Pharma, agri companies face threat of EU ban on some ‘forever chemicals’

Pharmaceutical and agrichemical companies run the potential risk of being banned from using some harmful "forever chemicals" that linger in the environment, after a European Chemicals Agency (ECHA) committee cast doubt on their right to have a sweeping exemption.

The two heavyweight EU sectors would escape a ban on at least 10,000 toxic chemicals, proposed earlier this year by Germany, Denmark, the Netherlands, Sweden and Norway. The chemicals in the crosshairs are known as per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS).

But a draft opinion from ECHA’s Committee for Socio-Economic Analysis, dated July 5 and obtained by POLITICO, says the arguments for excluding these industries from a bloc-wide ban on PFAS — also known as forever chemicals — are "at the moment not fully justified and inconsistent for several reasons."

Under the draft ban, the proposing countries decided to exclude chemicals used in plant protection products, biocides and medicines, citing a need for further evaluation to “determine the extent to which PFAS can be banned for those specific applications.”

The substances are known as forever chemicals because they take so much time to break down naturally in the environment — and have been linked to a host of health conditions, including cancer, liver damage and decreased fertility. Studies have identified the substances in everything from rainwater and soil to breastmilk.

It’s early days — this is an unfinished opinion from one of the chemicals agency’s two committees — and the European Commission, as well as EU countries, will have the final say. But the draft is likely to spook the billion-dollar industries, which use the chemicals in everything from packaging to manufacturing and within the finished products themselves.

Lobbying battle

The human and veterinary medicine lobbies have already pushed for an exemption to any ban, arguing that they don’t have ready replacements for the class of chemicals that are used in medicines treating everything from heart disease to malaria and depression.

According to the industry groups, out of 200 best-selling drugs, 25 of them contain the targeted chemistry.

They argue that the specific chemical properties of fluorine atoms — the key element of PFAS chemicals — means they can’t be replaced in medicines. Trying to swap them out with alternative chemical groups would lead to “serious toxicity issues,” they write. PFAS are also widely used throughout the pharmaceutical production process, in everything from starting chemicals and reagents to manufacturing equipment, as well as packaging.

Danish pesticide lobby Dansk Planteværn also previously welcomed the proposed exemptions, arguing that while some approved pesticides have fluorine in their chemical structure, existing pesticide-specific regulations "[provide] sufficient protection for the environment and health."

But NGOs have warned that exempting plant protection and biocidal products would be "potentially creating a huge regulatory loophole resulting in further human exposure."

While the ECHA Committee agreed certain PFAS used in the pharma and agri sectors play a "vital role in our society and banning them could lead to significant impacts, for example on human health in case of [medical products]," it said the applications lead to "significant emissions which are on par with some other uses of PFAS."

A consultation on the proposal is ongoing and the document is still subject to change.