European Scientific Committees to review Risk Assessment Approaches

Released on Thursday 7th January 2010

The European Commission Scientific Committee on Health and Environmental Risks has received a ‘Request for an opinion on possible improvements in risk assessment approaches in view of risk management needs and effective risk communication’.

Following a preliminary discussion and proposal formulation, it was decided to establish a joint working group a of the three Committees (SCCS, SCHER & SCENIHR), in order to proceed to a ‘review of risk assessment in view of better adaptation to risk management needs and more effective communication of risk-related issues’.

The main issues to be addressed in the review are concerned with the practicability of risk assessment approaches and the usability of risk assessment outcomes by risk managers:

‘Current approaches to the assessment of health and environmental risks frequently result in a variety of technical expressions of risks, based on consideration of endpoints, biological responses or other technical parameters that are sometimes only very indirectly related to the protection objectives pursued by risk managers and policy makers. [...] As a result, interpretation of expressions used in risk assessment reports may be problematic for risk managers and the public, open to misunderstanding and distortion, and difficult to communicate.’

The joint Working Group will work towards a deadline of June 2011 shall be given the tasks of:

1.    reviewing the current risk assessment practices,
2.    exploring the needs of risk managers and other stakeholders
3.    identifying approaches that can provide results which are based on the best available science, informative, consistent, transparent and easy to interpret and communicate.
 
This joint work item had recently been introduced during the Risk Assessment Day - Stakeholder Dialogue Session - (Brussels, 20th November 2009); according to the Chair of the SCHER committee, the mandate was developed, because ‘risk assessment should at least inform risk management, but it’s currently not clear that this is achieved.’
 
 
Related Links:
Meeting Reports (by the NIA Delegate):
20th November 2009: Risk Assessment Day - Stakeholder Dialogue Session - (Brussels, 20th November 2009)

 

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