Background to the ADI/TDI/PTWI

International scientific committees such as the Joint FAO/WHO Expert Committee on Food Additives (JECFA) and the Joint FAO/WHO Meeting on Pesticide Residues (JMPR), regional scientific committees such as those of the European Union, and national regulatory agencies generally use the safety factor approach for establishing acceptable or tolerable intakes of substances that exhibit thresholds of toxicity. The acceptable daily intake (ADI) is used widely to describe “safe” levels of intake; other terms that are used are the reference dose (RfD) and tolerable intakes that are expressed on either a daily (TDI or tolerable daily intake) or weekly basis. JECFA uses the term PTWI, or provisional tolerable daily intake, for contaminants that may accumulate in the body. The weekly designation is used to stress the importance of limiting intake over a period of time for such substances. When using this approach no-observed-effect levels (NOELs) or no-observed-adverse-effect levels (NOAELs) are identified in the critical studies, to which appropriate safety or uncertainty factors are applied. Although the value of safety factors varies depending upon a number of factors, 100 is most often used, which is designed to account for interspecies and intraspecies variations. Within the framework of the IPCS project on harmonization of approaches to the assessment of risk from exposure to chemicals, issues relating to uncertainty and variability are being addressed with the aim of relying, whenever appropriate, on data-derived safety/uncertainty factors. The ILSI Europe ADI Task Force has, for the past few years, been considering the scientific basis for the safety factor, which will be discussed by other speakers in the workshop. The value of the NOAEL is dependent on the design of the study. Because of the expense and time required conduct many studies, doses are usually spread over wide intervals. Thus, the no-observed-adverse-effect level may be considerably less than a marginally effective dose. In addition, use traditionally has not been made of the dose–response relationship when establishing ADIs. Newer approaches such as the benchmark dose may provide ways of making use of dose–response information. It is unlikely that consumption at the level of the ADI will result in significant risk to the consumer because of the conservatisms that are built into it. It usually is based on long-term studies that are intended to mimic consumption over the lifetime of humans. The ADI is applied to “discretionary” chemicals (food additives, veterinary drugs, and pesticides) by JECFA and JMPR, which are relatively easy to control if safety problems are identified. On the other hand, when tolerable intakes are derived for contaminants that are present in the environment at high levels, the use of standard safety factors could result in discarding large portions of the food supply. Thus, it is very important that the basis for the tolerable intake is fully described so that informed judgements can be made about the health consequences of exceeding it.