DES has also shown that effects may occur long after exposure selleck has ended. Finally, the reality is that people are exposed daily to a combination of potentially endocrine disrupting chemicals

and addressing such combinations should be the standard in toxicology testing. Several of the above points are illustrated by bisphenol A (BPA). BPA has been shown to be present in human serum at concentrations which are high enough to cause cell proliferation in in vivo tests, but which are well below the No Observed Adverse Effect Level (NOAEL) ( Myers et al., 2009). BPA also illustrates the bias of industry testing: hundreds of academic studies have found low dose BPA to have deleterious Caspase-dependent apoptosis effects while almost all industry-funded studies have found BPA to be harmless. Similar contradictions between industry and academic studies have occurred with soft drinks and tobacco. The presentation concluded with a call to rely on unbiased academic studies in setting policy. The process of peer review and open literature publication allowing for easy replication and discussion cannot be duplicated

by industry-funded Good Laboratory Practice (GLP) studies. Academic scientists who are actively publishing in the endocrine disruption field should be actively involved in policy making. Perception & Communication of Risks Associated with Food Technology. Prof. George Gaskell, London School of Economics, UK. This presentation summarised the Eurobarometer 2006 study 238 on Food risk perception which was commissioned by the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) and DG Sanco. Cyclooxygenase (COX) The aim of the study was to find out what risks Europeans associate with food, if there are national differences in these perceptions and if qualitative and quantitative approaches give different conclusions. The study involved 27 countries with representative samples of 1000 from each (except Cyprus and

Malta). Closed questions asked for a rating of 1 to 4 (1 = ‘not at all worried’ and 4 = ‘very worried’ on 14 food risks and the open question asked ‘What are all the things that come to your mind when thinking about problems or risks associated with food? Initial analyses showed that a person’s Food Risk Concern is closely linked to their Generalised Risk Sensitivity i.e., the more generally worried a person is, the more likely they are to be worried about food. Both measures showed strong country differences with the most Food Risk Concern in Malta, Lithuania and Latvia (among the seven highest in Generalised Risk Sensitivity) and the least in Finland, Austria and Germany (among the eight lowest in Generalised Risk Sensitivity).