The Luxembourg Institute of Science and Technology (LIST) has announced the development of its Scan4Chem App to help consumers and citizens protect themselves and the environment from chemicals of very high concern.
Substances of very high concern (SVHCs) are chemicals that are, for example, carcinogenic, mutagenic, toxic to reproduction or particularly harmful to the environment. With the free Scan4Chem app, consumers can use the barcode of a product to obtain information about SVHCs in the product. This enables them to identify and avoid products containing substances of very high concern. With their request, they can also signal to the companies that they do not want to use such products.
The app, which has been developed by LIST in the framework of the EU LIFE AskREACH project, in collaboration with REACH&CLP Helpdesk Luxembourg, is being launched in fourteen European countries, starting with Luxembourg, Germany and Sweden. According to LIST, the app will later be launched successively in Austria, Croatia, the Czech Republic, Denmark, France, Greece, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Portugal and Serbia and all versions should be available in early 2020. The ultimate aim is to establish the app in most European countries over the next three years.
The app is available for free on Google Play and the App Store.
For further details, visit https://www.askreach.eu/.
