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Gulf War Illness: As clear as the nose on your face
EPA widens rift with science advisers
12th Annual Heinz Women's Health and the Environment Conference
There are studies. And then there are studies.
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Toxins in our Kids' Foods: Where is the FDA?
Why, oh why is there plastic in my aluminum water bottle?
Fluoride in Your Water: How much is too much?
Borax: Not the Green Alternative It's Cracked Up to Be
Test Your Knowledge of Cosmetics Safety: 8 Myths Debunked
EWG's Tips to avoid BPA exposure
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Cutting the Pork from U.S. Farm Bill
Sunscreen safety & DC drinking water
Perchlorate in people, kids' personal care products & plastics, and sunscreen
BPA in baby formula & safe cosmetics
What can I do about fluoride in my water?
What is new carpet treated with? What can I do?
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FDA's moving goalposts on melamine in infant formula
Even though the global economic crisis has to be at the top of the incoming administration's agenda, President-elect Obama has signaled he isn't forgetting the other reason so many people voted for change: to do the few essential things we can't do for ourselves. As he put it in a press conference recently, "I think what the American people want more than anything is just common-sense, smart government. They don't want ideology. They don't want bickering. They don't want sniping. They want action and they want effectiveness."
That says it for all of us who believe it's past time to restore credibility to crucial government functions. Obviously, the new White House team must shore up our battered financial security. But close behind is what we at Environmental Working Group call hometown security. We need good policymakers and regulators, acting on the basis of the best science, to assure that we have pure food, clean water, clean air, safe household products, clean, reliable energy and ample jobs devoted to realizing all those basic requirements of a civilized society.
The current bunch of political appointees running the regulatory agencies don't seem to know or care that the taxpayers, not the industries they oversee, have been paying their salaries. Take the leadership at the federal Food and Drug Administration.
Please.
It's been a long time since the FDA front office could make a statement about a food or drug problem without sending our doubletalk detectors (that's the polite term) into red alert.
The latest episode to kick the meter into the red zone started with an Associated Press report last Tuesday that that the FDA had discovered traces of the industrial chemical melamine and a related compound, cyanuric acid, in a few U.S- made infant formula samples. It's hardly surprising that the story, sketchy as it was, made headlines around the globe: everybody who hasn't been living on Mars for the last couple of years knows about the massive melamine tragedy unfolding in China, caused by unscrupulous manufacturers who deliberately spiked baby formula supplies with the chemical to boost their apparent protein levels.
Melamine, a plastics component, is toxic in its own right and when combined with cyanuric acid can cause kidney stones and kidney failure. To date, according to Time Magazine, more than 60,000 Chinese babies have been sickened and at least four have died from drinking tainted formula. The scandal is still spreading as reports surface almost daily that melamine has turned up in Chinese food or animal feed exports.
Flooded with alarmed calls, FDA officials insisted that there was no comparison between the U.S. and the Chinese situations. On Wednesday, the Associated Press reported, Dr. Stephen Sundlof, director of FDA's Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition, characterized the levels of melamine found in Nestle's Good Start Supreme Infant Formula with Iron and the cyanuric acid level in Mead Johnson's Enfamil Lipil with Iron as "extremely low" - about l0,000 times less than the levels reported in Chinese infant formula.
But there was nothing reassuring about the agency's bungled handling of the matter.
For one thing, FDA officials didn't make public their own test results in an orderly fashion, with ample information on their website. They ran tests in October, sat on the results for several weeks, then released incomplete and inaccurate data to the AP in response to a Freedom of Information Act request. Corrections issued Wednesday only stoked confusion and doubt.
Even more suspicious was FDA's post-Thanksgiving Friday decision to move the goal posts.
On Oct. 3, in the midst of the Chinese scandal, agency officials posted an advisory on their website asserting that "FDA is currently unable to establish any level of melamine and melamine-related compounds in infant formula that does not raise public health concerns." That seemed to be a bureaucratic way of saying that anything more than zero wasn't safe.
The zero-tolerance position lasted only as long as Chinese products were the issue. When U.S. manufacturers' products came under scrutiny, agency officials scrambled to set out a new position. On Friday, they issued an update on FDA's investigation that declared that formula adulterated with 1 part per million of either melamine or cyanuric acid (but not both) was safe. (Two Nestle's samples tested positive for melamine at 0.137 and 0.14 parts per million, and three Mead Johnson samples tested positive for cyanuric acid at 0.247, 0.245 and 0.249 parts per million. Reports from China said that tainted formula contained as much as 2500 parts per million of melamine)
The one part-per-million mark is well above the adulterant levels found so far in U.S. formula. The FDA advisory declares flatly, "FDA's ongoing investigation continues to show that the domestic supply of infant formula is safe and that consumers can continue using U.S. manufactured infant formulas."
