 | This is anexplanatory essay aboutWikipedia:Manual of Style/Chemistry. This page provides additional information about concepts in the page(s) it supplements. This page is not one ofWikipedia's policies or guidelines as it has not beenthoroughly vetted by the community. |
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The majority of compoundscould be described by a long list of potential hazards as well as H&P phrases. Wikipedia doesnot aspire to be a surrogate for MSDS and doesnot provide advice as a matter of policy.The hazards associated with most chemical compounds are adequately described in the Chembox via GHSPictograms, GHSSignalWord, NFPA, or MainHazard parameters; further elaborated in H and P phrases.
When the safety section is warranted beyond the information in the Chembox, information should be succinctly presented. Pertinent information could beLD50 andTLV. Editors recognize that all chemical compounds could be abused and can be dangerous under diverse circumstances. In cases where the mechanism of toxicity is noteworthy in a chemical context, e.g., the inhibition ofmyoglobin bycarbon monoxide, a separate section within the article is often desirable because it illuminates the chemical subject. In a few cases where the literature and lore on toxicity is extensive, such ascyanide, an entire separate article can be warranted, e.g.cyanide poisoning. Obvious hazards that depend on knowledge of basic chemistry do not warrant inclusion. For example, sincehexafluorophosphoric acid is a strong acid, it is not necessary to state that it should be stored away from bases and reactive metals.
News reports of spills or accidents associated with a chemical compound, even though they may be tragic, are usually not notable. The description of hazards should avoid anecdotes. The role of Wikipedia is to give balanced and accurate information, allowing readers to reach their own conclusions. Hazards should be peer reviewed, and not taken from newspaper accounts. If an event is potentially significant enough to warrant inclusion as a safety hazard, first post it to the discussion page and discuss it with the Wikipedia community.
Descriptions of hazards should, as far as possible, be based on published, peer-reviewed sources, which should be cited at the appropriate point in the article. A list of resources for chemical safety information is given in the external links section of these guidelines.
In the usual encyclopedic way, the Project avoids serving either as a safety manual or a guide to regulation.[1] We follow the advice inWP:NOTGUIDE andWP:NOTMANUAL.
If a chemical is used as a pesticide, most likely its use is subject to extensive regulation, which will vary from country to country, and even depend on the province or state within many countries. Furthermore, most regulations change with time. Prudence must be exercised in covering such regulatory topics.
Depending on the extent of the information, this content may be incorporated into the Safety section or it may be a separate section on its own. If the compound is a drug, followWikiProject Pharmacology'srecommendations.
As indicated byWhat Wikipedia is not, editors are discouraged from providing advice about poisons or emergencies associated with chemical compounds: "a Wikipedia article should not read like a how-to style manual of instructions, advice (legal, medical, or otherwise) or suggestions."
The IPCS is a joint programme of threeUnited Nations specialized agencies (WHO,ILO,UNEP) with the collaboration of many other national and international bodies. It publishes several series of documents which may be of use here: these are peer-reviewed reviews, but are often long and technical. The three main ones are
Other IPCS publications which might be of use in specific circumstances include:
The IARC (CIRC in its French acronym) is an agency of theWorld Health Organization based inLyon, France. It publishes a series ofMonographs oncarcinogenic risks to humans which are very widely used around the world. Summary evaluations are available for all chemicals which have been classified as carcinogens by the IARC, and in some cases the full text of the monograph is available free of charge. These are apreferred source when discussing human carcinogenicity.
These are also published by the IPCS, but are much shorter than other IPCS publications (two pages!) and intended for a non-technical audience. They do not include citations to the original literature, but are peer-reviewed. They are particularly useful for providing basic chemical information (in the absence of a more specific source), and in providing NFPA-ratings which have been peer-reviewed (otherwise difficult to find).
The ECHA is the main site for EU-related chemical safety concerning e.g.REACH andCLP Regulation. Full GHS assessments of more than 100,000 chemicals with aEuropean Community number, i.e. in the European market are available.
