“It is now becoming evident that the effects of EDC exposure are not necessarily limited to the exposed individual. Many of these compounds are now recognized to have transgenerational effects and in some cases the effects within subsequent generations are more profound than those seen in the first generation.”—Heather B. Patisaul and Heather B. Adewale, “Long-term effects of environmental endocrine disruptors on reproductive physiology and behavior,” Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience
Related Posts, Oscillations : (1) Americans at Risk: EPA Must Test Chemicals for Endocrine Disruption & Label Products; (2) U.S. Endocrine Disruptor Screening Program’s Yet-To-Be-Tested-Chemicals List; (3) ‘Evidence-Based Actions Policy’ Paper Addresses Endocrine-Disrupting Chemicals Catastrophe
It’s going to take Heather Patisaul’s kind of unfettered courage by Americans nationwide to snap EPA and FDA out of their comfort zone with industry and rein-in endocrine-disrupting chemicals (EDCs) poisoning the country. Patisaul, a neuroendocrinologist, accuses the EPA and FDA of cherry picking data, among other sins. She is one of the most respected voices on the hazards of EDCs, particularly with regard to understanding “sex-specific mechanisms by which chemical exposures affect brain development and behavior.”
Heather Patisaul is currently Associate Dean for Research at North Carolina State University’s College of Sciences as well as a professor of biology at NCSU.
In 2016, Patisaul chaired Gordon Research Council’s conference on EDCs, and in 2020, chaired the Endocrine Society’s advocacy and outreach committee.
Patisaul is author with Scott M. Belcher of the book, Endocrine Disruptors, Brain, and Behavior. She is also one of the authors of the Endocrine Society’s 2020 EDC Guide. Patisaul has published more than 100 scientific papers.
Heather Patisaul’s academic base in North Carolina and before that at Georgia’s Emory University (PhD) and the University of Florida (BS, zoology) have required some serious protection from the sun. As one fair-skin blonde to another, Patisaul told me she relies on a mineral (as opposed to chemical) sunscreen, which blocks UV rays. So it’s just nanoparticles entering the skin that you have to worry about, she joked. Our conversation follows.
Suzan Mazur: Does the US government essentially leave it up to industry to police itself regarding harmful chemicals, endocrine-disrupting and otherwise?
Heather Patisaul: Essentially, yes.
Suzan Mazur: Since the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has no mandate to test for or to label America’s food regarding toxic chemicals or endocrine-disrupting chemicals (EDCs), and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has not been testing and labeling products contaminated with EDCs either—can we assume that Americans are being poisoned because of government failure to regulate?
Heather Patisaul: Yes.
Suzan Mazur: Would you explain the EPA’s high-throughput approach to identifying EDCs in lieu of animal testing?
Heather Patisaul: Toxicology testing for regulatory purposes was originally whole animal testing. And there are still statutes and laws that require animal data so whole animal testing remains super important. As an endocrinologist I find these tests particularly valuable because in the endocrine system one organ influences another organ.
The ovary is a classic example. The ovary makes hormones like estrogens, which then circulate through the body, traveling to the uterus, mammary glands, and to lots of other organs. However, there’s been a push to move away from animal testing for ethical and other reasons. High-throughput testing strategies [relying on data] are being devised that are meant to be faster, safer, easier, and avoid using whole animals. But it’s a bit of a Wild West and not all of them work well.
That’s how the EPA has been spending its time on EDCs. It’s trying to develop some of these assays with a pretty high failure rate. Meanwhile, we’re not seeing EPA in any hurry to use the mountain of data already available in the literature to regulate EDCs.
Suzan Mazur: A lot of the data EPA would be using in its high-throughput approach would be coming from industry that created the chemicals. Is that right?
Heather Patisaul: That’s my worry. A lot of the assay development and a lot of the information and data is coming from industry. We call that “grey data.” Because the EPA can see it, but a scientist like me and the public—we can’t see it. We don’t know how it’s being evaluated. That’s true for some whole animal work as well.
From some of the data that’s come out through the Freedom of Information Act and other means, it’s clear that industry is really good at saying nothing is toxic. If you believe that, then industry has never produced a toxic chemical. Since we know that’s completely false, we have a big problem, where our regulatory system is heavily reliant on industry data and there is an obvious financial conflict of interest.
Suzan Mazur: What are the differences between the US & EU approaches to dealing with the EDC catastrophe?
Heather Patisaul: The biggest difference is that Europe—its program is called REACH—takes what’s called a hazard-based approach. That means: I have a chemical, chemical X and I’m going to test it for toxicity.
Suzan Mazur: Europe is testing animals?
Heather Patisaul: Yes, Europe is mostly doing animal testing but it is also pushing to develop non-animal tests. That’s good, we want a whole variety of tests. So for Europe, if a chemical turns out to be hazardous enough, the regulatory process starts.
In the US it’s different. Determining if a chemical is endocrine-disrupting or has a toxic effect is step 1. That’s called identifying the hazard. Step 2 is where EPA tries to determine what the public’s exposure is. OK, chemical X is toxic—how much are people exposed to chemical X? Step 3 is risk assessment. EPA says, OK chemical X is toxic, but public exposure to chemical X is low—so we’re not going to regulate it. The problem with that is, as soon as EPA makes that determination, the exposure level changes and it usually goes up and up quickly.
We’ve seen that with flame retardants. And we’ve definitely seen that with perfluorinated chemicals where exposure is so dynamic. We’re going to be stuck with those for literally centuries because they’re so persistent.
You may have low exposure to a chemical and then its use goes up. And two years later, there is really high public exposure to that chemical. That’s how in the US we can end up with higher exposures than in other countries to some chemicals—and really toxic chemicals that are still on the market.
