Testsmart Project to Promote Faster, Cheaper, More Humane Lab Tests

The Environmental Defense Fund (EDF), Johns Hopkins University, the University of Pittsburgh, and Carnegie-Mellon University announced the launch of TestSmart, a project designed to find more efficient and humane methods of conducting preliminary toxicity screening tests on chemicals. The four institutions will explore new testing methods that minimize the use of laboratory animals and produce reliable results faster and for less money than in the past. The search for new testing methods will help to speed an initiative, announced last year, to gather basic information on the health and environmental effects of nearly 3,000 high-production volume industrial chemicals. The TestSmart project is funded by a $320,000 grant from the Vira I. Heinz Endowment.

Last October Vice President Al Gore announced a groundbreaking cooperative agreement among EDF, the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), and the Chemical Manufacturers Association (CMA) to test thousands of industrial chemicals that are used in the US in volumes of more than one million pounds each year. The agreement to test came after separate studies by EDF, EPA and CMA all concluded that basic health effects information is not publicly available for most major industrial chemicals. (More information on the high-production volume chemical testing initiative can be found online at: http://www.edf.org/pubs/NewsReleases/1998/Oct/b_cma.html.)

The high-production volume chemicals will be tested over the next five years using screening methods as defined through the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development’s international consensus process. Some of the test procedures now call for testing on laboratory rodents, fish and insects. The TestSmart project will explore alternative testing and evaluation techniques.

“The search for better testing methods comes at a time when industry, government, and the environmental community have sat down together and agreed we are operating in the dark when it comes to chemical safety,” said EDF senior toxicologist Ellen Silbergeld. “Getting basic test data is a key first step in giving the public what it is entitled to — assurance that chemicals in our economy are not causing unknown harms to our health and environment — and we want to see this testing done in the most efficient and most humane way possible.”

“Animal-based studies are used by virtually every regulatory agency in the world to set environmental standards designed to protect human health and the environment,” said Dr. Alan M. Goldberg, director of the Center for Alternatives to Animal Testing at Johns Hopkins University. “The HPV testing initiative offers an unprecedented opportunity to accomplish three important objectives: expand use of alternative techniques already known to be reliable; evaluate the reliability of additional emerging techniques; and identify areas where further targeted research is needed to develop new approaches. Although the use of laboratory rodents has long played a fundamental role in the science of toxicology ? and similarly in pharmacology ? emerging techniques appear to offer opportunities to significantly reduce use of animals while obtaining data that are of at least equal scientific value, and are cheaper and faster.”

“A key component of the initiative will involve use of Structure-Activity Relationship (SAR) analysis,” said Dr. Herbert Rosenkranz, Professor of Environmental and Occupational Health at the University of Pittsburgh’s Graduate School of Public Health. “Using SAR, it’s possible in appropriate circumstances to extrapolate from data on the health and environmental effects of classes of chemicals to structurally related agents that have not yet been tested. SAR is well established for certain endpoints, and we’ll be evaluating its application in a wider variety of contexts.”

“The project will also examine how to maximize the usefulness of the information provided by the testing program,” said Dr. Lester Lave, Professor of Engineering and Public Policy at Carnegie Mellon University. “By examining the predictive power of alternate protocols and their subsequent impact on society’s decisions, we will assess how to get the most valuable information within the prescribed time and at the least cost.”

In addition, the project team will help review proposals under the voluntary testing initiative to group similar chemicals into categories. Selected members of the categories would be tested and results interpolated to other members. While an important mechanism for enhancing the efficiency of testing and minimizing use of test animals, proper definition of scientifically robust categories is essential to the success of this approach.