World Health Organization Shuts Out Industry Group From Policy Setting Deliberat

[Guest guest]

6 Feb 2006 14:23:44 -0000

Health Supreme Update: World Health Organization Shuts Out

Industry Group From Policy Setting Deliberations

sepp

 

 

 

http://www.newmediaexplorer.org/sepp/2006/02/06/world_health_organization_shuts_\

out_industry_group_from_policy_setting_deliberations.htm

 

 

 

 

--

 

 

Health Supreme Update: World Health Organization Shuts Out Industry

Group From Policy Setting Deliberations

 

2006.02.06 15:23:39

 

 

--

 

 

February 06, 2006

 

World Health Organization Shuts Out Industry Group From Policy Setting

Deliberations

 

 

In a recent meeting, the World Health Organization's Executive Board

decided that the International Life Sciences Institute (ILSI), an

association of food, chemical and pharmaceutical companies based in

Washington, DC, can no longer participate in WHO health standard

setting activities, according to ENS newswire.

 

Sugar is one example of pressure by Big Food groups to disregard

science and continue an industry-friendly but health-destroying

practice. The refined sweet stuff coming from sugar cane and beets,

both produced with government subsidies, causes problems for our

teeth, unbalances mineral content in the body and thus our mood (see:

Sugar Blues) and generally works to both shorten and 'sicken' our lives.

 

Indeed it was over a WHO report recommending to limit sugar

consumption, that the industry group was found to have been covertly

pushing the industry agenda, rather than scientific findings. My

earlier report on this is titled Sugar: FAO Scientific Consultation In

Doubt - Financed by Sugar Industry.

 

The Natural Resources Defense Council was instrumental in pressing the

issue. " At best, ILSI's participation in WHO's decisionmaking process

is a blatant conflict of interest, " said Dr. Jennifer Sass, the NRDC

scientist who organized the coalition effort. " At worst, its

participation has biased WHO policies and jeopardized public health in

dozens of countries. "

 

ILSI membership reads like a who's who in big industry including food,

chemical and agriculture, but see for yourself. Here is the report by

Environment News Service.

 

- - -

 

WHO Shuts Life Sciences Industry Group Out of Setting Health Standards

 

 

(original on Environment News Service)

February 2nd, 2006

 

GENEVA, Switzerland, February 2, 2006 (ENS) - The World Health

Organization (WHO) has barred a life sciences industry association

from participating in setting global standards protecting food and

water supplies because its members have a financial stake in the outcome.

 

At a meeting in Geneva that concluded Saturday, the UN health agency's

Executive Board decided that the International Life Sciences Institute

(ILSI), an association of food, chemical and pharmaceutical companies

based in Washington, DC, can no longer participate in WHO health

standard setting activities.

 

The WHO Executive Board took this action at the urging of a coalition

of environment, health and labor organizations. In late December, the

Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) and 17 other organizations,

including Physicians for Social Responsibility and the United

Steelworkers of America, sent a letter to the WHO Executive Board

requesting that it sever its ties to ILSI because the relationship

violates the health agency's own guidelines.

 

WHO requires that nongovernmental organizations working with the

agency " be free from concerns which are primarily of a commercial or

profit-making nature. " ILSI does not meet that standard.

 

" At best, ILSI's participation in WHO's decisionmaking process is a

blatant conflict of interest, " says Dr. Jennifer Sass, the NRDC

scientist who organized the coalition effort. " At worst, its

participation has biased WHO policies and jeopardized public health in

dozens of countries. "

 

The industry group still will remain one of the nearly 200

nongovernmental organizations the health agency considers to be

working partners.

 

ILSI represents several hundred corporations in the chemical,

processed food, agro-chemical, and pharmaceutical industries. Its

membership includes 3M Pharmaceuticals, Aginomoto, Atofina Chemicals,

Bayer CropScience, Coca-Cola, ConAgra, Dow Agrosciences/Dow Chemical,

DuPont, Eli Lilly, ExxonMobil, General Mills, Glaxo Smith Kline,

Heinz, Hershey Foods, Kellogg, Kraft, McDonald's, Merck & Co.,

Monsanto, Nestle, Novartis, Nutrasweet, PepsiCo, Pfizer, Proctor and

Gamble, Syngenta, and Unilever.

