[Federal Register Volume 67, Number 194 (Monday, October 7, 2002)]
[Notices]
[Pages 62477-62478]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 02-25374]


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DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention


Final Selection Criteria and Solicitation of Nominations for 
Chemicals or Categories of Environmental Chemicals for Analytic 
Development and Inclusion in Future Releases of the National Report on 
Human Exposure to Environmental Chemicals

AGENCY: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), Health and 
Human Services (HHS).

ACTION: Notice.

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SUMMARY: On Wednesday, March 20, 2002, CDC sought public comment on its 
proposed criteria for selecting environmental chemicals or categories 
of chemicals for inclusion in future releases of the National Report on 
Human Exposure to Environmental Chemicals (the ``Report''). (See 
Federal Register, Vol. 67, No. 54, p. 12996). In response to the 
comments received, CDC now provides the final selection criteria and 
solicits public nominations for categories of chemicals to be included 
in future issues of the ``Report.'' The selection criteria, which will 
be used by experts to prioritize the nominated chemicals for analytic 
development and for inclusion in future issues of the ``Report,'' are 
as follows: (1) Independent scientific data which suggest that the 
potential for exposure of the U.S. population to a particular chemical 
is changing (i.e., increasing or decreasing) or persisting; (2) 
seriousness of health effects known or suspected to result from 
exposure to the chemical (for example, cancer, birth defects, or other 
serious health effects); (3) proportion of the U.S. population likely 
to be exposed to levels of chemicals of known or potential health 
significance; (4) need to assess the efficacy of public health actions 
to reduce exposure to a chemical in the U.S. population or a large 
component of the U.S. population (for example, among children, women of 
childbearing age, the elderly); (5) existence of an analytical method 
that can measure the chemical or its metabolite in blood or urine with 
adequate accuracy, precision, sensitivity, specificity, and speed; and 
(6) incremental analytical cost (in dollars and personnel) to perform 
the analyses (preference is given to chemicals that can be added 
readily to existing analytical methods).
    CDC welcomes all nominations: those persons who wish to nominate a 
chemical or chemical category (for example, pesticides, fumigants) 
should use the structural name (for example, 2,3,7,8-
tetrachlorodibenzo-p-dioxin). Do not submit chemicals by their product 
names because chemical products are most commonly mixtures of 
chemicals. Nominators should indicate which of the selection criteria 
the chemical or categories of chemicals satisfy and should provide as 
much information as possible about the chemical or chemical category, 
including references and Chemical Abstracts Service (CAS) numbers. A 
CAS number is a unique number assigned to a given compound by the 
Chemical Abstracts Service, a division of the American Chemical 
Society. This number is also known as the CAS registry number (CAS RN). 
You may verify spellings of chemical names and CAS numbers by referring 
to Hawley's Condensed Chemical Dictionary (published by John Wiley and 
Sons; ISBN: 0471387355) or by searching Web sites such as the 
following: http://www.chemfinder.com, http://www.chemindustry.com/chemicals/index.asp, http://webbool.nist.gov/chemistry/name-ser.html, 
or http://db.chemsources.com/chemsources/chemfind.htm. The more 
information nominators provide, the more efficiently the nominated 
chemical will move through the selection process.
    For each criterion, a panel of experts will score nominated 
chemicals on a scale of 1 to 5, with a higher score indicating higher 
priority. For each criterion, the score will be multiplied by the 
weighting factor for the criterion (criteria 1-3 each have weights of 
25, criteria 4 and 5 have weights of 10 each, and criterion 6 has a 
weight of 5) and the weighted score summed to obtain a final point 
score for each chemical or chemical category. The maximum final point 
score is 500, which would result from a scoring of 5 for each of the 
six criteria. On the basis of its final point score, a chemical will be 
placed in one of five priority groups (e.g., priority group 1, priority 
group 2, and so on). CDC will report each chemical or chemical category 
evaluated along with the priority group to which it was assigned. This 
information will appear in the Federal Register and on CDC's Web site 
at this address: http://www.cdc.gov/nceh/dls/report/selectedchemicals. 
CDC's intent is to maintain a transparent process and to be good 
steward of the data it produces.
    To that end, CDC will publish additional notices in the Federal 
Register as needed to keep the public abreast of progress on the 
nomination of chemicals for future issues of the ``Report.''

DATES: Submit nominations on or before December 6, 2002.

ADDRESSES: Address all nominations related to this notice to Dorothy 
Sussman, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Center 
for Environmental Health, Division of Laboratory Sciences, Mail Stop F-
20, 4770 Buford Highway, Atlanta, Georgia 30341. Nominations may also 
be made via e-mail to this address: [email protected].

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Technical Information: Dr. Richard 
Wang, Telephone 770-488-7950.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: CDC publishes the ``Report'' under the 
authorities 42 U.S.C. 241 and 42 U.S.C. 242k. The ``Report'' provides 
an ongoing assessment using biomonitoring of the exposure of the 
noninstitutionalized, civilian population to environmental chemicals. 
Biomonitoring assesses human exposure to chemicals by measuring the 
chemicals or their breakdown products in human specimens such as blood 
or urine. For the ``Report,'' an environmental chemical means a 
chemical compound or chemical element present in air, water, soil, 
dust, food, or other environmental medium. The ``Report'' provides 
exposure information about participants in an ongoing national survey 
known as the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES). 
This survey is conducted by CDC's National Center for Health 
Statistics; measurements are conducted by CDC's National Center for 
Environmental Health. The first ``Report,'' published in March 2001, 
gave information about levels of 27 chemicals found in the U.S. 
population. This ``Report'' can be obtained in the following ways: 
access http://www.cdc.gov/nceh/dls/report/; e-mail [email protected]; or 
telephone 1-866-670-6052. The second ``Report,'' which will be issued 
in late fall of 2002, will include information about at least 75 
chemicals. In addition to new data on those chemicals that appeared in 
the first ``Report,'' information on the following categories of 
chemicals will be in the second ``Report': polycyclic

[[Page 62478]]

aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), co-planar and non-coplanar 
polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), persistent organochlorine pesticides, 
carbamate pesticides, dioxins and furans, and phytoestrogens.
    Future editions of the ``Report'' will provide detailed assessments 
of exposure levels among different population groups defined by sex, 
race or ethnicity, age, urban or rural residence, educational level, 
income, and other characteristics. Over time, CDC will be able to track 
trends in exposure levels. Future editions may also include additional 
exposure information for special-exposure populations (e.g., children, 
women of childbearing age, the elderly) from studies of people through 
localized or point sources, and from studies of adverse health effects 
resulting from exposure to varying levels of environmental chemicals.

    Dated: September 30, 2002.
Verla S. Neslund,
Director, Executive Secretariat, Centers for Disease Control and 
Prevention (CDC).
[FR Doc. 02-25374 Filed 10-4-02; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 4163-18-P