MICHELLE: When we talk about cosmetics,
we're not just talking about make-up.
Cosmetics include everything from toothpaste to sunscreen
to bath bombs.
It's a big business.
Around the world,
it's believed we spend more than $380 billion a year
on products to make us look good.
But there's an ugly side to the beauty business -
animal testing.
Some people think that animal testing
is just putting make-up on the animals,
when it's actually a lot, like, crueller than that.
And they, um, test products on their eyes and their skin.
It all started around the 1950s.
Heaps of new stuff was hitting the market,
but there weren't a lot of rules to make sure the products were safe,
so some people got burned, scarred, or even worse
from trying out dodgy products.
It forced countries to bring in laws
to make cosmetic companies test the safety of their products
before they could be sold.
At the time, they decided that the easiest way to do this
was to test them on animals,
like rats, rabbits, dogs, cats and guinea pigs.
Researchers would put substances on the animals' skin
to look for blistering or scarring,
or in their eyes to test for redness.
But in the '80s, word got out about animal testing,
and over time, angry customers forced companies
to find other ways to test products.
Now there are heaps of alternatives,
like testing on donated tissue samples
or artificial skin and body parts,
or simply using ingredients that we already know are safe.
And there are even labels like these
to show that a product is cruelty-free.
But despite these alternatives,
animal testing is still legal in a lot of places around the world,
and people have a lot of opinions about it.
It's inhumane. Like, I don't think...
You wouldn't test on yourself, so why would you test on animals?
I've seen videos about animal testing and I'm like...
I'm not too happy about it 'cause they're getting hurt.
It's very unethical... Yeah.
..and it's really horrible to hear about
and it's bad that they don't really tell us about it.
In many countries, including Australia,
new medications and treatments
have to be tested on animals before humans
to make sure they're safe.
But when it comes to cosmetic testing,
the government here passed a law in 2019
to stop the practice.
There is an exception, though.
If an ingredient is used not just in cosmetics,
but on other stuff like household cleaning products,
it's still allowed to be tested on animals.
And on store shelves here in Australia,
you can still find heaps of products
that have been tested on animals overseas,
which can make it hard to spot and has a lot of people concerned.
It's a hot topic in the UK right now.
Cosmetic testing has been banned there since 1998,
but over the last few years,
the UK government has been giving out licences
which actually allow testing.
You see, in 2019,
the government changed its policy to match the rules in the EU,
where some ingredients are allowed to be tested on animals
to make sure they are safe for workers to handle.
Animal rights groups
and some big brands like The Body Shop
have criticised the move,
especially because news of it has only come out recently.
This reaction has kind of forced the government
to backpedal...a little bit.
It now says that no new licences will be given out to allow testing.
I think if I was aware that, like,
one of my favourite companies or something
was, like, animal testing, I wouldn't buy the product.
Yeah. Yeah.
It would kind of influence, like,
how many times I would use that product 'cause, "Oh, no,
"that animal could have, like, been harmed by that product."