Guest guest Posted August 3, 2008 Report Share Posted August 3, 2008 European Citizens in Alternative Answers Our Environment is contaminated by many dangerous chemicals. They are in our rivers, countryside, cities and in the air. Persistent Organic Pollutants, the most dangerous, accumulate in the environment and our food and are believed to interfere with reproductive and immune systems, imitate hormones and cause cancer. 1st of June 2008 was an important day for the New European Chemical Testing Policy called REACH (Registration, Evaluation, Authorisation & restriction of CHemicals). In Helsinki, Finland, the European Chemicals Agency which manages the implementation of this legislation started the process of pre-registration of existing substances. Before 1981 in Europe chemicals were put on the market without being adequately safety tested. REACH aims to classify the toxicity of about 30,000 substances used in quantities of over 1 tonne a year but still depends significantly on animal testing. When you consider the technological advances that have been made in recent years and that many animal tests have remained unchanged for over 60 years this may not be good enough. As this will ultimately determine which chemicals will be allowed to be used in Europe and which will not this will make a profound difference to the number of hazardous chemicals in our environment. The European Commission has estimated that Reach will cost industry between 2.8bn and 5.2bn euros over 11 years. This will be an inefficient use of resources if reliance is on outdated animal testing instead of making the most of new technological advances. Many alternatives exist which are quicker, cheaper and more reliable than animal tests. However, for these to be trusted and validated takes investment and a commitment to make medical progress a priority. REACH must make sure that all chemicals are tested with the most accurate and trustworthy methods and new techniques must be developed if only animal testing is available. The criteria necessary to validate alternatives are strict and comprehensive. Validated alternatives are legally trusted as suitable replacements for animal tests. However, the European Commission's list of approved methods does not include non-animal techniques that were approved for scientific validity in 2007 by the European Centre for the Validation of Alternative Methods ( ECVAM ). This is a delay which has been criticised by the MEPs of the European parliament because it will encourage companies to avoid using validated human based alternatives and continue using animal tests instead. ECVAM does important work but if they are to achieve what we all want - a comprehensive system of scientific tests to accurately find and eliminate all toxic chemicals from the environment - their efforts must be supported and acknowledged. Concerned citizens can contact their MEPs and ask them to support at every opportunity the validation and approval of alternative methods for all future testing of chemicals. For more information visit http://www.europarl.europa.eu Thank You Tony Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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