The Scientific Committee of the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) developed guidance for performing risk-benefit assessments of food. A stepwise approach is recommended for the risk-benefit assessment, i) initial assessment, addressing the question whether the health risks clearly outweigh the health benefits or vice versa, ii) refined assessment, aiming at providing semi-quantitative or quantitative estimates of risks and benefits at relevant exposure by using common metrics, and iii) comparison of risks and benefits using a composite metric such as DALYs or QALYs to express the outcome of the risk-benefit assessment as a single net health impact value.
After each step of the risk-benefit assessment, discussion and close collaboration should take place between the risk-benefit assessor and the risk-benefit manager on whether sufficient information has been provided or whether the terms of reference should be refined in order to proceed with the next step of the assessment. Two examples (selenium as an indispensable nutrient, and fish consumption) illustrate the proposed approach.
Guidance on risk-benefit assessment of foods
After the publication of the “Guidance on human health risk-benefit assessment of foods”, in line with EFSA’s policy on openness and transparency and in order for EFSA to receive comments from the scientific community and stakeholders on its work, EFSA engages in a public consultation on the mentioned guidance, receiving 280 submissions from 19 interested parties (non-governmental organisations, industry organizations and national assessment bodies), which are compiled in the attached document.
Public consultation results on the guidance
