I can't believe I'm actually about to complain about this – that the Trump administration is so profoundly shitty that they can make such a giant step for animal rights into something to be concerned over.
Each year, over 110 million animals are horrifically killed in the US alone for experimentation. It's very obvious there are classes of product where animal testing requirements are bogus. Animal testing bans for cosmestics are present in the EU, India, and elsewhere, and it should be banned here too as it's working out just fine there (although as this admin and this Congress strictly do not care about animal welfare, this won't happen in the next four years).
Of course we're talking about drugs here, not cosmetics, and a lack of experimentation can be seriously dangerous to human health. I don't for a single second trust this admin to replace animal testing with robust requirements that ensure the same level of dilligence is still carried out (which we do know is possible). Given this entire administration has shown itself to be a naked grift, and given we know that anything not a grift is motivated strictly by far-right, whackjob ideology (and neither RFK Jr. nor Trump give a fuck about animal welfare ideologically), the express reason this is being done is to make drug testing requirements more lax to the financial benefit of big pharma companies and to the detriment of everyone else in the US.
Now you could say "but hang on, human safety doesn't deserve to take precedent over the intentional, gruesome murder of millions of sentient animals; it's still good even if it's more dangerous to humans." And I agree that it's a complex dilemma. But here's the thing: this admin presumably isn't forever. There will come a time in the future where the public and the politicians are doing what they can to mop up Trump's steaming diarrhea. At this point, it's highly plausible that Trump's loosening of requirements for drug testing will have real, measurable negative ramifications and that there will be a reactionary push therefore to bring back animal testing stronger than ever. If we want animal testing gone, we need to make sure robust alternatives are in place, or its removal today will be seen for the foreseeable future as a cautionary tale anytime someone proposes the well-reasoned, well-intentioned removal of animal testing requirements.