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April 2011: There is a great deal of controversy and argument around whether or not the way chemicals are assessed for safety in the EU is adequately responsive to evidence that they may be causing harm. Leaving to one side lobbying by commercial and public-interest organisations, here we look at whether or not scientific practice produces the data regulators feel they need in order to make decisions about restricting the use of chemicals – and if not, then what can be done about it. 

Decisions about which chemicals are safe rarely fail to attract controversy, with regulators under constant attack for either giving too much or too little credence to studies which suggest a chemical may be harmful. Dr Ruth Alcock of Lancaster University’s Environment Centre (UK) argues in a recent paper that one reason for this is that scientific research practices are poorly suited to the needs of regulators, leaving regulators unable to interpret new findings into the risk assessments on which EU chemicals regulation is based (Alcock et al. 2011).

Alcock cites the example of the flame-retardant deca-BDE as being no exception. Although deca-BDE is currently given the green light by EU safety assessment standards, Alcock reports polarised expert opinion about the safety of the substance, with toxicologists, regulators and chemists expressing attitudes about the risks it poses to health ranging from "obvious impacts *…+ on neurodevelopment" to "no direct evidence of harm at all".