リスク・ベネフィットコミュニケーション

抄録

The risks of food additives, medical products, chemicals among others have come to be recognized, as national awareness about health issues grows. Organizations and companies are responsible for providing useful information about the risk/benefit of products including their policy and service. A great health hazard could take place when companies fail to fulfill such responsibilities, and consumers will consequently suffer economic and social damage. To avoid such occasions, clear information about the risk and benefit must be given to consumers. In Japanese the word “communication” is not properly understood and usually interpreted as conversations. In contrast, risk communication is where organizations and companies provide and share transparent information with other stakeholders including consumers to enable information exchange and feedbacks. Risk communication is generally accepted as one of the three key components, along with risk assessment and risk management, in the process of risk analysis in the fields of chemical and environmental problems. The principles of risk communication put importance on sharing information on the risk among all relevant parties, not limiting to experts, so that consumers can make their own decision about the health risk and safety. How the risk/benefit varies depending on the field and product. A risk management plan on the medical products has been recently implemented. Here, I would like to discuss the way of the risk/benefit communication while taking the medical products as an example.