The animal rights group PETA has honored Wendy Strgar of the Eugene-based feminine hygiene product company, Good Clean Love, with their Compassionate Business Award.
One of Good Clean Love’s personal lubricants became the first approved by the FDA without animal testing. Wendy Strgar says her original objection to using animal trails led to larger realizations about the FDA’s testing practices for these products, according to research done by PETA’s scientists.
“I didn’t want to do animal testing because you know I’ve always had pets,” says Strgar. “I just thought that’s ridiculous and then as it happens we were also doing a lot of scientific research simultaneously where we learned that animal testing actually give false positive results about safety.”
PETA’s research showed the FDA doesn’t collect important data on lubrication products’ osmolality, which is the concentration of particles in a solution. Hyperosmolar lubricants can make a woman 13 times more likely to contract illnesses like bacterial vaginosis. Tests for osmolality don’t work on animals but can be done using human skin tests, which require people to wear back patches for several weeks.