WRITTEN QUESTION E-1075/02 by Erik Meijer (GUE/NGL) to the Commission. Increase in malformations in babies as a result of drinking water from rivers contaminated with the female hormone oestrogen.
Date: 2002-04-18
Institutions: European Parliament, Provisional data
Subjects: EU programme, drinking water, health policy, hormone, medical research, pollution of waterways, reproductive health, water pollution, water protection, water supply, water treatment

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5.12.2002

During the negotiations with Kiribati the Commission is taking into consideration development aspects
aiming in particular at poverty reduction and economic benefits for the local economy.

Apart from the usual payment of a financial contribution to the state Treasury, social clauses concerning
the employment of Kiribati nationals on Community vessels and training of seamen may be taken into
account. Furthermore, important transhipment activity should be carried out by Community vessels in
Kiribati ports.

The Commission also intends to encourage Kiribati to achieve complementarity and synergies between its
National Indicative Programme (NIP) and the Regional Indicative Programme (RIP) for the Pacific with the
financing of fishery related programmes that should be defined in the context of a possible future
Community/Kiribati fishery agreement.

The Commission also supports Kiribati to extend the search for complementarity and synergies to take
into account other financing and business opportunities made available through institutions and bodies
such as the European Investment Bank (EIB) and the Centre for the Development of Enterprise (CDE).

(2002/C 301 E/091)

WRITTEN QUESTION E-1075/02

by Erik Meijer (GUE/NGL) to the Commission

(18 April 2002)

Subject: Increase in malformations in babies as a result of drinking water from rivers contaminated with

the female hormone oestrogen

1.
Is the Commission aware that Europe’s main rivers are becoming increasingly polluted with the
female hormone oestrogen, as a result of urine from women taking the contraceptive pill entering the
sewers, and that the use of drinking water taken from such rivers is causing an increase in the number of
babies with malformations. These malformations may take the form of harelip, penile abnormality
(hypospadias), gastroschis or spina bifida. Is the Commission also aware that in many river estuaries half
the male fish have changed sex?

2. Which areas of the EU are vulnerable to this problem because their drinking water or a large
proportion of it comes from treated river water? Is this risk particularly high for ports located on river
estuaries, such as Rotterdam, Antwerp, Bremen, Hamburg, Bristol, London, Hull, Le Havre, Bordeaux,
Porto, Cadiz, Marseilles, Venice and Thessaloniki?

3. What methods are now available for purifying water contaminated with oestrogen or for switching
to other sources of drinking water? What further developments in this area does the Commission expect
over the next ten years?

Is systematic research being carried out into this problem in areas of the EU other than the United

4.
Kingdom and Flanders?

Is the Commission prepared to encourage further research and coordination with other data in order

5.
to map the consequences throughout the EU?

In what other ways does the Commission envisage helping to protect the population against the

6.
effects of drinking water polluted with oestrogen?

Source: Flemish newspaper ‘Het Nieuwsblad’ of 19 March 2002.

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Answer given by Mrs Wallström on behalf of the Commission

(18 June 2002)

In March 1999,

1.
The Commission is aware of the problem of pollution of rivers by endocrine disrupting chemicals,
which include both industrial chemicals and natural/synthetic hormones such as the female hormone
the Commission Scientific Committee on Toxicity, Ecotoxicity and the
oestrogen.
Environment (SCTEE) concluded that there are associations between these chemicals and human health
disturbances, such as cryptochidism and hypospadia, but that no causative role has been determined.
Regarding reproductive effects in fish, the Committee found evidence of disorders such as imposex (1)
mainly in the UK and Sweden, associated with sewage effluents, natural and synthetic oestrogenic
hormones as well as industrial chemicals. In December 1999, the Commission adopted a Community
Strategy for Endocrine Disrupters (2). The strategy addresses the key requirements of further research;
international co-operation; communication to the public; and appropriate policy action. Recommendations
are made for short-, medium- and long-term actions, such as the identification of substances,
the
establishment of monitoring programmes, further research and the development of agreed test methods.

2.
The production of drinking water from surface water varies between Member States (indicative from
1 % of the total production in Denmark to approximately 60 % in Spain). As a result, the vulnerability to
the occurrence of oestrogenic substances in river water used for the production of drinking water would
subsequently be higher in Member States that use a high percentage of surface water. However, this does
not imply that oestrogenic substances occur in these raw water sources. The Commission is not aware of
the occurrence, and thus the risk, being higher in the delta area of rivers. Also it is not common practice,
if done at all, to abstract river water in harbour areas for the production of drinking water.

3.
Some scientific information is available on the efficiency of treatment processes in the production of
drinking water to remove oestrogenic substances. Especially oxidative processes, activated carbon filtration
and membrane filtration processes are reported to be successful
in the removal of oestrogens. If the
occurrence of oestrogens in raw water for the production of drinking water proves to be an issue,
treatment processes will be adapted and extended to guarantee that the quality of water intended for
human consumption complies with the Directive 98/83/EC (3).

