Role of OELs in Managing Work With Chemical Risks

Issues for the Role of OELs in Managing Work With Chemical Risks 

Even more fundamental are questions concerning the meaning of OELs -especially ones that address the extent to which they are misconceived to represent safe limits by users. Such questions praietrate to the core of current thinking on risk communication and risk regulatimi. If the definition of the level of risk represented by an exposure hmit for a hazardous substance is prone to a misinterpretation concerning its meaning and limitations, then the whole system is also likely to suffer a loss of both sense and credibility in terms of risk communication. One of the major shifts that has occurred in public policy in 

As well as the economic considerations that often affect whether substances have an OEL, there are also technical questions concerning problematic details such as the difficulties encountered in applying its criteria to certain substances, so that it is not possible to give them an OEL despite their known hazards. Such problems have contributed to a growing recognition of the need for reform. 

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