Chemicals: Innocent Until Proven Guilty?
Friday, June 4th, 2010
Which makes more sense: Making sure substances are safe before using them in products? Or waiting until people are getting sick from using a product, and then fighting endlessly through courts and regulatory agencies to keep the product on the market?
The United States uses the latter approach. But the European Union is preparing to switch over to the former one.
In 2007 the European Union inaugurated a new agency called the European Chemicals Agency (ECHA). Very basically, the purpose of this agency is to keep toxic chemicals out of consumer products and the environment.
Its provisions are still being phased in, but eventually ECHA will be registering almost all chemicals or other substances used in manufacturing in or imported into the European Union. If a manufacturer wants to use a new ingredient not in the registry and approved for use, the ingredient will have to be safety tested to ECHA’s satisfaction first.
No safety system is foolproof, of course, The history of manufacturing is full of stories about products that caused no problems on test subjects during the development phase, but which proved to be dangerous after being released to the public.
Unfortunately, it is too common for U.S. companies to fight to keep a product on the market even after it is causing apparent harm. This is especially true if the product is popular and bringing in big profits. The manufacturer wants to recoup money in research, development, production and marketing, and keep the stockholders happy, after all.
For example: Phenylpropanolamine (PPA) was an ingredient used for years in many over-the-counter decongestant products. Reports of hemorrhagic strokes among young women who had taken drugs containing PBA emerged in the 1970s. Instead of taking the drug off the market, however, a trade association representing manufacturers of PBA-containing drugs — including Bayer, Wyeth and GlaxoSmithKline — hired an army of lobbyists and lawers to fight the regulatory agencies. Not until November 2000 was the FDA able to get PBA off the shelves.
The FDA estimates that PBA caused between 200 and 500 strokes a year among people between the ages of 18 and 49. We saw a similar pattern with the popular drugs Vioxx and Fen-Phen.
Asbestos continued to be used in many products in the U.S., including auto parts, spackle, and spray-on insulation for years after comprehensive studies connected asbestos exposure to mesothelioma, a deadly lung cancer.
There is a new government report that strongly links exposure to chemicals released into the environment to cancer. The many products sold in the U.S. contain about 80,000 synthetic chemicals, and new ones are being introduced daily. Believe it or not, few of these chemicals have ever been evaluated independently to see if they are safe for people or the planet.
The 34-year-old Toxic Substances Control Act requires testing of a new substance only after someone can show it is dangerous. In other words, a new chemical is assumed to be safe until people can see that it isn’t. Essentially, the burden of proof that a substance is dangerous is placed on consumers and the environment.
Now Congress is considering a Safe Chemicals Act, which would require safety testing of all industrial chemicals. Spokespeople for manufacturers already are arguing that the act would cause more danger, because it would keep old, dangerous products on the market while newer and safer products are being tested. I kid you not; they are really saying that. Amazing.
June 15th, 2010 at 8:54 am
[...] to take steps to protect miners, for example. Pharmaceutical companies fought to keep products with phenylpropanolamine (PBS) on the market for years after PBS was known to cause strokes, because the products made [...]