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STATUS OF THE U.S. ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY'S ENCODRINE DISRUPTOR SCREENING PROGRAM
Citation:
Laws, S C. STATUS OF THE U.S. ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY'S ENCODRINE DISRUPTOR SCREENING PROGRAM. Presented at NC SETAC, (NCSU) Raleigh, NC, April 26, 2002.
Description:
Status of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's Endocrine Disruptor Screening Program. Susan Laws. Endocrinology Branch, Reproductive Toxicology Division, National Health and Environmental Effects Research Laboratory, ORD, U.S. EPA, RTP, NC.
In response to emerging concerns that environmental chemicals may have adverse effects on human health by altering the function of the endocrine system (http://www.who.int/pcs/), the Food Quality Protection Act mandated that the U.S. EPA develop and implement an endocrine disruptor screening program (EDSP). Working toward this goal, the U.S. EPA is currently implementing a proposed EDSP that is designed to detect chemicals that alter the estrogen, androgen, and thyroid systems in human, fish and wildlife (http://www.epa.gov/scipoly/oscpendo/index.htm). This program, based largely upon recommendations from the Endocrine Disruptor Screening and Testing Advisory Committee (EDSTAC), will allow for the initial sorting and prioritization of the 80,000 plus chemicals under the purview of the U.S. EPA, identify chemicals for further testing using a Tier I Screening Battery (TIS) that includes both in vitro and in vivo mammalian and ecotoxicological assays, and identify adverse effects and establish dose response relationships for hazard assessment using a Tier II Testing Battery. To date, the U.S. EPA has implemented the program on two fronts: (1) the development of the ED Priority Setting Database which will be used to establish priorities for screening compounds; and (2) the prevalidation and validation of the TIS and Tier II assays that are likely to be included in the final testing battery. In 2001, the U.S.EPA established The Endocrine Disruptor Methods Validation Subcommittee (EDMVS) that includes government and non-government scientists, along with ?stakeholder' representatives from various interest groups, to advise and review new and ongoing studies to support the assay pre-validation and validation processes. The Agency is working in close liaison with the Interagency Coordinating Committee for the Validation of Alternative Methods (ICCVAM; http://iccvam.niehs.nih.gov/methods/endocrine.htm ) and the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD, http://www1.oecd.org/ehs/endocrin.htm) who have agreed to assist with the validation of a number of the assays. Currently, the U.S. EPA anticipates that the final guidelines for priority setting and the validation of the TIS will be completed by 2003, Tier II validation by 2005, and issuing orders to begin screening of chemicals with high production volume by 2003. Finally, the EDSP will continue to move towards identifying assays for refining the ?first generation' screening and testing batteries that will incorporate additional computer technology and mechanistic in vitro assays.
This abstract does not reflect U.S. EPA policy.