Chemical Policy Reform!

As with many other public health concerns throughout the United States (and the rest of the world, for that matter), chemical policy reform takes place at extraordinarily slow rates. Rather than proactively testing chemicals before introducing them to the market and environment, regulations are implemented in a reactive manner. Sometimes, because of this, the harmful health effects of certain toxic chemicals manifest much sooner than we act, which can lead (and has led) to detrimental health impacts on the population and throughout the environment. 

Reform No. 4 of the Louisville Charter advocates for environmental scientists to act with foresight, which is something I've always believed many public health subdisciplines can be better at. Throughout the background paper, it's clear that chemists, environmental scientists, and public health practitioners should be proactively searching for potentially harmful toxic chemicals before using them for manufacturing, agriculture, or other purposes. The paper gives 2 specific situations in which the regulation of a chemical should be flagged as potentially harmful: credible evidence that a chemical can produce biological changes and the presence of potentially harmful chemicals in systems where it doesn't belong (like human bodies). Within the United States, our regulation of chemicals is relaxed; oftentimes this leads to a retroactive banning of a particular substance, rather than critically analyzing its potentially harmful effects before placing it into the hands of individuals.