While agreeing wholeheartedly with those emphasizing that sound, current science, with good peer review and critical oversight, should drive proposed regulation, the history
of standard-setting for perchlorate in drinking water is instructive of the practical challenges of finding Ôtruth' in regulatory science, and the importance of subjective factors in interpretation and modeling (e.g., weighting/selecting studies, choices of
exposure assumptions and uncertainty factors) that affect judgments about what is "safe" and associated regulatory risk management outcomes. The new emphasis on systematic review in regulatory chemical risk evaluation and associated decisional transparency
may help, if regulatory agencies are able to execute. A timeline tracing the evolution of thinking on perchlorate can be found at:
https://perchlorateinformationbureau.org/content/history
Best,
James G. Votaw
From: ACS Division of Chemical Health and Safety <DCHAS-L**At_Symbol_Here**PRINCETON.EDU>
On Behalf Of Margaret Rakas
Sent: Monday, May 20, 2019 5:39 PM
To: DCHAS-L**At_Symbol_Here**PRINCETON.EDU
Subject: [DCHAS-L] Evolution of chemical law and toxicology...
I have a colleague putting together a training presentation who is interested in "..the political and socio-economic policies that directly affect how companies release material information to consumers, how chemicals are regulated, and
how workers are affected-- during such and such administration, this chemical was designated safe where in previous years it wasn't...a timeline of where chemical law has been and where it has led us to now"
I am looking for a helpful website (or several) that gives an overview...as we know, you can spend months going through the history of modern chemical regulation (and push-back from interest groups..)...I am looking for something more condensed
and abbreviated. The EPA history page is a deep-dive into many topics; the OSHA history page stops in 2010 (yes, it's true it's supposed to be a 40-year history but the page linking to the timeline writes as if it's current, and besides, there's a lot of
non-chemical safety highlights...)...
Many thanks for any suggestions you can make-
Margaret
--
Margaret A. Rakas, Ph.D.
Lab Safety & Compliance Director
Clark Science Center
413-585-3877 (p)
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