In 2001, Springborn Labs in partnership with Battelle were awarded a 5 year $34 million contract by the US EPA to develop and validate standards for the endocrine disruptor screening program (EDSP) - a program to evaluate the effects of industrial chemicals on the human endocrine (hormonal) system by examining the reproductive organs of animals for abnormalities. The EDSP has been denounced by international scientists as “blindly stupid” and “appalling toxicology” because it calls for force-feeding massive doses of pesticides and industrial chemicals to animals in an attempt to mimic the effects on humans of long term, low-level exposure to possible endocrine-disruptive chemicals. The EPA plans to test thousands of chemicals using as many as 1.2 million animals for every 1,000 chemicals tested.
Another concern with testing at Springborn is their description of tests they perform for their High Production Volume (HPV) chemical testing. In early October 1998, the US EPA announced the HPV Chemical Challenge program, calling for toxicity testing on 2,800 chemicals. The program will cost the lives of millions of animals who will be used and killed in the crude tests that are required. The Springborn website cites a list of toxicity test that they will perform. Many of these have been deleted from the HPV program because in vitro tests have been developed to replace them. One such test is their Acute Oral Toxicity test, a classic LD50 test in which toxic substances are administered to the animals until 50% die.

We brought this issue to PETA, who then began correspondence with Springborn. To date, Springborn has
not responded and their website now links you to Charles River, who purchased them last October.
However, they continue to do business as Springborn Labs.

What you can do concerning the EDSP testing

Contact your representatives and senators and ask them to conduct an oversight hearing on EDSP. Please contact EPA Administrator Christine T. Whitman, and ask the agency to:

1. Replace animal tests with non-animal tests
2. Ensure that no animal tests are conducted before chemicals undergo high throughput screening in vitro.
3. Use the validation procedure through the Interagency Coordinating Committee for the Validation of
Alternative Methods (ICCVAM) for both non-animal and animal tests.

Further information concerning both of these EPA programs can be found at:

www.stopanimaltests.com

http://www.pcrm.org/resch/anexp/index.html

Springborn Providing Beagles to OSU