FDA Sees Nanotech Challenges In Every Product Category

An anonymous reader writes "The Food and Drug Administration's Nanotechnology Task Force has passed on its first report into the ever-growing field of nanotech products. As a result, the FDA is implementing changes that will allow it to oversee nanotech products in every category withinin its purview. Nanotech products are 'estimated to grow to $2.6 trillion in manufactured goods globally by 2014. As the Task Force report highlights, nanotechnology impacts every area of FDA responsibility--drugs, drug delivery systems, cosmetics, medical devices, and food products. Overall, the agency regulates products that are worth nearly $1.5 trillion annually and that account for almost 25 percent of US consumer spending.'"

Re:Nanotech == Molecular == Already regulated

[Anonymous Coward]

This is not strictly correct. "Nanotechnology" refers to materials with dimensions on the order of a hundred to a few hundreds of nanometers. In general, the "nanotech" materials that are interesting (carbon nanotubes, semiconductor nanocrystals, etc.) have emergent properties that are characteristic to their size, and uniquely different from the properties of either single molecules or bulk materials. For example, CdSe nanocrystals ("Quantum dots") are highly fluorescent, but neither bulk CdSe nor CdSe "molecules" are. From a toxicology standpoint, it is possible that most nanoscale materials will behave much like individual molecules, but it is also possible that they will behave differently.

Precautionary Principle

[Coleon]

I think there are two mayor issues with Nanotechnology.
The first is FDA or whatever Administration who has to approve it in other countries. The FDA in some way set the precedent so thats something you consider when you are testing a product to be approved in your country. "
Oh!! It was approved by FDA!! so it must be good"
As "maggard" said

Even though I think the FDA is a severely compromised agency, often too close to the industries they regulate and constrained by political pressure from the administration

So what happends if your almighty FDA fails? I will asume that guys in the FDA tries to make his best to test and to be sure that the product is not going to cause any harm.
In Europe they have something called "precautionary principle" is a moral and political principle which states that if an action or policy might cause severe or irreversible harm to the public, in the absence of a scientific consensus that harm would not ensue, the burden of proof falls on those who would advocate taking the action. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Precautionary_princip le [wikipedia.org]

So this leads us to the second problem. Nanotechnologies are a trillion dollars industry, not bad for a newcommer. So what could happend if they they present false data or they put some pressure to the guys of the FDA or even to some congress men, to try to be a little more permisive on that matter. So it sets a precedent so any other Nanotech company will use to pushit even further. The company prefer to pay some millions in indemnification in the future to loose a trillion dollars market NOW.

The efect of the Nanotech are unknown as well as GMO. And not only in human beings, but any other living creature including vegetables.
It is a difficult choice but the peoples health must be first.

Re:Nanotech == Molecular == Already regulated

[gregor-e]

But we've always had materials spanning all ranges of size, from nanometer-sized molecules through tire-sized molecules (a tire being the best example). Many commonly used synthetic and biological polymers span the "nanotech" sizes you mention. Any time there is a mist of solution, the solvent evaporating will leave an airborn clump of solute that is "nanotech-sized", often having a very specific-sized population. We've always had an obligation to investigate the material properties of specific ingredients. It has always been the case that materials in specific forms can have properties different from that of their bulk or single-molecule forms. We have always had to consider whether a particular substance, say, modified to increase its surface area, or provided in the presence of other catalytic substances, will exhibit new properties, desirable or otherwise. There is nothing new in this. To claim that some molecules or clumps of molecules are suddenly more worthy of scrutiny or regulation simply because they have been marketed as "nanotech" is transparent rubbish.