Non-food legislation – September 2021

Hazardous substances – rules and regulations
FPF reports that the OECD has published a report (14.4 MB) that revises the terminology for PFAS. Albania: SGS reports that the Candidate List of SVHCs (in Albanian) has been published. The law will become effective on 13 April 2022. EU: The EC has commissioned a study to gather information for an impact assessment on updating REACH annexes to include data requirements on endocrine disruptors (EDCs). The input will help the EC understand the potential impacts of two proposed options for introducing standard information requirements for EDCs to REACH Annexes VII-X. The deadline for comments is 8 October 2021. Intertek has published a whitepaper on nanoparticles under REACH that you can download after filling in your details. The submission of the Annex XV restriction report on BPA by Germany has been postponed from 1 October 2021 to 8 April 2022. In July 2021, Germany, the Netherlands, Sweden, Denmark and Norway formally announced the intention to submit a restriction proposal for PFAS to ECHA. The stakeholder consultation has now been extended until 17 October 2021. ECHA has announced that the database of SVHCs in products SCIP is now accessible for everyone. With this launch ECHA aims to allow consumers to make more informed purchasing choices and help waste operators to further develop the re-use of articles and the recycling of materials. US: EPA has added 36 chemicals to the Safer Chemical Ingredients List SCIL. The Massachusetts Administrative Council of the Toxics Use Reduction Act (TURA)has voted unanimously to add the PFAS Not Otherwise Listed (PFAS NOL) category to the TURA list of Toxics or Hazardous Substances (119 kB).

Medicines
CD&V (in Dutch) is introducing a bill in Belgium to prescribe antibiotics, benzodiazepines and opioids per unit from now on. Due to the large packages, medicines are often left over and this increases the risk of excessive self-medication.
In a recent press release, ISMP calls for manufacturers to stop printing medication barcodes across round surfaces.

Tobacco – rules and regulations
Denmark has sent draft legislation to the EC proposing that a packet of cigarettes will in future contain exactly 20 items. From 1 October 2021, NVWA (in Dutch) will be checking (in Dutch) at Dutch sales outlets whether all cigarettes and rolling tobacco are sold in neutral packaging. Any old stock may no longer be sold. In a paper (1.08 MB) published in JAMA Network Open, UC San Diego researchers demonstrate that graphic warning labels are effective reminders of the negative health consequences of smoking.

Deadline to apply the UK Conformity Assessed (UKCA) marking postponed
The government has announced that the deadline to apply the UK Conformity Assessed (UKCA) marking will be extended by a year to 1 January 2023. The UKCA marking replaces the product safety labelling the UK previously used while a member of the EU, such as the CE mark.

Research
In July 2021, IPEN and Commonweal's Biomonitoring Resource Center hosted a webinar on how toxic chemicals in plastics are threatening human fertility and health.
Erasmus MC research suggests that exposure to phthalates may interfere with the thyroid system during pregnancy. An article (701 kB) about the research is published in Environment International. Nanjing University researchers have found that microplastics induce reproductive toxicity in male mice. A preprint about the research is under consideration at Particle and Fibre Toxicology.
 

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