The EU-OSHA site contains information of a more general nature about the use of chemicals in the workplace.
The OSHA is the federal agency charged withoccupational safety and health regulations. ItsSafety and Health Topics site provides several useful links.Permissible Exposure Limits (PELs)[4] are the legally enforceable standards for workplace contamination in the U.S.
NIOSH is a federal agency concerned more with research and training rather than with regulation. ItsPocket Guide to Chemical Hazards is a widely used summary of basic safety information, but mostly redundant toICSCs (see above).IDLH values (for "Immediately Dangerous to Life and Health", availablehere) are a useful response to the common question "how much of this chemical will kill me?"
The EPA is mostly concerned with pesticides and environmental polluants, information on which can be found through thePrevention, Pesticides and Toxic Substances site. ItsAcute Exposure Guidance Levels (AEGLs) give one response to questions about "safe" levels of chemicals for the general population (rather than in workplace situations).
The FDA is the source for U.S.-related information aboutfood andcosmetics questions. ItsEAFUS database ("Everything Added to Food in the United States") is a particularly useful starting point to find information.
The CDC promote public health in general, and most of their work on occupational health is conducted through NIOSH. However, theirEmergency Preparedness & Response site is a useful secondary source of information on some more exotic compounds, such aschemical weapons, for which little reliable information is available elsewhere.
The ATSDR is a federal agency which publishesToxicological Profiles on just over 300 substances. These are fairly long and technical, and often redundant to CICADs or similar documents.
The National Toxicology Program of theDepartment of Health and Human Services publishes a regularReport on Carcinogens: the most recent available version is the11th ed. The IARCMonographs (see above) are preferred as a source for carcinogenicity information, as they cover more substances in greater depth, but the NTP report is also reliable. The report also links to many other federal regulations concerning the substances listed.
From theNational Library of Medicine, available viaTOXNET
The HSE is responsible for promotion and enforcement of health and safety regulations in the UK.This page provides a variety of general publications about various chemical hazards.
Much of the regulation of occupation exposure to chemical substances in Canada is of provincial competence. There is a federal classification system, theWorkplace Hazardous Materials Information System (WHMIS), which can be searchedhere at the site of theCanadian Centre for Occupational Health and Safety (CCOHS). TheHealth Canada WHMIS site also provides a small amount of information on"Substance-Specific Issues". TheCEPA Environmental Registry ofEnvironment Canada list substances which are regulated under theCanadian Environmental Protection Act of 1999 (CEPA 1999).
The standard reference work for chemical safety, other than the sites and monographs given above, isSax's Dangerous Properties of Industrial Materials, currently on its 11th edition (2004, 4860 pages). It is available in most university libraries and in many large public libraries, and some universities have local access to a CD-ROM version. In citingSax's, it is not necessary that the most up-to-date edition is used, although that is obviously preferable if you have access to it.
The monographs of theAmerican Conference of Governmental Industrial Hygienists (ACGIH) in establishingThreshold Limit Values (TLVs) have not been widely used as a source on Wikipedia, as they are not accessible to most editors: however, they are widely cited by other secondary sources in the field and so would constitute a reliable secondary source if need be. Note that TLVs arenot legally enforceable in the United States, although they have been cited in civil lawsuits as an example of industry best practice.
Editors arestrongly discouraged from using the primary literature (e.g. journal articles) as sources for chemical safety information.
CommercialMaterial Safety Data Sheets present several problems as sources: these problems are shared by the various collections of MSDSs kept and compiled by university chemistry departments and by data retrieved fromIUCLID.
As a counterbalance to these problems, MSDSs or IUCLID are often theonly available source of safety information for a particular chemical: indeed, they may be the only available source of basic chemical data such as melting points. If that is the case, a separate safety section is inappropriate. However the relevant summary datamay be included in the chembox, with the MSDS as a reference or included in theExternalMSDS field (label the link as "External MSDS",not with the company name).