Bioethics and toxicology

Human activity, involving nature and environment, alters the ecosystems in which we live; the question is whether this activity can be the source of risk and/or the origin of damages to human health. Risk assessment and risk management, connected with its protection, are not only a scientific and technical problem: hazards are real, but risks are social constructions. The role of toxicologists shows subjective features connected with different affiliations (industry, research, government); thus the assumptions and interpretations of risk assessment need to be integrated with wider psychological, social and political perspectives, in particular with ethical choices and values. Within public health personal subjectivities (genetic, biological and social) an adequate value should be given contrary to an abstract and collective entity which may erase and sacrifice subjectivities in favour of a statistical point of view. Public health should be considered as a whole of individual health conditions with regard to prevention, treatment and care.