IHI project leads animal test to be dropped

The Innovative Health Initiative (IHI) - a European Union (EU) public-private partnership funding health research and innovation - has boasted that it has made a major step forward for animal welfare.

This relates to the tests that must be run by manufacturers before a new batch of medicines can be released for use to check that it is safe for patients, whether human or animal.

The tests required to assess the safety and quality of different types of medicines are set out in a reference work called the European Pharmacopoeia. For medicines administered by injection, such as vaccines, some antibiotics, and blood products, manufacturers have to test for pyrogens, contaminants which can trigger a fever.