True Grit: A Story of Perseverance Making Two Out of Three the First Non-Animal Testing Strategy (Adopted as OECD Guideline No. 497)

In the last two decades, great strides have been made in developing alternative methods to animal testing for regulatory and safety testing. In 2021, a breakthrough in regulatory testing was achieved in that the first test strategies employing non-animal test methods for skin sensitization have been accepted as OECD guideline 497, which falls under the mutual acceptance of data (MAD) by OECD member states. Achieving this goal was a story of hard work and perseverance of the many people involved. This review gives an overview of some of the many aspects and timelines this entailed-just from the perspective of one stakeholder. In the end, the true grit of all involved allowed us to achieve not only a way forward in using test strategies for skin sensitization, but also a new approach to address other complex toxicological effects without the use of animals in the future.

Automated summary

Significant progress has been made in the past two decades in developing alternative methods to animal testing for regulatory and safety testing. In 2021, a breakthrough in regulatory testing was achieved with the acceptance of non-animal test methods for skin sensitization as OECD guideline 497. This achievement required the hard work and perseverance of many individuals.