 

ILSI has branches in Argentina, Brazil, Chile, China, India, Japan,

Korea, Mexico, North Africa and the Gulf, South Africa, and Southeast

Asia. For a complete list, go to www.ilsi.org.

 

ILSI says its goal is " to further the understanding of scientific

issues relating to nutrition, food safety, toxicology, risk

assessment, and the environment by bringing together scientists from

academia, government, and industry. "

 

ILSI says it strives to provide " new knowledge " on the role of

nutrition in human health, alleviation of worldwide micronutrient

deficiency, the safety of food ingredients and additives, and

evaluation of water purification methodologies and standards.

 

But the NRDC says that over the years, ILSI has participated in WHO

activities despite its members' financial interest in the outcome.

 

ILSI funded a 1998 WHO-UN Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO)

report on carbohydrates and nutrition that concluded there was no

direct link between sugar consumption and obesity or any other

lifestyle disease, and suggested there be no upper limit for sugar in

the diet.

 

That conclusion contrasts with common sense, as well as with a 1990

WHO report that found that sugar contributes to the risk of chronic

disease and a 2003 WHO-FAO report recommending that people restrict

sugar consumption sugar to less than 10 percent of their food energy

intake.

 

ILSI also has tried to avoid stronger curbs on toxic pollutants by

" misrepresenting study results and sowing doubt about existing

science, " the NRDC says.

 

Between 1983 and 1998, ILSI, whose membership includes tobacco company

Altria's subsidiary Kraft Foods, repeatedly attempted to weaken WHO's

position on the dangers of secondhand smoke.

 

As documented by Derek Yach, a former senior WHO official, in the

November 2001 " American Journal of Public Health, " ILSI tried to raise

doubts about those risks by funding scientists who claimed there was

still uncertainty about the adverse health effects of secondhand smoke.

 

The relationship between ILSI and the tobacco industry is detailed in

a February 2001 report by the WHO Tobacco Free Initiative online at:

http://www.who.int/tobacco/media/en/ILSI.pdf.

 

In the United States, ILSI hosts workshops for industry, academic and

federal agency scientists that have been a tool for influencing health

and environmental policy decisions.

 

When the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) assessed a class

of chemicals that includes perfluorochemicals used by DuPont to make

Teflon, the EPA drafted its policy based on an ILSI review claiming

that although the chemicals caused cancer in test rodents, the way

they caused cancer was irrelevant to humans, so the class of chemicals

could be considered safe. The ILSI review said there was insufficient

evidence to determine how the chemicals cause liver tumors in rodents,

and the possibility that they could cause liver tumors in humans

" could not be ruled out. "

 

An independent scientific panel rejected EPA's draft policy because it

was not supported by the data. Late last year DuPont was hit with the

largest administrative fine in EPA history to settle charges that it

hid information for more than two decades showing that

perfluorochemicals used in the manufacture of its Teflon coated

products are a significant threat to human health. Lab animal tests

have linked the chemical with liver and testicular cancer, reduced

weight of newborns, and immune system suppression.

 

Last week, the EPA launched a program that encourages companies to

reduce perfluorooctanoic acid releases and its presence in products by

95 percent by no later than 2010 and to work toward eliminating these

sources of exposure five years after that but no later than 2015.

 

The letter NRDC sent to the WHO Executive Board in late December was

signed by the California Committee on Safety and Health; Campaign for

Tobacco Free Kids; Connecticut Coalition for Environmental Justice;

Environmental Health Fund; Environmental Working Group; Infant Feeding

Action Coalition Canada; Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy;

International Federation of Building and Woodworkers; International

Federation of Journalists; International Metalworkers' Federation;

IUF-International Union of Food, Agricultural, Hotel, Restaurant,

Catering, Tobacco and Allied Workers Association; Natural Resources

Defense Council; Pesticide Action Network North America ; Physicians

for Social Responsibility; The Breast Cancer Fund; Third World

Network; United Steelworkers of America; and Women's Environment and

Development Organization

 

 

 

posted by Sepp Hasslberger on Monday February 6 2006