PUBLIC HEALTH GOALS FOR CHEMICALS IN DRINKING WATER Water Soluble Polychlorinated Biphenyls Expected to be Found in Drinking Water

with whom the Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment contracted through the University of California Office of the President for their peer reviews of the public health goal documents, and gratefully acknowledge the comments received from all interested parties. This Public Health Goal (PHG) technical support document provides information on health effects from contaminants in drinking water. PHGs are developed for chemical contaminants based on the best available toxicological data in the scientific literature. These documents and the analyses contained in them provide estimates of the levels of contaminants in drinking water that would pose no significant health risk to individuals consuming the water on a daily basis over a lifetime. perform risk assessments and adopt PHGs for contaminants in drinking water based exclusively on public health considerations. The Act requires that PHGs be set in accordance with the following criteria: 1. PHGs for acutely toxic substances shall be set at levels at which no known or anticipated adverse effects on health will occur, with an adequate margin of safety. 2. PHGs for carcinogens or other substances that may cause chronic disease shall be based solely on health effects and shall be set at levels that OEHHA has determined do not pose any significant risk to health. 3. To the extent the information is available, OEHHA shall consider possible synergistic effects resulting from exposure to two or more contaminants. 4. OEHHA shall consider potential adverse effects on members of subgroups that comprise a meaningful proportion of the population, including but not limited to infants, children, pregnant women, the elderly, and individuals with a history of serious illness. 5. OEHHA shall consider the contaminant exposure and body burden levels that alter physiological function or structure in a manner that may significantly increase the risk of illness. 6. OEHHA shall consider additive effects of exposure to contaminants in media other than drinking water, including food and air, and the resulting body burden. 7. In risk assessments that involve infants and children, OEHHA shall specifically assess exposure patterns, special susceptibility, multiple contaminants with toxic mechanisms in common, and the interactions of such contaminants. 8. In cases of insufficient data for OEHHA to determine a level that creates no significant risk, OEHHA shall set the PHG at a level that is protective of public health with an adequate margin of safety. 9. In cases where scientific evidence demonstrates that a safe dose response threshold …