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Forty-five million different chemicals are commercially available around the world – and many of these chemicals go untested. Host Bruce Gellerman talks with Professor Patricia Hunt from Washington State University who wrote a letter in the journal Science, calling for more stringent review of chemicals. Her letter was co-signed by scientific societies representing 40,000 researchers and clinicians.

Transcript

GELLERMAN: It’s Living on Earth, I’m Bruce Gellerman. The American Chemical Society registers twelve thousand new substances every day. And according to their records, there are nearly 45 million different commercially available chemicals sold worldwide. But data on the potential hazards these chemicals pose is available for only a very small percentage.

That’s why Professor Patricia Hunt has sounded a call for swifter and sounder testing of chemicals. She’s a reproductive biologist at The Washington State University School of Molecular Biosciences and author of a letter that appears in the current issue of the journal Science. In it, Professor Hunt writes about the need for new ways to safeguard chemicals. The letter is signed by scientific organizations representing 40,000 researchers and clinicians. And Professor Hunt, welcome to Living on Earth.

HUNT: Thank you, it’s nice to be here.

GELLERMAN: Did I get that right – there are actually 12,000 new substances registered daily?

HUNT: Yeah, that’s correct. It doesn’t mean that all of those chemicals go into production and enter our lives. And what we’re really concerned about is those that act like hormones in our body. And, of course, the ones that are also of most concern are the ones that are high-volume chemicals, the ones that are produced and are in our lives on a daily basis.