On Thursday 20th November CHEM Trust, along with other civil society organisations, delivered a letter for President Juncker to the European Commission’s headquarters building in Brussels. The letter asks the new President of the European Commission to take action to minimise our exposure to hormone (or endocrine) disrupting compounds.
The letter criticises the Commission’s current consultation on options for criteria for hormone disrupting chemicals, arguing that the consultation is biased towards identifying direct costs to industry, rather than the benefits of action to reduce exposures to hormone disrupting chemicals. These benefits include new business opportunities from innovating to use safer chemicals and benefits to public health and the environment from taking action.
The science around hormone disrupting chemicals has been strongly contested, particularly by the pesticides and chemical industries, who manufacture many of the affected substances. However, a number of substantial scientific reviews have examined the evidence, and a large number of scientists have backed the importance of action on hormone disrupters:
- The World Health Organisation (WHO) & United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) have published: a detailed 2012 report on the State of the Science of Endocrine Disrupting Chemicals; a Summary for Decision Makers (2013) is also available.
- The European Commission published a detailed State of the Art Assessment of Endocrine Disrupters.
- Two large groups of scientists have published joint letters in scientific journals about the importance of taking action on endocrine disrupting chemicals – one in Endocrinology, the other in Environmental Health.
- A large number of scientists have also signed the Berlaymont Declaration, calling for stronger EU regulation of endocrine disrupting chemicals.
