Congress to EPA: Flawed risk assessment must change

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is responsible for developing regulatory standards based on scientific assessments of a given chemical s toxicity. Now, however, longstanding industry and government criticism of this process has been bolstered by a study conducted by the National Academies National Research Council (NRC), and Congress has directed the EPA to improve their review process.

An integral part of these improvements will be the National Academies review of up to three of the EPA s toxicity assessments, which have been known to inaccurately pronounce chemicals dangerous. These chemical assessments are often quite controversial, inciting skepticism and disagreement from both industry and Capitol Hill. Most recently, the EPA s conclusion that formaldehyde causes leukemia was so heavily disputed that an NRC expert panel was called in to evaluate the assessment which they found to be flawed. EPA assessment of styrene and chromium 6 were discovered to be similarly inaccurate.

The public may see the effects of these new requirements relatively soon, as the budget language stipulates that the National Academies report should take no longer than 18 months. And, in fact, Congress has specified that the Academies must review the EPA s draft assessment of inorganic arsenic, which has been the focus of recent public concerns.

ACSH's Dr. Gilbert Ross was glad to hear the news. The EPA is frequently too quick to conduct perfunctory and superficial reviews of chemicals that they then incorrectly label as carcinogenic, he says. If the National Academies could take a supervisory role, it would benefit everyone, business and consumers alike. Noting that the Natural Resources Defense Council, an anti-chemical activist group, has criticized the new mandate, claiming it will be too slow and expensive, Dr. Ross observed, Better a few extra months to correctly evaluate a chemical s toxicity than the let s just ban everything approach favored by the NRDC and their acolytes.