Health groups have welcomed Belgium’s first-ever draft national action plan on endocrine disrupting chemicals (EDCs) as an important step towards better identification of and health protection against the risks associated to exposure to such harmful substances. A public consultation on the draft plan came to a close 14 February 2022. With the launch of its action plan, Belgium is joining a small group of other EU countries taking national action to address the challenge of EDC exposure through simultaneous actions on several levels:
1) increase efforts to better identify and regulate those substances at national and European levels,
2) better inform the population about EDCs to serve exposure reduction, including through training of relevant professionals in the health and social fields and boosting substitution efforts across sectors,
3) continue to develop research to serve more accurate identification and to monitor the exposure of the population and the environment.
Other countries that have already taken similar initiatives include France, Denmark and Sweden.