Comment:

Europe has almost 23% of the world’s new cancer cases despite making up
only 6% of the world’s population.

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EU abandons promise to ban toxic chemicals in consumer products

Exclusive: Plan to outlaw all but the most vital of harmful chemicals is
not included in leaked policy proposals

Arthur Neslen in Brussels
Mon 16 Oct 2023 18.38 BST

The EU has abandoned a promise to ban all but the most vital of toxic
chemicals used in everyday consumer products, leaked documents show.

Other legislation to be dropped includes a ban on the export of outlawed
chemicals from Europe to the rest of the world, a ban on caged farming and
a sustainable food systems framework that the European Commission once
described as “a flagship” of its farm to fork strategy.

These proposals are all absent from a copy of the commission’s 2024 work
programme seen by the Guardian and due to be announced on Tuesday.

The blueprint maps out which proposals the commission will bring forward in
the last months before European parliament elections in June, which will be
followed by the formation of a new commission team.

A wind power package will still be launched next year, as will a process to
establish a 2040 climate target, and a climate adaptation package. But
there was no hiding the disappointment of environmentalists.

Tatiana Santos, the head of chemicals policy at the European Environmental
Bureau (EEB), a network of environmental citizens’ organisations, said that
by shelving the promised review of the EU’s Reach regulation that governs
chemicals, “the European Commission has betrayed European citizens, turning
a blind eye to chemical pollution and favoured toxic industry’s short-term
interests over those of its citizens. It is now clear that the profits of
the chemical industry are more important to this commission than the health
of Europeans. The European Green Deal will be remembered as the European
Toxic Deal.”

Europe has almost 23% of the world’s new cancer cases despite making up
only 6% of the world’s population, in part because of “chronic exposure to
some pharmaceuticals, pollutants and other occupational and environmental
carcinogens”, according to the European Environment Agency.

In 2020, the EU released a chemicals strategy that called for “banning the
most harmful chemicals in consumer products – allowing their use only where
essential”. It also committed the EU to “phasing out the use of per- and
polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) in the EU, unless their use is
essential.”

PFAS – also known as forever chemicals – accumulate in nature and in our
bodies where they can damage the endocrine, immune and reproductive
systems. The substances can take thousands of years or longer to degrade,
and their health costs are estimated at €52-84bn (£45-73bn) a year.

The planned ban would have taken thousands of the most hazardous products
off the market but it is now unclear whether the proposals will be
mothballed or buried

<https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/oct/16/eu-abandons-promise-ban-toxic-chemicals-consumer-products>

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