The Israeli newspaper, Haaretz, has reported on the 2013 animal testing statistics, which were recently released by the Health Ministry’s Council for Experimentation of Animals.
The total numbers rose 6% to 299,144 animals, of which 86% were mice or rats. This total is still much lower than the peak of over 340,000 animals were used in 2007. Rodent use has increased since 2010, from 81% of the total up to 86%, with an increase in genetically modified rodents likely to be influencing this rise.
Non-rodent species have declined since 2010, with dogs and cats falling to 0, and primate use falling by almost a third, from 33 down to 25.
Most research, 80%, is conducted at universities and research institutes, while only 10% were carried out by biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies. Cosmetic testing is illegal in Israel, as is the sale and import of cosmetics and cleaning materials tested on animals.
Like the UK, and several other EU countries (e.g. Denmark, Germany, Switzerland), the Israeli Government publishes a breakdown, by species, of the number of animals involved in experiments every year. This proactive publication of the stats is a step in the right direction for openness in animal research.
On July 10th 2014 (Thursday), the UK Home Office will publish the 2013 statistics for animal research in England, Scotland and Wales (Northern Ireland publishes it statistics separately, though its numbers are very small by comparison). We will provide a detailed post on this on Thursday as we have in previous years.
Speaking of Research
Israeli data from:
2013 – Ido Efrati, Haaretz, Israeli science used 6% more animals in testing last year
2012 – Dan Even, Haaretz, Number of animal experiments up for first time since 2008
2011 – Dan Even, Haaretz, Only 3 percent of animals survive lab experiments
2010 – Ilan Lior, Haaretz, Study shows steady decline in use of animals for lab testing in Israel
Speaking of Research 
It is nice to see that the trend in Israel is in the right direction.
When will the USA also ban cosmetic testing like most of the developed world. Is there anybody on this forum that supports testing cosmetics on animals? If you’re in the USA, please support the Humane Cosmetics Act so that the USA can start catching up.
In the US, the FDA is responsible for assuring that cosmetics are safe and labeled properly, a process that is accomplished through the enforcement of the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (FD&C Act), This act does not specifically require the use of animals in testing cosmetics for safety nor are cosmetics required to obtain FDA premarket approval. It is the responsibility of the manufacturer to employ whatever testing is appropriate to ensure the safety of their products. Consumers deserve a reasonable expectation that the product they are using won’t cause them to go blind or burn their skin.
If a company chooses to use animals in their testing of new products or ingredients, then the FDA supports the adherence to all applicable regulations such as the Animal Welfare Act and the Public Health Policy of Humane Care and Use of Laboratory Animals. They also encourage the the search for alternative methods of testing before the use of animals.
It’s often easy to look to cosmetics as an example of where the use of animals is inhumane. People say, “Why should an animal have to die so you can look pretty.” To some degree that’s a fair question. But on the other hand, so long as people continue to insist on using cosmetics, is it better to know if the product is harmful before or after it’s used?
I’m not sure what you’re trying to say? Are you saying that without animal testing there can be no cosmetics? How are countries like Israel, France and all of the EU doing it?
But anyway, maybe it would actually be better for the people that are willing to do anything for their beauty to suffer instead of animals suffering for their vanity.
Now that the EU has banned not only the testing on animals for cosmetic purposes, but also the import of products which have been tested on animals, the argument for other countries continuing to do so seems to be increasingly weak.
I’m not sure what was so hard to understand. I was pointing out the process in the US in case you weren’t aware of it. I have no idea what the laws are regarding verification of safety for products in other countries. For the most part, cosmetics are not tested on animals in the US unless the company is using a new ingredient. If all they’re doing is remixing ingredients that have already been approved or that don’t need approval to begin with, then there’s no point to testing them again. Try to remember that animal testing is extremely expensive so if a company, whose ultimately looking at profits, doesn’t HAVE to spend the money testing its products, they won’t.
I’m not sure how countries such as those you listed can approve a product without knowing for sure it will cause harm to the users. But it’s not my circus, not my monkeys.