Non-animal testing for make-up becomes step closer

A UK laboratory aiming to do away with animal testing of chemical ingredients in cosmetics and household products has received a major boost from the European Union.

The £50,000 grant takes the XCellR8, based in Daresbury, Cheshire, a step closer to winning regulator approval for a new test that uses human cells donated by cosmetic surgery patients. Currently EU Reach (Registration, Evaluation, Authorisation and Restriction of Chemicals) regulations require environmental chemicals to be tested on animals if there is no valid alternative method of assessing their safety.

In certain circumstances this can include cosmetics ingredients – even though animal testing for cosmetics is generally prohibited by the EU Cosmetics Regulation.

XCellR8 is developing reliable laboratory tests for identifying the level of harm a cosmetic or personal care product might cause to humans without resorting to animals.

Carol Treasure, co-founder and managing director of XCellR8, said: “Our acute toxicity testing method is aimed at meeting both the safety demands of EU Reach regulations and the ethical demands of the EU Cosmetic Regulation. We are confident it can do this by using human skin cells that will give robust test results for human toxicity which are more accurate and reproducible than any animal test.”