In the Headlines: Is oncology ready to move away from animal testing?

NIH has announced it will stop issuing funding opportunities solely dedicated to animal models, but has not published any formal guidance related to the announcement, and researchers are unclear on when or whether further policy materials are to be expected. 

In this episode of The Cancer Letter Podcast, Paul Goldberg, publisher of The Cancer Letter, and Claire Marie Porter, reporter, talk about cancer policy, politics, and NIH’s new announcement on moving away from animal testing. 

The announcement, made by Acting NIH Deputy Director for Program Coordination, Planning, and Strategic Initiatives, Nicole Kleinstreuer, also said that all new NIH-funded project proposals must mention non-animal testing methods.

“From what I’ve heard, on and off record, from the sources that I’ve reached out to—is that we're nowhere near,” Claire said of moving away from animal testing.” Everyone wants to save animals, and have less animal testing, that would be great. There’s a lot of measures in place that are already focused on reducing those things.”  

The statement was made on July 7 at the very first joint meeting of NIH and FDA, an event called Workshop on Reducing Animal Testing, to discuss the prioritization of the replacement of animals in research and testing.

“But AI is not ready. Organs on a chip are not ready, from my understanding, to take the place of those animal models,” Claire said. “They can complement the animal models, but they cannot replace them.

“It's just interesting whether there has been really sufficient open discussion of this with the real scientists from the outside highest level,” Paul said.

Stories mentioned this week include: 

• The Directors: Mark Evers and Steven Libutti on riding out the tempest—and maintaining research momentum. As oncology braces for funding, Medicaid cuts, these two directors tell young investigators not to panic

• ODAC nixes GSK’s Blenrep myeloma regimens, citing ocular toxicity, dosing, applicability to U.S. population

• Jeff Sorenson: Imaging’s ride to the bottom in clinical trials—and why it matters now

• NIH says it’s moving away from animal-based models

• Trump threatens tariffs on Big Pharma by Aug. 1

• CMS publishes Medicare physician fee schedule proposal

• CMS proposes policy to move away from hospital-based care

• Enrollment begins in NCI’s Vanguard study focused on defining benefits of MCD tests

• Ohio State launches pancreatic cancer trial via telehealth

A transcript of this podcast is available: https://cancerletter.com/podcastc/20250723-animal-testing/