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Demand Gone Wild for Wild Salmon
Labor Group Disappointed as Asbestos Talks Fail
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May 26, 2004
Ford under fire for concealing safety tests
As the Detroit News reports, Ford Motor Co. has again withheld evidence of safety problems with its SUVs and other vehicles. For Ford, it’s hardly an isolated incident.
Ford has consistently fought mandatory increases in fuel economy for SUVs and other vehicles by invoking fears that higher mileage requirements would result in smaller, more dangerous vehicles. Safety has been used to beat back fuel efficiency regulations. In 2003, EWG’s investigation of Ford's own internal documents revealed a company that is shockingly indifferent to safety risks in SUVs, the very class of gas-guzzling vehicles it most wants to shield from increases in fuel economy standards.
The investigation, Suddenly Upside-down Vehicles, details egregious examples of Ford’s disregard for safety and willingness to commit fraud, including the company’s knowledge of rollover problems with the Bronco II – problems so serious Ford cancelled routine safety tests out of fear for the safety of the test drivers. In anticipation of rollover lawsuits, Ford “sanitized” critical engineering documents before the production of the Bronco II. http://www.ewg.org/reports/upsidedown/index4.php When litigation began to heat up, Ford paid a former company engineer $5,000,000 over eight years to lie in a series of 30 rollover cases.
Related story:
New York Times - Fraud Charged in Rollover Case
May 25, 2004
Study: American Pesticide Levels Are High
A new study by the Pesticide Action Network (PAN) found that a large percentage of people who had their blood and urine tested carried pesticides above levels considered safe by government health and environmental agencies.This analysis is but one of an increasing number of ‘body burden’ studies, as scientists refer to them, that are providing researchers with troubling insights into the health risks of everyday human exposures to toxic chemicals. Scientists have spent decades researching chemical contaminants in air, water and on land, and have now begun to turn their attention to an important pollution site they have by and large neglected until now: people.
In 2003, in an investigation by the Environmental Working Group (EWG), Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York, and Commonweal, researchers at two major laboratories found an average of 91 industrial compounds, pollutants, and other chemicals in the blood and urine of nine volunteers, with a total of 167 chemicals found in the group.
These findings about environmental contaminants in people have prompted unusually swift and rigorous actions on the part of government officials and companies as well as ongoing questions as to how these chemicals got into our bodies in the first place. These actions include a State of California lawsuit to force grocery store chains to label mercury-contaminated seafood and the forcing of 3M Company to alter its original Scotchgard formula after it was found to have contaminated every American.
Related links:
EWG Files Legal Challenge to FDA Mercury Health Advisory
Study Finds Record High Levels of Toxic Fire Retardants in Breast Milk from American Mothers
Toxic Fire Retardants Are Building Up Rapidly in San Francisco Bay Fish: And People
PFCs: A Family of Chemicals That Contaminate the Planet
May 21, 2004
USDA Weakens National Organic Food Standards
Grist magazine reports that the Bush Administration, at the behest of agribusiness lobbyists, has quietly taken several actions to weaken national standards for organic food. The Department of Agriculture made the changes without allowing public comment or feedback from the National Organic Standards Board, an advisory panel that is supposed to review changes to the standards. By keeping the changes quiet, USDA avoided a repeat of last year, when a Georgia congressman tried to weaken the standards so a farmer in his district could call his chickens organic. EWG's work to alert the public to the scheme generated a loud uproar and helped kill the bill.Among the USDA's recent changes:
* Dairy farmers who treat their cows with antibiotics will be allowed to sell the milk labeled "USDA Organic."
* Cattle farmers can feed their heifers non-organic fishmeal (the same PCB-polluted feed that results in farmed salmon with high contaminant levels) and still sell the beef as organic.
* Organic farmers, previously required to use only pest controls they were certain were natural and non-toxic (thus excluding pesticides with "secret" ingredients, hidden by pesticide manufacturers claiming proprietary reasons,) are now allowed to use some synthetic pesticides if the make a "reasonable effort" to determine that the pesticide products they use contain no toxic or non-natural pesticides.
RELATED LINKS:
• Grist Article: "Organic: Friend or Faux?"
