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As policymakers, scientists, NGOs and industry meet early December in Brussels to design the future scope and activities of the European Environment & Health Action Plan (formerly known as SCALE), one of its key instruments - human biomonitoring - is ready to be shaped up.
Human biomonitoring (HBM) is the measurement of natural and synthetic substances - or the products they break down into - in human tissue, e.g. blood, hair, urine. Over the years, it has shown potential to develop into an effective tool to assess human exposure and the potential health effects of environmental factors.
Working in close collaboration with 35 European partners, including government institutions, academia and NGOs through COPHES (the Consortium to Perform Human Biomonitoring on European Scale), Cefic hopes to contribute to the development of a coherent and harmonized approach to human biomonitoring in Europe. COPHES will exploit existing and upcoming HBM projects and work programmes, including LRI* projects, in Europe. It will also investigate what is needed to improve better comparability and use of HBM data across Europe.
As a collaborative partner in COPHES and involved from the outset to develop a coherent approach to human biomonitoring, Cefic brings LRI's expertise, experience and know-how to the table. The first LRI projects on human biomonitoring started in 2002, long before scare stories started to hit the media and more than a dozen such projects are still running today.
"Human biomonitoring raises issues that are not only personal and emotional, but also highly political. It is time to put more efforts to improve the knowledge about the health relevance of HBM measurement," Gernot Klotz, Head of Cefic Research & Innovation says. "Because health impact of environment is a cross-border issue, we need to bring together the scattered national activities on human biomonitoring into a European framework."
Being an active partner in both the EU and WHO Environment & Health processes, Cefic is constantly calling for validated, harmonised methodologies. A solid framework would also improve the workability, broad implementation and effectiveness of chemicals management.
Sitting at the table brings with it a certain level of responsibility. And obviously a European Week is not enough to make a difference. COPHES will run for three years and, as a first step to complement these activities, the LRI Innovative Science Award was launched recently and, for the second year, will tackle the issue of exposure.
Learn more on Cefic LRI Biomonitoring projects and the ongoing work through the International Council of Chemical Associations (ICCA)