Singer Leona Lewis has sent a Valentine’s card and letter to John Dalli, European Commissioner for Health and Consumer Policy, with a personal plea for him to help end the suffering of animals used in cosmetics testing.
Leona’s card, sent in support of Humane Society International's CrueltyFree2013 campaign, features a stunning photo of the ‘Hurt’ singer wearing an End Animal Testing body art message.
The European Union banned animal testing for cosmetics in 2009, yet ingredients can still be tested on animals in other countries and then sold in EU shops. A ban on selling these animal-tested cosmetics is due to come into force in 2013 and would act as a major financial incentive for cosmetic companies to kick their animal testing habit. However, Commissioner Dalli is now considering a proposal that would undermine the ban by giving cosmetics companies a loophole to continue profiting from animal suffering.
“Like most girls, I love make-up, but my ethical principles are also very important to me,” wrote Leona. “No new lipstick, eye-liner or other cosmetics ingredient can ever be worth the suffering and death of defenceless animals forced to endure painful toxicity tests. These gentle animals are killed by the hundreds in some tests, despite the fact that manufacturing products free of new animal testing is perfectly possible through the use of thousands of existing, safe ingredients. Animals have suffered enough – if their pain has been deemed immoral within the EU, it must also be immoral outside the EU. To trade in their pain would be hypocrisy.”
In countries such as China, Brazil and the United States, animals such as rabbits, guinea pigs, mice and hamsters are still being force-fed cosmetic products and ingredients, or having them dripped into their eyes or on to their skin. In some cases, animals are chemically overdosed to the point of death, while in others chemicals are fed to pregnant mothers to see the effect on their unborn babies.
Leona Lewis, Ricky Gervais, Dame Judi Dench, Ke$ha, Melanie C, Mary McCartney, Sir Roger Moore, Virginia McKenna and Brigitte Bardot have all signed HSI’s CrueltyFree2013 on-line petition to save the 2013 sales ban. More than 140,000 EU citizens have also signed at hsi.org/crueltyfree2013.
