A committee of the National Research Council will conduct a scientific peer review of the formaldehyde assessment presented in the National Toxicology Program (NTP) 12th Report on Carcinogens (RoC). The committee will identify and evaluate relevant, publicly available, peer-reviewed literature, with particular emphasis on literature published as of June 10, 2011, the release date of the 12th RoC. The committee will document its decisions for inclusion or exclusion of literature from its evaluation and will identify the set of information deemed most critical to the evaluation. The committee will apply independently the NTP’s established RoC listing criteria to the scientific evidence from studies in humans, experimental animals, and other studies relevant to mechanisms of carcinogenesis and make independent level-of-evidence determinations with respect to the human and animal studies. The committee will integrate the level-of-evidence conclusions, and considering all relevant information in accordance with the RoC listing criteria, make an independent listing recommendation for formaldehyde and provide scientific justification for its recommendation.
Note: The NRC has an agreement with the Department of Health and Human Services to undertake a scientific peer review of the determinations concerning formaldehyde and styrene in the National Toxicology Program’s 12th Report on Carcinogens (RoC). The expert committees appointed by the Academy for this assignment will follow standard Academy practices in carrying out their independent scientific reviews, which may include consideration of any and all issues that the committees and the Academy decide are necessary to carry out credible, independent, scientific evaluations of the two determinations, potentially including the criteria for the determinations. The statements of task for these two peer reviews were recently modified to make it clear that the NRC’s assignment does not also include a separate review of the National Toxicology Program’s listing criteria.