Environmental Working Group (EWG): EPA Convenes Panel to Strip Safety Standards That Protect Kids From Cancer-Causing Chemicals
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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
April 4, 2008
11:19 AM
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CONTACT: Environmental Working Group (EWG)
EWG Public Affairs, (202) 667-6982
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EPA Convenes Panel to Strip Safety Standards That Protect
Kids From Cancer-Causing Chemicals
EPA's Advisory Panel Chaired by Scientist With Ties to Chemical Industry
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WASHINGTON, DC - April 4 - Three weeks after the launch of a major Congressional
investigation into conflicts of interest compromising EPA expert review
panels and the revelation that EPA, at the request of the chemical industry,
had fired a career public health professional as chair of an important
chemical safety review panel, EPA convened yet another panel with members
linked to polluting industries. The panel members are charged with reviewing
a controversial new EPA document that would weaken safety standards put in
place to protect children from carcinogens.
The panel is set to review a controversial new EPA proposal that would
weaken current health safeguards for carcinogens that were originally put in
place to protect children. Oil and chemical companies stand to save millions
if they can weaken EPA safeguards for carcinogens.
Since 2003 EPA guidance has required the agency to strengthen health
standards by a factor of up to 10 to protect children from chemicals that
are toxic to DNA, and are well established as compounds likely to cause
genetic mutations, a critical step in the evolution of cancer in an
individual. In their new, revised framework the agency has proposed to limit
dramatically the application of this additional children's protection to
only those cases in which studies are available to definitely prove that a
carcinogen to which a child is exposed causes cancer by mutating DNA. But
federal law for industrial chemicals, the 1976 Toxic Substances Control Act,
does not require that companies conduct such tests, or any studies to
establish if their products are safe or not. EPA's new proposal to consider
chemicals innocent until proven guilty is a giant disincentive for voluntary
testing.
To review their proposal, EPA has placed on its advisory panel scientists
with ties to companies that manufacture and use some of the same
cancer-causing chemicals that would be impacted by EPA's roll-back of the
agency's children's health protections.
³EPA's controversial reversal of a precautionary policy to protect
children's health deserves a rigorous review by independent experts,² said
Sonya Lunder, Senior Analyst with Environmental Working Group. ³Instead of
wheeling and dealing to justify removing safety factors that protect
children, the EPA review panel should be working to expand the scope of the
Cancer Guidelines to make sure that children are protected from all
carcinogens, regardless of how they cause cancer.²
The Agency's proposed rollback is not consistent with a large base of
science showing that chemicals that are toxic to DNA pose risks for
mutations and cancer, and is not consistent with policies in place at FDA
and internationally. EPA's Children's Health Protection Advisory Committee
recommends that EPA's guidelines be redrafted to state that standards will
be strengthened to protect children unless data are available to
definitively show that such protection is not merited. If EPA's draft
guidelines become policy, they could allow companies to use greater amounts
of carcinogens and could increase children's exposures to carcinogens.
EWG reviewed the professional background of the panelists and found 2
individuals with ties to industries that would benefit from weakened cancer
standards, including the panel chair.
Bette Meek (chair) is a member of the technical committee for the
industry-funded International Life Sciences Institute (ILSI) and sponsor of
an industry-funded effort to explore the biological significance of DNA
adductsthe key issue at hand in EPA's proposed change to their cancer
guidelines. ILSI's work on mutagens is sponsored by: AstraZeneca, Dow
Chemical, DuPont, ExxonMobil, Merck, Pfizer, Procter & Gamble,
Schering-Plough, Shell Chemicals and others who stand to benefit from a
relaxation of cancer standards.
In 2006 ILSI was restricted from developing risk standards at the WHO due to
industry influence. EWG demands that Meek fully disclose her role in ILSI's
work on mutagens, and that ILSI fully disclose the role of industry funding
in their development of mutagen guidelines. Publicly available information
suggest that the relationship between Meek and ILSI clearly makes her unfit
to chair this historic panel.
Jerry M Rice has previously served as a consultant for the American
Petroleum Institute on benzene, a potent mutagen. Rice is also a consultant
for the law firm of Goodell, DeVries, Leech & Dann that represents chemical
companies that manufacture mutagenic chemicals. Rice should fully and
publicly disclose his work for companies who could benefit from weaker
standards.
Both Meek and Rice have criticized public interest' scientists who hold a
more precautionary viewpoint about risk assessment for mutagens, all of whom
have been excluded from the panel. ³The EPA must make decisions and
implement policies without undue influence or pressure from the chemical
industry by removing panelists with conflicts of interest from all advisory
panels. Until this is done, the external peer review of EPA's decisions
cannot be considered a valid process,² added Lunder.
EWG is a nonprofit research organization based in Washington, DC that uses
the power of information to protect human health and the environment.
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