We hope so. But as has been said so many times about so many aspects of the Bush administration's governing style - hope is not a policy. If you don't have anything to hide, why hide? If you know what you're doing, why bungle?
Once the new team takes over FDA, maybe we'll find out why the agency handled the melamine issue this way. And maybe we'll learn a lot more about why FDA has been so determined to resist calls for reducing other contaminants that we know are in food and drink. There will undoubtedly be investigations led by members of Congress like Rep. Rosa DeLauro, D-CT, who told the Washington Post's Lyndsey Layton, "This FDA, this Bush administration instead of protecting the public health, is protecting industry."
But the first priority has to be the health of our children. They can't wait months or years for Congress and the new administration to turn FDA's file cabinets inside out.
That's why EWG president Ken Cook has written the major formula makers, asking them to tell the public exactly what they know about their products and what they are doing to make sure they're pure. As Cook put it, "When FDA claims there isn't any reason to worry, that's exactly what the consumer should do."
So we're looking for change - real change, not the Washington-revolving-door kind - at FDA. And we're keeping our doubletalk detectors tuned up.
Melamine in formula: Another round with the FDA
When the FDA says "there's no reason for any parent to be concerned for any reason," I want to roll my eyes. So when FDA spokesperson Judy Leon said exactly that about its recent discovery of melamine in U.S. Baby formula, I did roll my eyes, albeit briefly.
Then I tried to get to the bottom of this, since I wasn't feeling overly confident that the FDA and manufacturers have got it covered. I'm sure I'm not alone in turning elsewhere for the full, science-based story. The Associated Press' two articles are quite thorough, and as always with breaking news, there are stories cropping up by the hour.
Turns out the Associated Press broke the story by requesting results of formula testing under a Freedom of Information Act request (FOIA). FDA hadn't even told manufacturers about their findings. There are 3 firms involved in this mess (Nestle, Mead, and Abbott), and together they manufacture more than 90 percent of the formula made in the U.S. FDA originally gave the AP incorrect data, but Wednesday's story straightened it out.
Now we know that melamine was detected in Nestle's Good Start Supreme, cyanuric acid (a related chemical) was found in 3 samples of Mead Johnson's Enfamil Lipil with Iron, and Abbott (makers of Similac) told the AP their own tests had turned up some of the chemical.
What is melamine? It's a synthetic chemical with loads of familiar uses when combined with formaldehyde (dry erase boards, dishware, and formica, to name a few). When ingested at toxic levels, melamine can adversely affect kidney health and, as we saw with pets and babies in China, at high enough doses it can kill. Contaminants in formula pose an incredible risk to infants because of their small body size, intense appetites, immature body systems that can't metabolize toxic chemicals, and the fact that a single type of formula can be 100% of their diet.
If there is a silver lining to this situation (I know, I shouldn't mention linings since metal formula can linings still contain BPA, too...), it's that the amounts found are far lower than those found in China. But aside from that, I'm not feeling very grateful for an agency that has so very poorly protected public health in recent years.
At least it's common knowledge that the place needs an overhaul, and soon. Especially since it is contradicting its own prior statements on melamine by suggesting that the trace amounts being found are safe. Less than two months ago it made very clear where it stood on melamine safety, and it doesn't add up:
FDA is currently unable to establish any level of melamine and melamine-related compounds in infant formula that does not raise public health concerns
This change sure makes a parent wonder whether this lifting of the safety levels was due to increased understanding based on science and testing, or if it was conveniently raised because, well, they found some. Based on its abysmal, industry-preferring performance on bisphenol-A, my guess is the latter, but as with so very many toxins, we just don't know. And when it comes to feeding infants formula, not knowing just isn't good enough. So today we sent a letter to U.S. formula manufacturers, with this request:
Your clients have a right to know what your company is doing to identify and eliminate melamine in your infant formula, your strategy for preventing melamine contamination of your products, and how you are monitoring your products for all food additives and trace contaminants.Please tell them what effective and aggressive measures you are taking to fulfill your commitment to every child who consumes your formula.
Agreed?
A change at the top
As has been widely reported, California Representative Henry Waxman, chair of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform will replace Michigan’s John Dingell as chair of the powerful House Committee on Energy and Commerce in the next Congressional session.
