Farming News - MEPs to grill Commission over delays in tackling hormone-disrupting chemicals.

MEPs to grill Commission over delays in tackling hormone-disrupting chemicals.


Growing worries that endocrine disruptors can damage your health will be raised in MEPs’ questions to health Commissioner Vytenis Andriukaitis on Monday at 19.00. Scientists link these chemicals, present in many everyday products, to a rise in foetal and genital abnormalities, cancer and infertility. MEPs will ask the Commission to explain delays in delivering criteria for identifying and categorizing these chemicals, which they say it had a legal duty to do by December 2013.

In a resolution voted in March 2013, MEPs urged the EU to act to reduce exposure to these chemicals, which scientists link to a recent rise in cases of impaired sperm quality, early onset of puberty, certain cancers and other disorders.

The Council of Ministers decided last month to back Sweden in taking the European Commission to the Court of Justice for failure to act over the chemicals, found in products ranging from pesticides to toys, medical devices and cosmetics.

Data from New York University presented at the annual meeting of the Endocrinology Society last week and reported by the BBC suggested that the chemicals could be costing more than €150bn a year in damage to human health in Europe.