Drugs in development no longer need to be tested on animals before they receive U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approval. Under a new law signed by President Joe Biden at the end of last year, the requirement that all drugs be tested on animals before moving on to human trials has been removed.
Senator Dr. from Kentucky, who paved the way for the law. “The FDA Modernization Act 2.0 will accelerate innovation and bring safer, more effective drugs to market faster by eliminating bureaucracy unsupported by current science,” Rand Paul said in a statement. It’s a step towards giving.”
However, this does not mean that testing new drugs on animals is prohibited. Instead, it means removing the requirement for pharmaceutical companies to test on animals. In other words, companies will be able to continue animal experiments.
The new law replaces the US Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act, passed in 1938, to oversee the safety of food, drugs, medical devices, and cosmetics. Prior to its revision, the FDA required that a drug be tested on a rodent species, such as a mouse or rat, and a non-rodent species, such as a monkey or dog, in order to receive approval.
“A mouse or rat doesn’t always process drugs and chemicals the same way as humans,” FDA chief scientist Namandjé Bumpus told Nature Index in November, adding: “To develop more systems based on human cells, human tissues, and human models, In some cases it may be more useful.”
It’s too early to tell whether the future of drug development will ban animal testing altogether. However, even in the current state of the law, it is certain that it is a welcome step, especially in the eyes of animal rights groups.
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