Letters: November 2024
Readers celebrate longevity, ponder practical purposes, and more
Regulating plant extracts
The article ‘Tea tree oil faces ban in UK and EU over reprotoxicity’ highlights a wider issue regarding assessment and hazard classification of plant extracts.
The article states that industry representatives are challenging the proposal for classification as reprotoxic Category 1B, meaning a presumed human reproductive toxicant.
As background, substances are tested or otherwise assessed according to the Reach regulation 1907/2008, and the results are used for hazard classification according to classification, labelling and packaging (CLP) regulation 1272/2008. Generally, substances are classified from the data, while mixtures are classified from the hazards of ingredients and their percentages in the mixture (the calculation method).