March 10, 2015

The Honorable Tom Udall

531 Hart Senate Office Building
Washington, DC 20510

The Honorable David Vitter

410 Dirksen Senate Office Building
Washington, DC 20510

Dear Senators Udall and Vitter:

On behalf of the undersigned, organizations committed to improving maternal and child health across our
nation, we are writing to commend your bipartisan efforts to amend the Toxic Substances Control Act of
1976 (TSCA). While our organizations are not presently prepared to endorse legislation, we recognize
and appreciate your concerted bipartisan attempt to move forward on an issue of great complexity in a
thoughtful fashion. Because vulnerable populations including pregnant women, infants and children face
ubiquitous exposure to chemicals, it is vital to ensure the safety of such chemicals.
TSCA is an outdated law in dire need of revisions to bring the regulation of chemicals into the twentyfirst century. At the time of its original passage almost 40 years ago, TSCA provided only an elementary
framework for the regulation of chemicals in commerce. Since that time, the law has remained essentially
unchanged, even as tens of thousands of new chemicals entered the marketplace and were used in a vast
array of consumer products and settings.
Since TSCAs passage, our understanding of the impact of chemicals on human populations has
increased significantly. Robust scientific evidence has emerged over the past several years demonstrating
that preconception and prenatal environmental exposures can have a profound and lasting impact on
health across the life course for both mother and child. In addition, as infants and children grow and
mature, their unique physiologic, developmental and behavioral differences make them especially
vulnerable to chemical exposures during critical windows of development.
The Frank R. Lautenberg Chemical Safety for the 21st Century Act is an important effort to put in place a
sensible federal framework to assess, evaluate, and regulate chemicals with an emphasis on the protection
of maternal and child health. Our organizations hope this legislation will serve as the basis from which
we move ahead in a timely fashion to craft a chemical management system that protects the health of all
citizens, but particularly the most vulnerable including pregnant women, infants and children.
Thank you again for introducing this legislation and advancing the debate on TSCA reform. We
appreciate your commitment to meaningful reform and public safety, and we look forward to working
with all stakeholders to make sure that any TSCA reform legislation is appropriately protective of
maternal and child health.
Sincerely,
American Congress of Obstetricians and Gynecologists
American Society for Reproductive Medicine
March of Dimes
Society for Maternal-Fetal Medicine