At least one-third of all cancer cases worldwide could be prevented, according to recent estimates. Tobacco use, poor diet, physical inactivity, and other behaviors are some of the preventable risk factors involved; other cancers have been attributed to environmental exposures such as outdoor air pollution and occupational hazards such as asbestos, metals, and substances used in consumer products. An international team of public and occupational health experts from the World Health Organization (WHO), universities, and independent agencies now makes a case for a global strategy for preventing these exposures. . . .  

But avoiding exposures to many carcinogens can be difficult. The public and workers are often ignorant of both their exposures and ways to prevent them. Further difficulty arises from the long latency period for many cancers, which tends to obscure the connection between exposure to carcinogens and later health effects. The researchers emphasize that widespread "invisible" exposures such as persistent organic pollutants and substances in consumer products should be addressed through policies that work across sectors including housing, food, energy production, and industry. In other words, preventing more cancer cases depends on addressing more sources of a given carcinogen.  

Lautenberg's legislation would update the Toxic Substances Control Act, or TSCA. Environmental groups, public-health advocates, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency officials and the chemical industry have called for reform.

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Effective April 11, 2013, the Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment (OEHHA) is adding bisphenol A (BPA) (CAS No. 80-05-7) to the list of chemicals known to the State to cause reproductive toxicity for purposes of Proposition 65.

The listing of BPA is based on formal identification by the National Toxicology Program (NTP), an authoritative body, in a final report by the NTP Center for the Evaluation of Risks to Human Reproduction (CERHR), that BPA causes reproductive toxicity (developmental endpoint) at high doses.  The criteria used by OEHHA for the listing of chemicals under the "authoritative bodies" mechanism can be found in Title 27, Cal. Code of Regs., section 25306.  

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