Industry Generally Supportive of EPA Action on Pet Products

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s announcement today about new regulatory requirements and other action items regarding spot-on flea and tick pesticide products was greeted with cautious optimism today by the Consumer Specialty Products Association (CSPA).

“Pets are an important part of many people’s lives, and these products are designed to help protect pets from dangerous diseases that can be transmitted by fleas and ticks,” said Chris Cathcart, CSPA President. “While it is uncertain how some of the announced changes will play out within the industry, the end result will help provide consumers with increased confidence that they can to continue use these products safely and effectively.”

Companies are required under Federal Insecticide, Fungicide and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA) to report all incidences to the EPA. Spot-on pet products along with other pesticide products sold in the U.S. are regulated by the EPA under FIFRA. EPA reviews data submitted by the pesticide applicant and approves the directions for use, storage and disposal, and hazard warnings and precautions on the product label.

Member companies of CSPA that make the products provided EPA with additional incident report data in order to help the agency shed light on why there was an increase in reports in 2007 and 2008.

The EPA, after nearly a year of evaluating spot-on pet products, today reported the rate of incidents per 270,000,000 doses sold in 2008 was 0.00016% per dose and that of those incidents in 2008, approximately 95% were classified as moderate or minor. This means that the overall reaction rate was 16 per 100,000 applications, which includes all incidents. 94% of those reactions were minor, self-limiting, and non-life threatening, 4% were more serious in nature, and 1.9% resulted in fatalities that included misuse of the products.

“These figures confirm the apparent wide margin of safety of these products,” Cathcart said. “However, our analysis of the data also confirms the importance of reading and following the label instructions for proper application.”

“The registrants are working with EPA to standardize collecting and reporting adverse incidents and side effect profiles associated with product use. The standardization of the reporting requirements could aid in ongoing surveillance and make data analysis much more streamlined and consistent,” Cathcart concluded.

EPA also proposed revising data requirements for these products, but some wonder if the additional cost is warranted, based on the already impressive safety profile that the existing pre-market requirements assure, as shown by the data analysis announced today.

More info: www.cspa.org