Page 41 - Veterinary Toxicology, Basic and Clinical Principles, 3rd Edition

8 SECTION | I General

VetBooks.ir Laboratories continues today as the Pacific Northwest War II when the major chemical companies such as
Dupont, Dow, Union Carbide, Eastman Kodak, and others
Laboratories operated by Battelle Memorial Institute.
created laboratories that had a strong toxicology orientation.
Later I would lead one of the specialized AEC laborato-
ries, the Lovelace Inhalation Toxicology Research Many veterinarians played a key role in these laboratories.
Institute (ITRI) in Albuquerque, New Mexico, which con- Unfortunately, many of these laboratories today are much
tinues today as part of the Lovelace Respiratory Research smaller or have even disappeared. This, in turn, has fostered
Institute. The initial mission of ITRI, when it was created the development of many contract research organizations
in 1960, was to study the health consequences of expo- (CROs). Many veterinarians are employed in CROs.
sure to airborne radioactive materials such as might occur The substantial knowledge base was eventually used
with a catastrophic nuclear reactor accident. Later in the to guide the safe use of chemicals regarding the potential
1970s the mission would be broadened to include a broad impact on human health and the environment. This con-
range of airborne materials including coal-fired power cern was the focus of Rachel Carson’s book, Silent Spring
plant and vehicle emissions. The research conducted at (Carson, 1962). She focused on both human health and
Hanford, Lovelace ITRI and in numerous other laborato- impacts on the total ecosystem of which people were just
ries with support from the AEC, which later became the a part. Her book was certainly one of the key stimuli to
Energy Research and Development Administration, and a tidal wave of legislative actions in the United States that
then soon became the Department of Energy, provided an focused broadly on the environment with concern for
enormous knowledge base on the health effects of expo- clean air and water, safe food, pharmaceuticals, pesti-
sure to both external radiation and radionuclides that cides, fungicides, rodenticides, and consumer products,
would be deposited internally. Contrary to the impression and a safe working environment.
gained from many popular media reports, our understand- Legislative actions and related administrative actions in
ing of the health effects of radiation probably vastly the 1970s created the US Environmental Protection Agency
exceeds our knowledge of any other toxicant (McClellan, (USEPA), the Consumer Product Safety Commission, the
2014). National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health
It is useful to also briefly recount the role of veterinar- (NIOSH), the National Center for Toxicological Research,
ians in the military. A Veterinary Medical Corp was orga- the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences,
nized within the US Army in 1916. Initially, these and the Cancer Bioassay Program within the National
veterinarians focused their professional talents on ensur- Cancer Institute (NCI), which evolved into the National
ing the health of horses and mules used by the Army. Toxicology Program (NTP) now administered by the
This role quickly broadened to include public health National Institute for Environmental Health Sciences. This
activities and research. When the US Air Force was cre- was also a period of rapid expansion of research activities
ated as a separate entity, it included an Air Force in the pharmaceutical, food, chemical, and petroleum indus-
Veterinary Corp. Individuals within that unit had an tries. The major chemical companies started the not-for-
important role in the conduct of research related initially profit Chemical Industry Institute of Toxicology (CIIT) in
to aviation medicine and then in the 1960s to aerospace 1976, based on a proposal advanced by Perry Gehring, then
medicine. Many of those individuals, after completing a Veterinarian at Dow. CIIT was initially funded by the
their military service in either the US Army or US Air chemical industry but was later transformed into The
Force Veterinary Corp and having gained extraordinary Hamner Institutes Health Sciences. The initial mission of
specialized education and research experience, found CIIT was to (1) test commodity chemicals, (2) investigate
opportunities in government agencies and in the pharma- the mechanisms of chemical toxicity, and (3) train addi-
ceutical field as well as in other private-sector firms tional toxicologists. A senior chemical industry official in
where they continued to make contributions. the 1970s characterized CIIT as the “crown jewel” of the
The post World War II era was also a period of sub- industry. I concur. It was this reputation that attracted me to
stantial growth of the chemical and pharmaceutical indus- serve as the third President of CIIT (1988 99) following
tries, especially in the United States and in Europe. This Leon Goldberg and Robert Neal. I would be followed by
included the development of a wide array of new pro- William Greenlee. In the early 2000s, the chemical industry
ducts, including many chemicals used in agriculture, and changed its strategy, centralizing funding decisions in the
from the pharmaceutical industry the development of a industry’s trade association and spreading its funding across
wide array of new drugs, including many that are now many organizations in addition to CIIT. The Institute was
widely used in veterinary medicine. The growth of these closed in December 2016.
industries was intertwined with an increase in research During its four decades of operation CIIT had a huge
and development. This included substantial research to impact on the field of toxicology and risk assessment.
ensure the safe manufacture of products and their safe All of the Institute’s research findings were published
use. This continued a tradition that began before World in the peer-reviewed literature without prior review by the