Used particularly in electric car and phone batteries, lithium, a substance toxic to reproduction, is also an endocrine disruptor about which knowledge needs to be expanded to control the health and environmental risks associated with its use, according to Anses.
Lithium, and three of its salts (lithium carbonate, lithium chloride and lithium hydroxide), is used " as a medicine, in the manufacture of car and phone batteries, glass, ceramics or even " certain cosmetic products", the health agency reminded on April 16, 2026 in an opinion.
“ Faced with growing usage and the emergence of mining and extraction projects In Europe and France, the health safety agency has drawn up an assessment of the potential risks of these substances to human health and the environment. It concludes that lithium has effects on the thyroid, constituting an endocrine-disrupting effect on human health", notes the French Agency for Food, Environmental and Occupational Health & Safety (Anses).
He also has of the toxic effects on various aquatic organismsincluding fish, invertebrates, algae and amphibians, even during chronic exposure"The agency adds. Consequently, ANSES recommends classifying lithium and its salts at the European Union level as " endocrine disruptor for human health " And " chronically toxic to aquatic organisms » within the CLP Regulation.
This regulation defines how chemicals containing a substance, or mixture of substances, that may pose risks to health and the environment must be classified, labeled, and packaged in the EU. This labeling may lead to more regulated use of these substances in Europe.
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Manufacturers are being called upon to take risks into account.
The agency also recommends " measures to collect the information necessary for the prevention of corresponding potential risksFurthermore, it calls on manufacturers, during their regulatory risk assessments, to to take into account the reprotoxic and endocrine-disrupting effects of lithium and its salts on human health, as well as its toxic effects on environmental species", within the framework of the regulation relating to batteries and battery waste in particular. ANSES, which has defined toxicological reference values, requests that all exposure data "human and environmental, that is" made available to public authorities“.
In December 2019, ANSES (the French Agency for Food, Environmental and Occupational Health & Safety) proposed to the European Chemicals Agency (ECHA) a labeling requirement for the three lithium salts indicating their proven toxicity to fetal development. ECHA must submit its opinion to the European Commission, which will decide whether or not to add lithium salts to the CLP Regulation; this procedure is still underway.
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