Cosmetics testing using animals

The use of animals to test cosmetics products or their ingredients has been banned in all 27 member states of the European Union.

However, within the EU it is still possible that consumers may be buying cosmetics products whose ingredients have been tested on animals elsewhere in the world. This is because a total ban on the sale of these products is not due to come into force until 2013.

But then that will be the end of the matter, right? Wrong - we are concerned that some companies are now lobbying to have this 'sales ban' postponed. We have been campaigning on this issue for many years and believe that any further delay is completely unacceptable - and we will be working to ensure it doesn’t happen. 

Background

• In 2003 an amendment was made to the EU Cosmetics Directive putting in place plans to ban the use of animals to test cosmetics or their ingredients within the European Union. 
• In 2004 the ban on using animals to test finished cosmetics products in the EU came into force.  
• In 2009 the ban on using animals to test ingredients for cosmetics in the EU came into force. 
• In addition, a ‘sales ban’ on products whose ingredients had been tested on animals elsewhere in the world came into effect. But this was not a total ban. It could be delayed until 2013 for three specific types of safety test (repeat-dose toxicity, reproductive toxicity and toxicokinetics) - which it was thought would take longer to replace.

Although disappointed that the original 2009 sales ban did not include all animal tests, we accepted that setting this deadline could act as encouragement to the cosmetics industry to develop alternative methods - which might also then be of use in replacing animals in other areas of chemicals testing, or medical research.

Warning signs of a further delay

As part of the original 2003 amendment to the Cosmetics Directive, a requirement was put in place for the European Commission to assess the progress made with developing and validating alternative test methods. In 2009, the Commission convened a number of expert working groups to assess the availability of replacement methods for the three areas concerned. The report from these groups, after public consultation, was finalised in May 2011 and concluded that alternatives would not be available in time for the 2013 sales ban.

In December 2010, the Commission began a targeted stakeholder consultation on the possible impact of maintaining or postponing the marketing ban. Eurogroup for Animals was invited to contribute to this and the RSPCA helped prepare its response, strongly supporting the enforcement of the 2013 ban regardless of the availability of alternative tests.

It is possible that over the coming months the Commission will draft a ‘legislative proposal’ which could recommend postponing the ban. This will then be put to the European Parliament and Council. If the 2013 deadline is extended still further then this will mean that animals may continue to be used outside the EU to test ingredients in products sold within the EU, and there will also no longer be any pressing need for companies to develop humane alternatives for the remaining animal tests.

What we believe

The RSPCA accepts that some animal tests have not yet been replaced with humane methods, but we believe that the sales ban should be implemented regardless. The testing and sales bans were introduced in response to overwhelming public opposition to the use of animals to test cosmetics.

There are already more than enough cosmetic products available and thousands of existing cosmetic ingredients are accepted as safe. It is simply not justifiable to develop new cosmetic products at the cost of animal suffering. We, along with Eurogroup for Animals, will lobby the European Parliament and member state governments to make sure that the 2013 ban stands.
 

If companies can’t make new cosmetics ingredients without causing animal suffering, they will just have to make do with the thousands of ingredients they already have available.

Dr Barry Phillips, Research Animals Department, RSPCA
 

How you can help

Write to Commissioner Dalli at the European Commission and ask him to maintain the 2013 ban on the sale of cosmetics containing ingredients tested on animals:

John DALLI
European Commissioner for Health and Consumer Policy
European Commission
B - 1049 Brussels, Belgium

or send an e-mail to: cab-dalli-webpage@ec.europa.eu 

More information

• See our press release from January 2011: More lab animals will suffer if EU cosmetics sales ban is postponed (2011) (PDF 65.3KB)  
• Read our report: The testing of cosmetics using animals (2011) (PDF 170KB)
• See the European Commission website