Risk Assessment as a Career
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| Title: | Risk Assessment as a Career | |
| Author: | Lara Pullen | |
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"There is no better job than working in the government. I have job security. I am not dependent on getting grants, and I have flexible hours that I didn't have in academics. I didn't find academics to be family-friendly at all, and that really makes a difference when you are a mother. Here [at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency] they discourage you from working overtime."
Having completed her Ph.D. in microbiology, Colleen Olsberg spent four and a half years running an immunology lab as a research associate. Then, at the age of 33, with two young girls and the anticipation of a third child, she took some time off to be with her young children and to look for the perfect job. Seeking a job in the federal government, she ended up hired by the EPA as a human health risk assessor. She hadn't sought to be a risk assessor, but she found that her scientific training in the basic life sciences provided her the background she needed to perform risk assessments.
Quantifying Contamination's Health Impact
The EPA and other regulatory agencies clean contaminated sites in order to minimize the impact to human health and to the environment. But it is difficult, if not impossible, to quantify the negative effect that results from exposure to an environmental contaminant. Risk assessments aim to put a number on the human health impact of contaminated water, soil, sediment, or air. Very little data is available on the direct effects of environmental contaminants on humans. Extrapolations must therefore be made from animal studies of toxicity, the first major component of environmental risk assessment. To ensure that these extrapolations are truly protective, uncertainty factors are built in. A toxicity value such as an LD50 is calculated based on experiments with mice. In order to apply this factor to humans, the toxicity value is multiplied by uncertainty factors: 10 to account for the possibility that humans are more sensitive than mice; 10 again in case sensitive humans, such as babies, are more sensitive than lab mice; and maybe by 10 again if the mouse studies are not particularly good. The result is a toxicity value that is removed from any actual data by a factor of 100 or 1,000.
The EPA calculates these toxicity factors and revises them periodically as new data become available and as time and resources allow. The average risk assessor will never have the need or opportunity to create a toxicity factor, although it is possible to expand one's career in that direction.
A Risk Assessment Is Algebra
The second major component of a risk assessment is exposure: with how much chemical does the average person come into contact? A range of exposure numbers are allowed by EPA headquarters, and the risk assessor can choose a number within that range. For example, an individual drinks 2 liters of water a day and eats 50 mg of dirt.
If all of this sounds unscientific, perhaps it is, but it is the best method available to model risk from environmental contaminants, and from there to calculate cleanup goals. These risk assessments represent the application of science to environmental decision making. Risk assessors combine predetermined toxicity values with predetermined exposure estimates to produce a number that represents an individual's chance of getting cancer (or some other health endpoint). The result is often a number such as one in a million or one in a thousand. This risk number is then used to make decisions such as how to clean a contaminated site, or how to provide clean drinking water to a community.
In the most basic sense, a risk assessment is algebra. Toxicity factor (predetermined and found in a database) multiplied by exposure (fairly standard) equals risk. Risk assessments can and are being performed by people with a B.S. in the life sciences. A good risk assessor, however, goes beyond the algebra and becomes a combination of magician, negotiator, communicator, and mostly problem solver. The more the risk assessor understands the science behind the assessment, the better she is able to explain, defend or perhaps even move beyond it.
Graduate School Helps
Olsberg describes the role of her Ph.D. in her job as a risk assessor: "Initially my job did not take advantage of my scientific training. At the beginning my focus was on very program-specific risk assessments. Later, I began to work on larger, multimedia issues that took advantage of my training. . . . I use my biochemistry and my physiology. Graduate school strives to teach you to question things and think on your feet. It teaches you to work through problems, and that has helped me. When I get put on the spot in meetings, graduate school training has helped."
Risk assessments are only one factor in the calculation of a cleanup goal. The decision also incorporates feasibility (an engineering issue), cost, and (unfortunately) politics. Sometimes, the determination of these cleanup goals requires heated negotiations with the industry that must pay for the cleanup or those that have a political stake in the outcome. At these times, the science behind the decision must be rigorously defended.
Amy Mucha joined the EPA as a risk assessor after completing her master's in immunology. She describes the process of negotiation like this: "You have to argue a lot with people for a living - but then, you learn that in graduate school." Pelka also explains the sense of accomplishment that comes from feeling that you have contributed to sound decision making. "It's fun to apply the scientific information and use it to inform better decisions. I feel that I get to use my scientific training to accomplish good. I feel like I have effected change."
Traditionally, risk assessors have an academic background in public health, toxicology, or epidemiology. Many employers will be surprised if an individual without a traditional toxicology or public health background applies for a risk assessment job and conversely, they would never think to recruit from schools that offer training in the basic life sciences.
Jobs in Both Public and Private Sectors
Howard Zar, currently a senior environmental scientist at the EPA, is an exception to this rule. He has hired individuals with an advanced degree in the health sciences with the assumption that they would be bright enough to learn the specifics of risk assessment while on the job. "I look for someone who has an advanced degree in the health sciences. .. . It helps if they show knowledge that goes beyond the health sciences. Performing the job requires flexibility and an ability to meet with the public and be believable and talk about things that affect people's lives and their children's lives. There has to be a sincerity about them and the work they do."
There are many risk assessment jobs in state and local governments as well as the federal government. In addition, large companies frequently keep risk assessors on staff, and there are many consulting firms that specialize in providing contract risk support both for government as well as industry. The Society for Risk Analysis is the major professional organization of risk assessment and claims over 2,200 members.
Salaries for federal risk assessors start at $35,000 (with a master's degree) and can theoretically go up to $80,000 (with a Ph.D. and experience). Private companies and consulting firms may pay much more. As with all jobs, an employer will be more receptive if the applicant has taken the time to learn about the specifics of the job, either formally by taking a course or informally through reading. Beyond that, being hired is a matter of convincing the government or company that you have intellectual flexibility, people skills, and the desire to learn a new and challenging field. |
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Lara Pullen has a Ph.D. in immunology and worked as a human health risk assessor at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency for three years. She currently is President of Environmental Health Consulting, a science communication company that specializes in risk to vulnerable subpopulations such as children. All employees work from their homes and have flexible hours. |
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Republished with permission |
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