EU: Recommendations on phasing out of animal testing for chemical safety assessment

In a commentary published in “Frontiers. Policy Labs”, Love Hansell, J. Ritskes-Hotinga, I.J. Visseren-Hamakers, and Thomas Hartung, outline the key steps the EU should adopt in order to accelerate the transition to a world of chemical safety assessments without animal testing. This follows the commitment of the European Commission to a roadmap to phase out animal studies for chemical safety testing in the coming years. The key recommendations made by the members from an international, transdisciplinary consortium combining biomedical and social sciences backgrounds called SAFE (Safety Assessment through animal-Free Evolution) are aimed at accelerating the transition to animal free safety assessment in the EU and USA (SAFE 2024) and comprise 12 steps.