This page is part of our public exclusion list — a transparency tool that shows which companies we screen out and why. It is not investment advice, and it is not an accusation. But it is subject to change as our understanding of the facts evolves.
Novo Nordisk conducts animal testing as part of its pharmaceutical development and manufacturing processes. The company’s Laboratory Animal Science unit is responsible for animal welfare within its operations. In 2025, a U.S. Food and Drug Administration inspection resulted in a warning letter to Novo Nordisk citing serious violations. While the specific details of the violations are not public, FDA warning letters for pharmaceutical manufacturers typically address failures in quality control, adverse event reporting, and manufacturing standards, which can encompass animal testing protocols.
Novo Nordisk is a global pharmaceutical company whose core business of developing and manufacturing biologic medicines, including diabetes and obesity treatments, inherently requires animal testing for regulatory compliance. The company states that testing drug candidates in living animals is a prerequisite before they can be tested in humans, as authorities require data on efficacy, safety, and quality.
While Novo Nordisk has taken some steps to limit animal use, these apply to specific tests and not its fundamental research and development pipeline. In 2019, following public campaigning, the company banned the forced swim test for antidepressant research, a procedure criticized for poor predictive value. Earlier, in 2011, it committed to stop using living animals for routine quality testing of marketed medicine batches. However, the company’s ongoing drug development, particularly for novel biologic entities, remains dependent on animal models.
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A digest of changes to our exclusion list — new additions, removals, and the evidence behind them. We review the list continuously as new evidence surfaces.
Companies appear on our exclusion list based on our investment judgment — not because they've done anything illegal. This is a difference of values and opinion, not an accusation of wrongdoing. Exclusion does not constitute a recommendation against investing in any company, and absence from the list does not constitute a recommendation to invest.
This information is provided for educational and transparency purposes only and should not be relied upon as investment advice. Data is drawn from independent watchdogs, NGOs, government registries, and Ethical Capital's ongoing research — see Research Sources for the full list.
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