Kudos to the FDA and EPA for planning to phase out animal testing

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration said it plans to phase out animal testing in the development of monoclonal antibody therapies and other drugs with human-relevant methods. (Photo by Adam Gault/Getty Images)

As a board-certified family and lifestyle medicine physician in Salt Lake City, I laud both the Food and Drug Administration and the Environmental Protection Agency for separately announcing initiatives last week to start backing off of animal testing.

In a news release on April 10, the FDA said it plans to phase out animal testing in the development of monoclonal antibody therapies and other drugs with more effective, human-relevant methods. “The new approach,” the agency said, “is designed to improve drug safety and accelerate the evaluation process, while reducing animal experimentation, lowering research and development (R&D) costs, and ultimately, drug prices.” Separately, EPA spokeswoman Molly Vaseliou told the Washington Examiner in a statement on Thursday the EPA “is wholly committed to getting the agency back on track to eliminating animal testing.”

As a former NASA engineer turned physician, I have the highest regard for evidence-backed decision making. The move by these two federal agencies to minimize animal testing in favor of human-focused models makes perfect scientific sense and ultimately will benefit patients by getting new pharmaceuticals and therapies to the market sooner and in a more cost-effective manner.

Animal testing is outdated. It is tedious, expensive and oftentimes produces data that doesn’t translate to human health. Experimental methods that don’t use animals, like tissue chips and computational models, lead to the development of safer and more effective therapies and pharmaceuticals.

In addition to benefits to human health, human-centric research approaches save animal lives and prevent their suffering.

My perspective is not unique.

A recent survey shows the vast majority of Americans are in favor of phasing out animal experiments.

A September 2024 Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine/Morning Consult poll of more than 2,000 asked for agreement levels to the statement “The US government should commit to a plan to phase out experiments on animals.” Eighty percent of respondents agreed or strongly agreed. This represents a shift from a 2018 Pew Research Center study that found that 47% of Americans were in favor of using animals in scientific research labs and 52% opposed it.

In my lifestyle medicine practice, I work with patients to prevent and reverse chronic disease through diet, movement, and stress management. Often, my patients are able to come off of medications. But when pharmaceuticals are needed, I want to ensure they’re safe, effective, and fairly priced. To those points, the federal government’s recent moves to begin phasing out animal testing is a big step in the right direction.