If regulators become the final authority, who ensures they keep pace with science?
Most of us place an extraordinary amount of trust in regulators. Every day they make decisions that affect the food we eat, the medicines we take, the chemicals used in our parks and workplaces, and the products we bring into our homes.
Most of the time we never think about those decisions — we simply assume someone has asked the difficult questions, weighed the evidence, and reached the right conclusion.
But here’s a question that rarely gets asked: who decides when regulators should change their minds?
Not because regulators are necessarily wrong — but because science has never stood still.
Why Regulatory Approvals Go Out of Date
When a regulator approves a chemical, medicine, or technology, it does so using the best evidence available at that moment. That decision is not a scientific endpoint — it is a snapshot. The problem is that science keeps moving.
Every year researchers publish new studies, develop more sophisticated analytical techniques, and investigate questions that barely existed a generation ago. Ideas such as endocrine disruption, cumulative exposure, the human microbiome, and long-term low-dose effects have become increasingly important in understanding how chemicals interact with biological systems.
Should regulators be expected to revisit their conclusions as that knowledge grows? Or is a decision made ten or twenty years ago still sufficient?
How Quickly Should Regulators Respond to New Scientific Evidence?
This isn’t a criticism of any particular regulator — it is simply the reality of scientific progress. History is full of examples where understanding changed over time. Lead, asbestos, smoking, and PFAS were all once considered acceptable under the knowledge available at the time.
As more evidence accumulated, regulatory positions changed, sometimes gradually and sometimes after years of debate. That doesn’t necessarily mean regulators failed.
It raises a different question: how quickly should regulatory systems respond when the evidence changes?
What the Monsanto Roundup Supreme Court Ruling Means for Regulatory Authority
The recent US Supreme Court decision involving Monsanto’s Roundup wasn’t really about toxicology. The Court did not review cancer studies, compare the findings of different scientific bodies, or decide whether glyphosate causes cancer. Instead it answered a legal question: who has the authority to decide what appears on a pesticide label?
The Court’s answer was straightforward. Congress gave that responsibility to the US Environmental Protection Agency. As long as pesticide labels comply with EPA requirements, individual states cannot require additional warnings through state-law failure-to-warn claims.
Whether people agree with the judgment or not, it highlights something significant — when regulators become the final authority on public warnings, confidence in those regulators becomes critically important.
Does the Current System Keep Pace With Modern Chemical Safety Research?
That may be the more interesting question.
- Do regulators actively monitor emerging evidence, or do they wait for a formal reassessment?
- How often are older decisions revisited?
- What threshold of new evidence is needed before a review begins, and who decides when that threshold has been reached?
These questions matter because science rarely changes all at once.
More often, understanding develops gradually as hundreds of individual studies slowly build a larger picture. If reassessments occur only once every decade or two, it is worth asking whether regulatory decisions can realistically keep pace with modern research.
How Canada’s Continuous Oversight Model is Changing Pesticide Regulation
This is one reason Canada’s recent decision to place glyphosate under a Continuous Oversight programme attracted international attention. Importantly, Canada did not conclude that glyphosate had suddenly become unsafe, nor did it announce a ban.
Instead, Health Canada recognised that significant new information continues to emerge and that ongoing evaluation may be preferable to waiting years for another formal reassessment. Rather than treating regulation as a series of fixed milestones, Canada is experimenting with a model that more closely reflects the continuous nature of scientific discovery.
Is New Zealand’s EPA Equipped for the Pace of Modern Science?
New Zealand has its own regulatory system and its own Environmental Protection Authority. The question isn’t whether EPA New Zealand is doing its job — the more interesting question is whether the system itself is designed for the pace of modern science.
- Should reassessments be triggered more often?
- Should regulators publicly explain how they evaluate important new research between major reviews?
- Should there be greater transparency around what evidence is considered, what is rejected, and why?
These questions apply just as readily to PFAS, food additives, medicines, and emerging technologies as they do to glyphosate.
Transparency is What Makes Regulatory Systems Trustworthy
Public confidence doesn’t come from asking people to simply trust the system. It comes from understanding how decisions are made, from transparency, and from seeing that regulators are willing to revisit earlier conclusions when credible new evidence emerges.
Perhaps that is the real lesson from the recent US Supreme Court decision — not that Monsanto won, and not that the science has been settled, but that when regulators become the final authority, society has an even greater interest in understanding how those regulators reach their decisions and how willing they are to revisit them as science continues to evolve.
History suggests regulators will need to change their minds.
The real question is how quickly they’ll recognise when it’s time.
Further Reading
Roundup Warning Label Lawsuit: What the US Supreme Court Ruling Means for New Zealand
If you haven’t already, read our companion article examining what the US Supreme Court actually decided in Monsanto Co. v. Durnell and why the ruling matters for New Zealand’s approach to glyphosate regulation and public accountability.
If Canada Can Continuously Monitor Glyphosate, Why Can’t New Zealand?
Canada has introduced a Continuous Oversight programme that allows regulators to keep reviewing important new evidence as it emerges, rather than waiting years between formal reassessments. Could this provide a model for New Zealand?
Why New Zealand Needs a Glyphosate Reality Check: Insights from Dr. Jodie Bruning
Dr Jodie Bruning explores why scientific understanding evolves over time and why regulatory systems should be willing to revisit earlier conclusions as new evidence emerges.
EPA New Zealand – Chemical Reassessment Programme
How does EPA New Zealand decide when an approved chemical should be reassessed? This page explains the current reassessment framework and the circumstances that may trigger a formal review.
International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) – Glyphosate
The IARC Monographs explain why glyphosate was classified as “probably carcinogenic to humans” (Group 2A) in 2015. The classification continues to influence scientific and regulatory discussions around the world.
The Structure of Scientific Revolutions* [Amazon.com]
By Thomas S. Kuhn
A landmark book exploring how scientific understanding changes over time. Rather than advancing in a straight line, Kuhn argues that science periodically undergoes major shifts as new evidence challenges established thinking. While not about glyphosate, it provides valuable context for understanding why regulatory decisions sometimes lag behind emerging science.
*For your convenience, we provide links to Amazon.com. If you choose to purchase through these links, we may receive a small commission — at no additional cost to you. Your support helps us continue our work.
Questions Worth Asking
- How often should regulators revisit decisions when new evidence continues to emerge?
- Should reassessments occur only after formal requests, or should continuous review become the norm?
- What level of transparency should regulators provide when explaining why new evidence does—or does not—change an existing assessment?
- If public trust depends on regulatory independence, what safeguards ensure that independence is maintained?
Image Source & Attribution
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