dailypress.com (link not available)
by Alexander C. Hart of Tribune Washington Bureau

Washington — A program to test pesticides to make sure they do not affect human hormone systems will be compromised by an Office of Management and Budget order allowing data from studies by pesticide companies to susbstitute for new studies, according to some scientists involved in developing the new program.

Thirteen years ago Congress required the Environmental Protection Agency to screen pesticides for hormonal effects such as reproductive and developmental problems by 1999. Pesticides have been implicated in the appearance of male fish laying eggs in the Potomac River.

But the program to test the chemicals on animals such as tadpoles and rats is only now set to begin, and some scientists say it is already being rendered ineffective.

“What the OMB is asking the [EPA] to do is to accept all the old data from pesticide manufacturers defending the safety of their products,” said Theo Colborn, a scientist who served on panels that designed the testing program and selected the tests that compose it. “This looked like, to me, a very desperate attempt to cover up a decade or more of about 1000 studies and research on the effects of chemicals on the endocrine system,” which regulates many bodily functions.

The OMB, which oversees administration regulatory policies, told the EPA “to the greatest extent possible” accept existing data on the toxicity of the pesticides in lieu of conducting new tests on the 67 chemicals selected for investigation.

“I would view it as a smart, good government way of not making people do costly and duplicative tests,” said a senior OMB official, who noted that the tests can cost up to a million dollars.

But this instruction angered some environmental scientists, who contend the submission of previously conducted tests would allow the pesticide makers to selectively submit industry-financed and outdated studies that show the pesticides are safe. The pesticides should undergo the new battery of tests, they say.

“OMB is telling three federal advisory committees and dozens of scientists that they don’t know what they’re talking about,” said Peter deFur, an environmental scientist who sat on the three panels that selected the tests and designed the program. “It’s either hubris or ignorance.”

But the OMB defended its directive, noting that the EPA’s program already contained provisions allowing pesticide companies to submit existing data.

OMB spokesman Tom Gavin said. “A lot of the concerns were expressed from a lack of understanding about process and from a lack of understanding about the intricacies of the federal government.”

“Where data didn’t exist or wasn’t applicable, we’ve given the agency the full authority it needs to get the information,” Gavin said.

Industry officials cheered the OMB decision. “I am particularly gratified that EPA will allow citation of existing data in response to test orders,” said Jay Vroom, president of the pesticide trade group CropLife America, in a statement. “These positive measures will greatly facilitate the testing process.”

For deFur and Colborn, however, the OMB directive is a capitulation to industry groups. Pesticide makers “have done everything they could to make sure that EPA wasn’t going to put this program in place,” deFur said. But it is common practice for the EPA to look at existing data when making regulatory decisions, said a senior scientist involved in the creation of the testing program, who was granted anonymity to discuss interactions with pesticide companies.

“I get data. I look at it. If it’s junk, I tell them,” the scientist said, declaring that agency scientists can effectively separate good data from bad.

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