EU roadmap for phasing out animal testing for chemical safety assessments: Recommendations from a multi-stakeholder...

The commitment to develop a roadmap for phasing out the use of animals for chemical safety assessments was part of the European Commission’s response to the European Citizens’ Initiative “Save Cruelty-Free Cosmetics – Commit to a Europe Without Animal Testing”. The roadmap aims to outline milestones and specific actions to be implemented in the short to long term to ultimately phase out animal testing for chemical safety assessments. To advance this goal and help define a structure of the roadmap, a multi-stakeholder roundtable workshop was organized by five animal protection non-governmental organizations in June 2024. The roundtable aimed to explore and define key elements and organizational structures for shaping the roadmap and identify pathways to facilitate the transition to a non-animal testing regulatory framework. Participants discussed a range of critical issues such as revising legislation and guidance, facilitating validation/qualification and regulatory acceptance, strengthening coordination, providing education and training in non-animal approaches, transparency and accessibility to data, establishing metrics to measure progress, and securing funding. The importance of a multi-faceted approach integrating scientific, regulatory, policy, ethical, societal, and practical dimensions was emphasized, along with the critical role of transdisciplinary collaboration and combining diverse knowledge, ideas, and technologies to achieve optimal outcomes. This report summarizes the main findings and discussion points and provides concrete recommendations. These are intended to facilitate the Commission’s work to develop the roadmap and may serve as a valuable resource for similar initiatives worldwide.