While the gavel race between these two environmental and public health champions was clearly tough, someone had to win. We congratulate Rep. Waxman, who has long stood shoulder to shoulder with EWG and others as we’ve fought to reform the federal government’s lax chemical laws. With Rep. Waxman at the helm of Energy and Commerce, we may finally see our years of hard work and partnership pay off with the passage of the Kid-Safe Chemicals Act, which Rep. Waxman is co-sponsoring.
We also want to thank Rep. Dingell for his tireless work to improve the lives of Americans, both in leading the charge to investigate the use of the toxic chemical bisphenol-A (BPA) in infant formula containers, and his leadership in enacting of the landmark Food Quality Protection Act of 1996.
With both Reps. Waxman and Dingell in leadership roles on the committee and allies in the fight to protect our children from the dangers of toxic chemicals, EWG pledges our support as they begin to reverse eight years of the Bush administration’s failed policies.
Where have all the frogs gone?
Earth in Mind, a book by notable environmental educator David Orr, opens with two memorable and frightening statistics:
- Male sperm counts worldwide have fallen by 50% since 1938;
- There has been a marked decline in populations of amphibians - frogs, toads, salamanders, and newts - world-wide.
I first encountered David Orr's book in 2004, when, as a bright-eyed young instructor in an urban community college, I sought to share with my inner-city students the beauty and value of nature. I particularly wanted them to understand the urgency of the species extinction disaster that is facing all inhabitants on this planet - humans, animals, plants, even fungi. Orr's statistics eloquently articulated the inextricable bond between human and environmental health.
Enviroblog readers are very familiar by now with the dangers synthetic industrial chemicals pose to human reproduction, especially normal reproductive development of baby boys. Endocrine disrupting-chemicals, such as phthalates and bisphenol A, have been strongly associated with problems in fetal development and fertility.
It now appears that animals in the wild are as much or even more at risk for reproductive disorders and other toxic effects that threaten their survival. We can let the numbers speak for themselves. As reported by Amphibian Ark, a conservation organization, half of the approximately 6,000 species of amphibians may become extinct, and the remaining half is in trouble.
Scientists have fiercely debated the primary cause of the decline of the amphibian population. Certainly, loss and fragmentation of habitat, degraded air and water quality and changes in ecosystem structure because of climate change have contributed to the disappearance of frogs from our rivers and streams.
New research strongly indicates that amphibians are especially at risk from widespread application of agricultural pesticides.
Amphibians have highly permeable skin, which makes them particularly vulnerable to chemical contaminants. Moreover, unlike lizards, birds or mammals, whose developing offspring is protected by an egg shell or by the mother's body, the most sensitive, hormonally-regulated stages of amphibian development occur in the aquatic environment, where the defenseless tadpole is exposed to agricultural, industrial and urban contaminants. Imagine what is happening year after year as generations of frogs are being hit literally by truckloads and plane-loads of water pollutants.
Studies by Tyrone Hayes of the University of California at Berkeley and many other scientists has demonstrated that agricultural chemicals such as the herbicide atrazine, a ubiquitous, persistent contaminant of ground and surface water, have endocrine-disrupting properties that strongly affect amphibians. Atrazine both chemically castrates and feminizes exposed male amphibian larvae and also retards tadpole development and growth, inducing edema, erratic swimming and irregular behavior.
And exposure to atrazine is not a frog-only problem. EWG tap water database reported that between 1998 and 2003, 19.1 million people in 702 communities rank water contaminated with atrazine. In 345 of these communities, tap water was contaminated at levels above health-based thresholds established by EPA. Atrazine is the second most-commonly used pesticide in US agriculture, with 74-80 million pounds applied to the fields every year. No wonder so much of it ends up in our drinking water sources.
New research presented last week at the annual meeting of the Society of Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry indicated that atrazine suppresses immune system in an endangered species of northern leopard frog Rana pipiens. University of South Florida scientist Jason Rohr found that atrazine-exposed leopard frogs are especially susceptible to parasitic flatworms known as trematodes. As described in the journal Nature, trematode infections of amphibians can cause limb malformations, kidney damage and debility, most often with lethal consequences. The presence of phosphate, a fertilizer ingredient, aggravated the disease in frogs.