• EWG's Organic Issues Page
May 18, 2004
Demand Gone Wild for Wild Salmon
The Oregonian reports consumers are increasingly choosing healthy wild salmon instead of PCB-laden farmed salmon. Studies over the past year by EWG and others have shown that farmed salmon has far higher levels of toxic PCBs than wild salmon. Higher prices for wild salmon are good news for Alaska and other West Coast fishermen who have struggled in recent decades.LINK: Read story
May 11, 2004
Labor Group Disappointed as Asbestos Talks Fail
The AFL-CIO expressed its dissatisfaction with the end of negotiations seeking an agreement between asbestos companies, insurers and those sick or dying from the harmful material.Statement of President John Sweeney on the End of Mediated Discussions on Asbestos Compensation Legislation
May 07, 2004
The AFL-CIO is deeply disappointed that after more than a year of intensive efforts we have been unable to reach an agreement with asbestos defendants and insurers on legislation to establish a no-fault National Trust Fund to compensate victims of asbestos disease. Throughout this process we have made our position clear that legislation had to provide victims fair compensation and be adequately funded.
Unfortunately, the level of funding which business and insurers were willing to support was inadequate to fund fair compensation values for victims. Moreover, given the current and future extent of the asbestos disease crisis and likely claims, we believe the fund could face financial insolvency and collapse within a few years at the levels of funding proposed by business. Such a result is clearly in no one's interest.
The AFL-CIO appreciates the leadership of Senators Daschle, Frist, Leahy and Hatch in this process, and also the special efforts of Senator Specter to try to help forge a consensus. We also deeply appreciate and thank Judge Edward Becker for his extraordinary service in facilitating and mediating discussions among the parties on this complex issue.
The AFL-CIO remains committed to seeking fair compensation for asbestos victims. The hundreds of thousands of workers and other victims who have been injured, suffered or died from disabling asbestos diseases deserve no less.
RELATED LINKS
• EWG's Asbestos Report
May 10, 2004
Talks on Asbestos Bill End
The Republican Senate leadership's asbestos bailout bill appears dead for now, after negotiations stalled May 7. The bill would have denied thousands of Americans their day in court, reduced damage awards to victims of asbestos diseases, and run out of money well before the epidemic of asbestos deaths peak.Until March, the bill appeared to be a slam-dunk. But the EWG Action Fund s investigation revealed that asbestos disease is growing a public health crisis and argued persuasively that any legislation should extend help to all the victims of asbestos.
Backers of the bill claimed that lawsuits by asbestos victims is bankrupting scores of U.S. companies and could even threaten the national economy. But the Action Fund s investigation found that "bankrupt" companies tell a different tale to Wall Street, calling their asbestos bankruptcies "good news" (Halliburton), with "little impact on day-to-day operations" (Babcock and Wilcox).
Despite what most Americans believe, asbestos is not banned and is still widely used in consumer products. More Americans die each year from cancers and other illnesses caused by asbestos than from fires and drowning combined. EWG Action Fund researchers recommend that the federal government ban asbestos immediately and look for a policy solution that will care for all victims - now and in the future.
RELATED LINKS
• EWG's Asbestos Report
May 7, 2004
Study Links Teflon Chemical to Higher Cancer Rates
According to a May 5 Charleston Gazette story, a new study presented at a meeting of the Society of Environmental Toxicologists and Chemists, or SETAC, links the Teflon chemical C8 [also known as PFOA] to elevated cancer rates. Researchers found higher levels of prostate cancer in men and cervical and uterine cancer in women exposed to C8 than in the general population.Americans have used and trusted the brand name Teflon for about fifty years, but the federal government has little data to support that trust. Teflon cookware was approved for use in the early 1960s with data from just one study. Since that time, scientists from government, industry and universities have compiled stacks of research linking C8 to reproductive damage, cancer, and other adverse health effects.
These chemicals build up in the environment and do not break down, and they appear to cause many types of harm in laboratory animals. Teflon chemicals are not just in your kitchen, either. Lots of surfaces are treated to resist spills or stains - carpets, fast-food packaging, clothing, cars, and more: all of these convenient products are likely making use of Teflon chemicals. They are found in more than consumer products, though -- C8 and similar chemicals are now in over 90% of Americans' blood as well.
• Read the Charleston Gazette story
• EWG's work on Teflon chemicals and the EPA's investigation of C8
May 6, 2004
NY Newsday, FL Times Union document diverse asbestos problems
As U.S. Senate leaders negotiate a trust fund for Americans sick or dying from asbestos, new facts are transforming the debate. Despite what many Americans believe, asbestos is still being used, and continues to cause new public health problems.Newsday reports that a study headed by Mt. Sinai Medical Center's Dr. Phillip Landrigan finds that the collapse of the World Trade Center towers sent an "intensely toxic" cloud onto New Yorkers fleeing the site and rescue workers trying to help. In addition to glass shards and cement dust, the cloud contained asbestos, lead and PCBs.
Meanwhile, Florida Times-Union reporter Steve Patterson has investigated widespread corner-cutting and fraud by contractors removing asbestos from homes, needlessly worsening the public health problem.
• Read the Newsday story
• Read the Florida Times-Union story