Day 040 - 21 Oct 94 - Page 09
1 that it came to the attention of the SCF when it was
2 published or shortly thereafter?
3 A. I would be surprised if the Scientific Secretariat of
4 the SCF and the submembers of the SCF would not also have
5 read the JECFA report; I expect they did.
6
7 Q. It would be absolutely astonishing, would it not, if they
8 did not read the conclusions of JECFA about one of the
9 substances which they presently have under review?
10 A. It would not be remarkable if one or two members of SCF
11 had not read it, because some of them are nutritionists
12 rather than toxicologists who tend to focus on other
13 topics. But it certainly would be remarkable if
14 toxicologists who were on the SCF did not read the JECFA
15 report.
16
17 Q. Have you seen this paper before, No. 19 of the series in
18 1984?
19 A. Indeed I have. I have a copy in my study; I consult it
20 regularly.
21
22 Q. Then, perhaps, you can help me with this: Unless I have
23 missed it -- if I have, I apologise -- I cannot find a
24 reference to it in your report.
25 A. I am not sure whether I refer to it either, but the
26 fact that I may not have explicitly referred to it does not
27 mean I was not aware of it. I have indices of both the
28 reports of the Scientific Committee for Food and the Joint
29 Expert Committee. When I examine a compound, I trawl
30 through those and pull out the references from both
31 committees. So I am indeed familiar with this.
32
33 Q. The difficulty is, Dr. Millstone, I am going to suggest to
34 you that when one comes to consider the carcinogenicity, or
35 potential carcinogenicity, in man of Amaranth, the possible
36 adverse effect of renal calcification and the validity of
37 the SCF's activities which you have criticised on this
38 page, this is actually rather an important document; do you
39 follow me?
40 A. Well, my -- I am not questioning the importance of that
41 document, but my understanding from both the SCF and JECFA
42 and the COT, for that matter, is each jealously guards its
43 own independence. Insofar as the SCF indicated in 1983
44 that they were calling for more information, my expectation
45 would have been that they ought to have, in the normal
46 course of events, returned to this matter whether or not
47 JECFA had already done so.
48
49 From time to time the judgments of JECFA and the judgments
50 of the Scientific Committee for Food do coincide; from time
51 to time they differ, and they each take responsibility for
52 their own judgments. An ADI set by the SCF carries weight
53 in the decision-making of the European Commission and the
54 Council of Ministers quite directly, since the SCF is a
55 statutory body of the European Community, the European
56 Union, whereas that is not the case with JECFA.
57
58 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Am I misunderstanding completely? The
59 paragraph before the one you have been referred to says:
60 "In 1983 the SCF awarded a permanent ADI". Is that the
