 1 comprises all animal tests for which alternative methods already exist from a scientific perspective. Basket 2 includes animals tests for which there are no technologically mature or validated alternatives, but for which there are already concrete ideas and hypotheses that could be developed to replace them. Basket 3 concerns animal tests for which there is still no hypothesis how NAMs could replace them. Categorizing animal tests this way will help to have a better overview of the current situation and to prioritize the replacement and/or refinement of animal tests.

 

Conclusion

This second workshop was a very good opportunity to engage with different stakeholders in order to discuss the development and implementation of NAMs in the chemical legislation and explore synergies with other sectors facing similar challenges. The final roadmap is expected to be published in 2026. A third workshop will be organised in Helsinki in June 2025.

 

Sources:

Second Workshop on the Roadmap for phasing out animal testing in chemical safety assessments