In an article published on October 2, 2014 in the French newspaper Le Monde, journalist Stéphane Foucart reports on three documents published by the monthly magazine Terra Eco. Among the documents is an email addressed to the Secretary General of the European Commission (EC), Catherine Day, in which the chemical company Bayer asks the EC to launch an impact assessment of the EDC criteria. According to the article, the email was followed by a letter from the EC Chief Scientific Advisor Anne Glover to the Secretary General and several Commissioners arguing that a number of experts in toxicology opposed an EDC specific regulation at the European level. In a letter written to Le Monde, Glover responded to the accusations that she had no role in delaying the process of establishing EDC criteria. The NGOs Greenpeace and Corporate Europe Observatory (CEO) argue on the other hand that Glover’s intervention short-circuited the regular scientific processes in the European Union. A confrontation of different experts in the office of Anne Glover in autumn 2013 further showed that the scientific controversy was in fact non-existent (previously reported on by the FPF). In the final document published by Terra Eco, Secretary General Day stresses that an impact assessment is necessary due to the divergence in opinions regarding EDCs. The letter was sent by Day on July 2, 2014 to the Directorate General (DG) SANCO and Environment. All the documents can be accessed on the webpage of Le Monde.
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Stephane Foucart (October 2, 2014). “Perturbateurs endocriniens : les raisons du retard européen.” Le Monde (in French).
