Environmental pollution is recognized as one of the major causes involved in amphibian and reptile declines, in spite of which these animals have not been traditionally considered in risk assessment of some pollutants like pesticides, being supposedly protected through data retrieved from other vertebrate taxa. The development of the Regulation (EC) 1107/2009 concerning the placing of Plant Protection Products on the market has recently established that amphibians and reptiles must be considered in risk assessments in terrestrial scenarios, being amphibian aquatic stages supposedly covered by fish-derived data.

The current situation faces two problems: on the one hand, reptiles and terrestrial amphibian stages must be tested as part of risk assessment that manufacturers must conduct before their products can be approved, according to EU Regulations 283/2013 and 284/2013, but because of the large information gaps in this contexts, there are not internationally-approved standardized protocols for chemical industry doing so. Therefore, a clear necessity for developing and validating methodologies useful to test pesticide toxicity on these animals exists. On the other hand, amphibian aquatic stages are still supposedly covered by fish-derived data, but available information in this regard is not clear enough, and whereas some reviews support that fish would indeed cover aquatic amphibians, other suggest that available information is still scarce to get relevant conclusions. One of the main limitations of the amphibian vs. fish comparisons is that they are usually restricted to the most common lethal or growth-related responses, while relevant endpoints at the physiological level are often ignored.