Introduction to Endocrine Disrupting Chemicals: A Guide for Public Interest Organizations and Policy Makers
Author:
Andrea C. Gore, David Crews, Loretta L. Doan, Michele La Merrill, Heather Patisaul, and Ami Zota
Date Published:
12/2014
Description:
Over the last two decades there has been burgeoning scientific evidence based on field research in wildlife species, epidemiological data on humans, and laboratory research with cell cultures and animal models that provides insights into how EDCs cause biological changes, and how that may lead to disease. However, endocrinologists now believe that a shift away from traditional toxicity testing is needed. The prevailing dogma applied to chemical risk assessment is that “the dose makes the poison.” These testing protocols are based on the idea that there is always a simple, linear relationship between dose and toxicity, with higher doses being more toxic, and lower doses less toxic. This strategy is used to establish a dose below which a chemical is considered “safe,” and experiments are conducted to determine that threshold for safety. Traditional testing involves chemicals being tested one at a time on adult animals, and they are presumed safe if they did not result in cancer or death.
A paradigm shift away from this dogma is required in order to assess fully the impact of EDCs and to protect human health. Like natural hormones, EDCs exist in the body in combination due to prolonged or continual environmental exposures. Also like natural hormones, EDCs have effects at extremely low doses
(typically in the part-per-trillion to part-per-billion range) to regulate bodily functions. This concept is particularly important in considering that exposures start in the womb and continue throughout the life cycle. A new type of testing is needed in order to reflect that EDCs impact human health even at the low levels
encountered in everyday life.
Rather than the old toxicological method of a single-exposure, dose-response approach using pure compounds, it is vital that new risk assessment procedures simulate more closely what occurs in nature. Rather than pure compounds, we need to know the effects of combinations of compounds or mixtures. We also need to recognize that because certain life stages are particularly vulnerable to EDCs, especially early in development, testing EDC effects on adults, which is the norm in traditional risk assessment, may not extrapolate to the exposed fetus or infant.
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