EU agency to test pesticides’ cumulative risk
The European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) will soon begin testing some pesticides for the cumulative risk they pose to health when combined with other pesticides.
On Friday, EFSA issued its method for assessing the cumulative risk of groups of pesticides with similar toxicity for specific organs or systems.
The first such groups for which EFSA has finalised its rules comprise pesticides toxic to the thyroid and central nervous systems. A similar approach will be “gradually introduced” for the regulation of other pesticides, it said.
The methodology has been devised to bring risk assessments in line with the maximum residue level rules set out in a 2005 regulation, a spokesman explained.
http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=OJ:L:2005:070:0001:0016:en:PDF
But development of the methodology is “still in the early stages, so for the time being this will be something applied by EFSA”, with member state authorities likely to start using it in the “long term”, he added.
Sixty-eight active substances were found to have specific effects on the nervous system, while 103 were found to affect the thyroid or thyroid hormone systems.
EFSA experts recommend that the methodology should continue to apply only to pesticides and not to other chemicals potentially present in food.
Campaign group PAN-Europe said the cumulative effects of pesticide residues should have been taken into account since 2005 when rules on residue levels were adopted, but EFSA did not have methodologies in place.
http://www.endseurope.com/24327/?referrer=bulletin&DCMP=EMC-ENDS-EUROPE-DAILY
The pesticides industry acknowledges that multiple residues can be present in food samples. But it argues it is sometimes necessary to use different pesticides because no single product is effective against all pests and diseases,
The possibility of cumulative effects of pesticides on people needs to be “thoroughly assessed, taking into account factors such as the level of residues in food, the amount of food actually eaten, and the existing safety benchmarks that are in place,” the European Crop Protection Association said.
The EFSA approach backs the grouping of pesticides according to their common adverse effects, rather than insisting on the groups having a common mode of action. This is because the mode of action is often unknown, the agency said.
Follow Up:
EFSA statement and scientific opinion
http://www.efsa.europa.eu/en/efsajournal/doc/3293.pdf
