ABSTRACT
Initially, immunotoxicologists as toxicologists, focused their efforts on the identification of hazard, namely immunotoxic effects, and no attention was paid to immunotoxicity risk assessment. Therefore, most immunotoxicity data from animal studies are at best of limited relevance because they were obtained in experimental conditions remote from those of human exposure. In addition, until recently immunotoxicity was governed by immunological considerations much more than toxicological considerations. Fortunately, immunotoxicologists increasingly turned to assessing the risk in relation to immunotoxic effects (ILSI, 1995; Luster et al., 1994b; Belgrade et al, 1995; Trizio et al., 1988) and risk assessment is now emerging as a new and important area of immunotoxicology.
