Abstract
Scientists face growing pressure to move away from using traditional animal toxicity tests to determine whether manufactured chemicals are safe. Numerous ethical, scientific, business, and legislative incentives will help to drive this shift. However, a number of hurdles must be overcome in the coming years before non-animal methods are adopted into widespread practice, particularly from regulatory, scientific, and global perspectives. Several initiatives are nevertheless underway that promise to increase the confidence in newer alternative methods, which will support the move towards a future in which less data from animal tests is required in the assessment of chemical safety.
Highlights
It is over 50 years since Russell and Burch first introduced the concept of the 3Rs—the reduction, refinement, and replacement of the use of animals in research and testing [1]
One area that remains heavily reliant on animal models, is chemical safety assessment, in which toxicity tests are carried out to ascertain whether manufactured products pose a threat to the health of humans or the environment
There can sometimes be reluctance among regulators to embrace new technologies and approaches, and little flexibility in adapting to alternative methods, with more traditional methods being preferred and perceived as less “risky.”. Another factor precluding regulatory acceptance is the uncertainty around how to handle the data generated from alternative methods and how it should be interpreted—for example, data generated using ‘omics technologies can be very complex and require a high level of expertise to interpret them in the context of human risk assessment
Summary
Citation: Burden N, Sewell F, Chapman K (2015) Testing Chemical Safety: What Is Needed to Ensure the Widespread Application of Non-animal Approaches? PLoS Biol 13(5): e1002156. doi:10.1371/journal.pbio.1002156 Funding: The authors received no specific funding for this work. Competing Interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.
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