ACSH
When the EU adopted the anti-science “precautionary principle” as its guiding paradigm a
decade or more ago, we don’t think anyone (except perhaps its anti-progress
advocates) had any idea how low the regulatory process would stoop in service
of its ideology. This misguided concept asserts that any process or substance
which has not been “proven safe” should be restricted or banned out of an
excess of precaution, until such time as such proof can be obtained. The fact
that “proving a negative” is impossible and unscientific is not taken into
account, nor is the fact that if the principle is stringently applied,
essentially all progress must come to a screeching halt.
The individual nations as well as the EU Parliament and its various bureaucratic
commissions seem to be competing to outdo one another on how far to kowtow to
superstition-based fears of chemicals, devices and technologies whipped into
frenzies by agenda-driven activist groups. The current target of concern is the
so-called “endocrine disruptor” group of chemicals, especially
phthalates (plasticizers, softeners of PVC plastics in consumer and medical
products). As we here at ACSH have often pointed out, the whole concept is
fraught with the conflation of pseudo-science and politics, as in the
worst-case scenario, these chemicals might impact the endocrine system of
certain rodents at extremely high exposure levels. No human health effects have
been documented, but fears of such has generated extreme anxiety among
regulators “over there.”…To Read More…
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