Other than UK and B, the Commission is aware of national research and monitoring programmes
4.
inter-alia, the
underway in DK, D, NL, S, SF, and F. These programmes are designed to investigate,
endocrine disrupting effects on fish in rivers from sewage effluent, in particular the effects of oestrogenic
activity, as well as human-health related effects. The Commission, under the Community Framework
Programme for Research and Technological Development (RTD) is also supporting a number of European
research projects on endocrine disruption addressing, inter-alia, urogenital malformations in babies, effects
of effluent on fish as well as assessment of technologies for removal of endocrine disrupting chemicals
from sewage and drinking water.

funding of EUR 13,5 million. Under

The Community strategy for endocrine disrupters identifies research as a key requirement to better
5.
understand the phenomenon of endocrine disruption. Endocrine disruption was identified as a research
priority since 1996 within the Fourth Community Framework Programme for Research and Technological
Development with a total
the Fifth Framework Programme
(1999-2002), namely in the Quality of Life (QoL) and Environment and Sustainable Development (ESD)
Programmes, endocrine disruption was highlighted as an important research topic and to date, circa
EUR 10 million of Community funding has been spent and 6 newly accepted projects with a total budget
in excess of EUR 10 million are under negotiation. In addition, a joint QoL and ESD dedicated call on
human and environmental implications of endocrine disrupters was launched with additional budget of
EUR 20 million. As a result of the call four multidisciplinary projects are supported. These projects
investigate a wide range of issues related to endocrine disruption, such as the effects of complex mixtures
of endocrine disrupting chemicals in human and fish tissues. Furthermore, these projects will form a
cluster aimed at providing a focus for endocrine disruptive research in Europe, with activities such as
workshops, coordination of databases and dissemination of results. (http://europa.eu.int/comm/research/
press/2002/pr1505en.html).

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Apart from the ways highlighted in the Strategy for Endocrine Disrupters, the Commission wants to
6.
the existing water legislation (Drinking Water Directive 98/83/EC (3), Water Framework
recall
that
Directive 2000/60/EC (4) and the list of priority substances Decision 2455/2001/EC (5)) are aiming at
protecting the water for the production of drinking water. In particular, for Directive 98/83/EC, a study on
‘Endocrine Disrupters in drinking water’ is under way; the subject and scope of this study is among others
to identify those individual endocrine disrupters or groups of endrocrine disrupters that might be
appropriate for future regulation in drinking water.

Impositin of male characteristics in female animals.

(1)
(2) COM(1999) 706.
(3) Council Directive 98/83/EC of 3 November 1998 on the quality of water intended for human consumption,

OJ L 330, 5.12.1998, p. 32.

(4) Directive 2000/60/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 23 October 2000 establishing a framework

for Community action in the field of water policy, OJ L 327, 22.12.2000.

(5) Decision No 2455/2001/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 20 November 2001 establishing the
list of priority substances in the field of water policy and amending Directive 2000/60/EC, OJ L 331, 15.12.2001.

(2002/C 301 E/092)

WRITTEN QUESTION E-1082/02

by Jules Maaten (ELDR) to the Commission

(18 April 2002)

Subject: Antibiotics in honey and other foodstuffs

1.
A recent survey carried out by the Belgian consumer magazine Test-Aankoop (No 451, 2002) found
that 78 % of all imported honey contained prohibited antibiotics (in particular, streptomycin, tetracyclines
and sulphonamides), and research in other European countries has produced similar findings. Does the
Commission intend to take measures to prevent this contamination, and if so, how?

2.

Is this contamination also present in other imported foodstuffs?

On 15 March 2002 the European Union announced an import ban on foodstuffs from China,
3.
the same time the
including honey, containing the carcinogenic antibiotic chloramphenicol. At
Commission proposed measures against
foodstuffs contaminated with antibiotics (chlor-
amphenicol and nitrofuran) from Burma, Thailand and Vietnam. Have imports of such foodstuffs now
ceased?

imports of

4.
Is it correct that chloramphenicol can still be administered to cattle in the EU by way of exception
and, if so, what measures are taken to prevent this antibiotic from entering the food chain via this route?

Answer given by Mr Byrne on behalf of the Commission

(2 July 2002)

In the EU, there is an absolute ban on the use of chloramphenicol and compounds of the nitrofuran family
for animals whose products are intended for human consumption. It emerged from an evaluation of these
molecules that these substances pose risks to public health, and the EU therefore issued a formal ban.

The discovery of chloramphenicol and nitrofuran contamination in foodstuffs of animal origin from
Thailand, Myanmar,
Indonesia and Vietnam led the Commission to call on the Member States to
systematically monitor these imports. In practice, these measures enable the batches contaminated by these
substances to be identified and removed from the market without any embargo being imposed on imports
from these countries. The placing on the EU market of batches of imported honey contaminated with
chloramphenicol should therefore not occur.