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SETAC Pellston WorkshopTM: Environmental hazard and risk assessment approaches for endocrine-active chemicals (EHRA)
Citation:
Leopold, A., M. Roberts, G. Ankley, P. Guiney, H. Holbech, T. Iguchi, A. Kumar, L. Lagadic, P. Matthiessen, E. Mihaich, J. Odum, L. Ortego, L. Weltje, AND J. Wheeler. SETAC Pellston WorkshopTM: Environmental hazard and risk assessment approaches for endocrine-active chemicals (EHRA). SETAC North America, Orlando, FL, November 06 - 10, 2016.
Impact/Purpose:
not applicable
Description:
Suspected endocrine disrupting substances (EDS) are now being evaluated by several regulatory authorities. A debate is in progress about whether or not EDS can be adequately assessed by following the standard approach involving identification of intrinsic hazards, prediction of exposure and consequent calculation of risk or if hazard alone should be used to decide if chemical registration can be permitted. For this reason the SETAC-Pellston Workshop on Environmental Hazard and Risk Assessment Approaches for Endocrine Active Chemicals (EHRA) was held from the 31st of January to the 5th of Febuary, 2016. It had the following aims: 1) resolving the scientific disagreement about how best to assess the impact of endocrine active substances (EAS); developing guidance to assist regulators and policy makers in their decision making and thereby contribute to speeding up the global progress in controlling these chemicals; 3)identifying areas of uncertainty and knowledge gaps. The approach to the workshop was to identify cross-cutting issues that arose from the six case-studies that were performed ahead of the workshop. Cross-cutting issues emerging from the case-studies covered: improved hazard and risk assessment (Coadyet al, in review; Martyetal, in review); whether an EDS can confidently be subjected to environmental risk assessment or whether regulation by hazard is the most appropriate option (Parrottet al, in review); distinguishing between endocrine- versus non-endocrine-specific responses (Mihaichet al, in review). Key questions to be addressed to support endocrine disrupter environmental hazard and risk assessment include: environmental exposure; effects on relevant taxa and life-stages; delayed/multigenerational effects; dose-and concentration-reponse relationships. A proposed decision making scheme developed at the workshop will be presented and discussed. Main conclusions of the workshop will be presented as well as areas of future research.