Non-animal alternative toxicity tests for detergents: genuine replacements or mere prescreens?

Non-animal toxicity tests and testing strategies for use in identifying the potential toxic hazard of chemicals and products, and in providing information for use in risk and safety assessment, are in the course of development, validation and evaluation. Possible replacement alternatives to the rabbit Draize eye irritancy test are discussed, and results obtained for two in-vitro tests developed by FRAME (the kenacid blue test and the neutral red release test), applied to 19 surfactants and 32 formulations, are discussed. It is concluded that there are now legal and moral requirements that relevant and reliable non-animal tests should be developed and accepted for use whenever possible.