We won! That is, the forces of science-based public health policy seem to have won – if not the war, at least a major battle. At long last, federal risk assessors and regulators have come around to the view that administering chemicals to rodents in super-high doses does not reliably predict human risk — of cancer, or anything else — and that a better method needs to be employed, if we are to avoid more unnecessary bans, anti-chemical media hysteria, and activist crusades.

High dose animal tests on one rodent species don’t reliably predict cancer risk in another rodent type, much less in humans. The same tests for “carcinogens” that are used to condemn synthetic chemicals also give false positive findings for a whole spectrum of natural substances that we safely eat, breathe, and drink every day.

The sort-of good news is that the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) just announced a new collaboration: the development of a “new paradigm” for testing potentially toxic chemicals. Drawing upon the unique testing methodologies to be found in their various sub-agencies, they plan to shift from testing chemicals on whole animals to testing the chemicals on cells and “isolated molecular targets,” using high-speed, automated screening robots.