US chems criticise Senate vote to ban phthalates

01 August 2008 19:26  [Source: ICIS news]

WASHINGTON (ICIS news)--US chemical industry officials on Friday criticised final congressional approval of a ban on certain phthalates in children’s toys as lacking scientific basis, but they expressed hope that the prohibition may be lifted later.

 

The US Senate gave final approval in an 89-3 vote to an immediate ban on three types of phthalates and a temporary prohibition on three others for use in infant-care products.

 

The phthalates plasticiser bans were part of a bill to reform and expand the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC), the principal US watchdog agency for end-use consumer products.

 

The bill, The Consumer Product Safety Modernization Act, HR-4040, was approved by the House of Representatives earlier this week with an equally overwhelming vote of 424-1.

 

With both chambers having approved the measure with veto-proof margins, President George Bush is expected to sign the bill into law within days.

 

The bill permanently prohibits the sale of children’s toys or child care articles that contain more than 0.1% di-(2 ethylhexyl) phthalate (DEHP), dibutyl phthalate (DBP) or benzyl butyl phthalate (BBP). 

 

The sale of children’s toys or child care articles containing concentrations of more than 0.1% of diisononyl phthalate (DINP), diisodecyl phthalate (DIDP) or di-n-octyl phthalate (DnOP) will be prohibited on an interim basis.

 

Whether the temporary prohibition on those three phthalates will be made permanent will be decided after a two-year scientific review by a Chronic Hazard Advisory Panel (CHAP), established by the bill.

 

The American Chemistry Council (ACC) said that while it supported strengthening the CPSC, the phthalates ban had no scientific merit.

 

“Our children's health and safety is too important to rush through product restrictions without understanding their full consequences, and ACC believes that restricting phthalates from children's products, when they have been deemed safe for use in those products by the CPSC, will do nothing to protect children's health,” said council vice president Sharon Kneiss. 

“With over 50 years of research, phthalates are among the most thoroughly studied products in the world, and have been reviewed by multiple regulatory bodies in the US and Europe,” she said. 

 

Christopher Bryant, managing director for the council’s technology division, said the trade group is confident that scientific data will support a lifting of the interim ban on the second group of three phthalates when the advisory panel study is completed in two years.

 

Bryant said that even though the legislation does not provide any means for review of the immediate ban on the first group of three phthalates, the council will consider all options.

 

“We hope that when the CHAP study is completed - and we’re confident that that review will end the interim ban on the three phthalates - that the results will open the eyes of lawmakers and perhaps open a legislative avenue for a revision of the total ban,” he said.

 

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By: Joe Kamalick
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