The US is abandoning a controversial animal test to assess
whether a chemical provokes allergies. The test requires large
numbers of guinea pigs to develop skin rashes. From now on,
regulatory agencies will require a less stressful test which
analyses lymph nodes from the ears of mice. Although the US
generally lags behind other nations in cutting down on tests
that cause animal suffering, the guinea pig test is still used
in Europe. To continue reading this article, subscribe to
receive access to all of newscientist.com, including 20 years of
archive content.