Mar. 11, 2013 (TSR) – After 23 years of effort, a BAN on testing cosmetic products on animals comes into force in all 27-nation bloc of the European Union today making them the world’s largest cruelty-free market.
The EU ban will make it illegal, from 11 March 2013, all personal care products, from makeup, skin care products and other products, from high-end to drugstore brands, to market cosmetics within the European Union if the final product or any of its ingredients have been animal-tested anywhere in the world after 11 March 2013. Everything will now be subject to the rules. It is therefore prohibits the sale of newly animal-tested cosmetics and requires companies to use existing approved ingredients in their products.
Animal experiments carried out to test cosmetics or their ingredients have been outlawed in the EU since 2009. However, it was never enforced as companies have still been free to sell products with a history of animal testing conducted outside Europe. This is now forbidden under the new directive.
Cruelty-free cosmetics and ingredients are those which have not been subject to new animal testing after a specified date because they are already in safe use.
According to the European Coalition to End Animal Experiments (ECEAU), the credit of making this all happen was due to the work of Tonio Borg, the new European Commissioner for Health and Consumer Policy.
“The former European Commissioner in charge of the EU’s cosmetics regulations had been considering recommendations to delay or weaken the ban, allowing the cosmetics industry to continue testing cosmetic products and ingredients on animals until they could find alternative methods,” details the ECEAU, but it went through, thanks to Borg’s urging.
USA gives no protection to animals
The American Humane Society gives an excellent FAQ (Frequent Asked Questions) page on animal testing in the United States to give snapshot:
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skin and eye irritation tests where chemicals are rubbed onto the shaved skin or dripped into the eyes of restrained rabbits without any pain relief
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repeated force-feeding studies lasting weeks or months to look for signs of general illness or specific health hazards such as cancer or birth defects
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widely condemned “lethal dose” tests, in which animals are forced to swallow large amounts of a test chemical to determine the dose that causes death.