PETA and Tobacco Companies Team Up

PETA International Science Consortium Ltd., Imperial Brands, Plc., Altria Client Services (ALCS), British American Tobacco (BAT), Plc., and Philip Morris International have all teamed up to donate equipment that will help replace the use of animals in respiratory testing with more human-relevant, non-animal test methods.

The equipment is manufactured by Germany-based Vitrocell Systems and is worth $110,000. The equipment was donated to the Institute for In Vitro Sciences (IIVS), a non-profit laboratory in Gaithersburg that carries out animal-free testing. It will be used in the IIVS in vitro respiratory laboratory, which helps companies asses the effects of tobacco, nicotine, and other aerosols on the human respiratory tract. The results of these test will help show regulatory agencies, including the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), that non-animal methods are accurate and effective and can be used instead of tests on animals.

“This latest donation takes us one step closer to replacing the use of animals in inhalation testing,” commented Dr. Amy Clippinger, president of the Science Consortium. “Testing chemicals on cells in a way that mimics real-life exposure will lead to more human-relevant results and spare animals’ lives.”
Tanvir Walele, head of scientific research and harm reduction at Imperial Brands, comments: “We are delighted to contribute to the IIVS, a leader in the advancement of alternatives to animal testing, whose principles are in alignment with our own established position on using in vitro assays – preferably using human-derived cells. We believe these assays are a more relevant replacement for in vivo animal testing.”

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