Contents

Attachments

Ali Esat Karakaya Lini Ashdown

United Kingdom

updated Apr 20, 2010 by Nick Thorp

Please help improve the WLT by reporting broken links and suggesting additional content and features by contacting the Country Correspondent or the WLT at Contact@wlt.org.

Country Correspondents
Lini Ashdown
Paul Harrison
Phil Holmes




Overview


View United Kingdom in a larger map Legend: = Government Agency, = NGO, = University, = Professional Society, = Poison Control Center, = Toxic Site.

Humanity's growing understanding that external agents may cause harm has an extremely long history, dating no doubt to the recognition by early humans that some plants and animals were poisonous and extending to the understanding that non-living materials could also cause harm. Indeed, the first known deity connected with poisons, Gula, dates back to 4500 BC, and treatises on herbal medical experiments with poisons date back to 2000BC. A number of philosophers - including Homer, Aristotle, Theophrastus and Socrates - from early Greek civilisation were clearly well aware of the effects of some poisons, while there are stories dating from the pre-AD period of experiments, usually on criminals, of the effects of poisons and the use of antidotes.

While Europe has its own long history of famous poisoners, such as Cesare Borgia and Catherine de Medici, and knowledge of the effects of poison even found its way into the plays of Shakespeare (Romeo and Juliet Act 5 "Thy drugs are quick. Thus with a kiss I die"), the formal study of poisons as a "science", in a way recognisable to modern toxicology is generally held to have started with Paracelsus - born Phillip von Hohenheim in Einsiedeln, Switzerland in 1493 - who famously wrote "Alle Ding' sind Gift und nichts ohn' Gift; allein die Dosis macht, dass ein Ding kein Gift ist" (All things are poison and nothing is without poison, only the dose permits something not to be poisonous). However, it was not until the 1700`s that toxicological treatises can really be identified within the UK by the publication of such work as "The Mysteries of Opium Revealed" by Dr John Jones in 1701, that discussed not only the medical uses of opium but also potential adverse effects, and a hypothesis by Dr George Baker in the 1760`s that lead in apple juice was to blame for a condition, Devon Colic, that had been known since 1655. The work of Sir Percival Pott is also of note in this century, with the recognition of an association between exposure to soot and the high incidence of scrotal cancer in young chimney sweeps in 1775, thus establishing the first demonstration that a malignancy could be caused by an environmental carcinogen. In turn, the 1800s saw early applications of forensic toxicology, for example, the use of a test developed by James Marsh as evidence of arsenic poisoning in a murder case in 1840, and also the introduction of the first measures to control the sale of a poisonous substance, such as the Arsenic Act of 1851. Indeed, a bill had been proposed as early as 1819 to regulate the distribution and sale of arsenic, but was heavily opposed by the Committee of Associated Apothecaries on the grounds that it would "embarrass the dispensing of medicines, and (was) not calculated to effect the object intended".

With the coming of the twentieth century, there were major developments across the globe in our ability to manufacture novel toxic agents and to detect them through chemical analysis, as well as a growing understanding of the mechanisms by which the toxic agents work and the types of effect that can occur; the first world war contributed in no small measure to this through the use of various poison gases in 1914 and the subsequent efforts by both sides to develop more powerful weapons and counter measures. Since that time, with its well established University system, the establishment of dedicated research units (e.g. the MRC`s Toxicology Unit, originally established at Porton Down in 1947, to study the mechanism of action of chemicals at all levels from the animal to the individual molecules) and our large chemical, agrochemical and pharmaceutical industrial sectors, the UK has been heavily involved in applied toxicological research, as well as contributing to basic chemical and biological (e.g. the identification of the structure of DNA by Crick and Watson at the Cavendish Laboratory, Cambridge University in 1953) understanding.

Thus, today the UK remains active in basic academic research and the application of such knowledge to practical issues across the wide field of toxicology, from the discovery and development of new drugs, regulation of the use of chemicals in relation to novel foods and food-related materials, biocides and industrial and consumer products, through to environmental- and eco-toxicology and forensic toxicology. The UK government has also played a leading role in improving the welfare of experimental animals (e.g. through the Animals (Scientific Procedures) Act 1986) and in promoting adoption of alternative test approaches wherever possible (e.g. through promotion of replacement, reduction and refinement for the use of animals, the so called `3Rs` principal) and its establishment of a National Centre for the Replacement, Refinement and Reduction of Animals in Research (NC3Rs). The current time is, however, a particularly challenging one in the history of toxicology in the United Kingdom (UK). As well as the need to address the challenges and opportunities posed to toxicological risk assessment by the rapid developments in new technologies (such as "omics") and the increasing understanding of the mechanistic basis of genotoxic and non-genotoxic carcinogenesis and mixture toxicology, there are the forthcoming challenges presented by a major step change in the approach to chemical regulation across the European Union (EU) with the impending implementation of the Registration, Evaluation (Restriction) and Authorisation of Chemicals (REACH) regulations in 2007. Supporting this wide range of activities is a growing base of academically and/or professionally trained toxicological specialists. For example, there are at present approximately 1000 members of the British Toxicological Society (BTS) and 297 UK Registered Toxicologists (the designation of which also confers membership of the EUROTOX Register of Toxicologists). The BTS, along with sister organisations such as the Royal College of Pathologists and the Institute of Biology and the Society of Apothecaries of London, oversee the professional standing of toxicologists in this country. The Society of Environmental Chemistry and Toxicology (SETAC) has a role in representing the particular interests of environmental toxicologists and ecotoxicologists.

A version of this article was published in Information Resources in Toxicology, 4th Edition,L Ashdown, PTC Harrison, P Holmes, M Takamiya, Copyright Elsevier (2009).


Government Departments


Government Agencies and Services


Government Advisory Committees


Government Funded Independent Research Councils


Non-Government Organizations


Universities


Professional Societies


Poison Control Centers


Miscellaneous Resources

  • OSHWorld (a collection of occupational safety and health resources)


Key Publications


Legal Links

 Note:* Also Consider --- EUR-Lex (Access to EU law) and N-Lex (A common gateway to EU national law sites)


About United Kingdom


Multilateral Organization Contacts


Literature References from TOXLINE (United Kingdom)

Labels:

Enter labels to add to this page:
Wait Image 
Looking for a label? Just start typing.

Toxipedia is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License

Powered by Atlassian Confluence and Zen Foundation