This research tells us that we need to look at the effects of chemical pollution not only in the laboratory but also in the real world. Rohr and his team found that atrazine suppressed the immune system of frogs, making them easy targets for parasites. Moreover, atrazine and phosphate spurred growth of aquatic plants that, in turn, triggered an increase in the population of snails that feed on them. The snails host flatworms, which are parasites that prey on the already-debilitated frogs.
The University of South Florida team concluded that their study, taken together with data on endocrine disruption, hermaphroditism and mortality in amphibians, raises serious concerns about the relationship between atrazine and global amphibian losses. They also noted that the important nexus between amphibian disease rates and pesticide and fertilizer pollution in water would not have been detected in standard studies used to register chemicals in the United States and Europe because these studies are typically conducted on laboratory animals, one chemical at a time. Clearly, this regulatory and legislative gap needs to be addressed. That's why the Environmental Working Group is backing the Kid-Safe Chemicals Act, federal legislation that promises comprehensive reforms, including a requirement that manufacturers prove their chemicals are safe before they go on the market.
Each of us can take one step immediately to help protect those beautiful frogs and salamanders, so that our children will be able to see them in the neighborhood pond, not just in a glass tank at a distant metropolitan zoo. It is very simple and very powerful: we need to support local organic farming and vote with our wallets as well as our ballots to promote sustainable agriculture that protects the health of humans and wild animal species alike.
Photo by ~sage~
Gulf War Illness: As clear as the nose on your face
If you follow environmental health policy, then you're well aware that there are more than a few folks out there who continue to assure us that low-dose exposures to toxic chemicals don't harm human health, despite a whole lot of (rapidly mounting) evidence to the contrary. Of course, this "there's not enough proof" and "if I can't see it I won't believe it" attitude is hardly limited to environmental health.
Right off the top of my head I can think of several other issues where some people's refusal to acknowledge and/or fully explore cause-and-effect continue to cause human suffering and delayed action at great cost. Gulf War illness is one of them.
Just yesterday, 17 years after the Gulf War began in 1991, a Congressionally-mandated Research Advisory Committee on Gulf War Veterans' Illnesses issued a 450-page report stating what has long been suspected but not fully accepted: it's real. Or, in the Committee chairman's own words, "When you look at all the studies, it's as clear as the nose on your face that this is real." How real? The report's press release says more:
The new report says that scientific evidence "leaves no question that Gulf War illness is a real condition," and it cites dozens of research studies that have identified "objective biological measures" that distinguish veterans with the illness from healthy controls.Those measures relate to structure and functioning of the brain, functioning of the autonomic nervous system, neuroendocrine and immune alterations, and variability in enzymes that protect the body from neurotoxic chemicals.
And to make it even more difficult for veterans, the Committee's Science Director explains how sufferers have been treated:
"Veterans of the first Gulf War have been plagued by ill health since their return 17 years ago. Although the evidence for this health phenomenon is overwhelming, veterans repeatedly find that their complaints are met with cynicism and a 'blame the victim' mentality that attributes their health problems to mental illness or non-physical factors."
It's hard to know whether to be glad it's finally been said, or incredibly frustrated that at least 1 in 4 of that war's 697,000 veterans have been in medical limbo for so many years, their bad health doubted. I feel both. And not solely because these honored citizens suffer without credibility or the appropriate medical attention. But because history is repeating itself. It took 20 years to admit that Agent Orange caused illness, and here we are again. And again, the chemicals are toxic and the health effects serious. The Washington Post summarized the report yesterday in a piece titled Toxic Chemicals Blamed for Gulf War Illness.
It is incredibly important to see these links between toxic exposures and adverse human health supported and confirmed. While in this case it is pesticides and the drug pyridostigmine bromide that are to blame, there are many others. But more to blame is our government's slowness to connect the dots. There is a rapidly growing body of respected evidence that tells us we are using chemicals with known and unknown adverse health effects that we don't fully understand, won't acknowledge, and can't remedy. It is high time that we protect public health from known toxic chemicals as if our lives depended on it. Because they do.
[photo courtesy of flickr commons]
EPA widens rift with science advisers
The stress crack between Environmental Protection Agency and its outside science advisers just got a lot deeper. In fact, these days it looks a lot like a thousand-foot crevasse.
The proximate cause: perchlorate, a rocket fuel component, potent thyroid toxin and ubiquitous water and soil pollutant, thanks largely to improper storage at military and space installations over the past four decades. Federal government and academic scientists have detected perchlorate in the urine of every American tested, public water supplies in at least 26 states, many agricultural products and even breast milk. Based on data from the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Environmental Working Group has estimated that as many as 44 million women who are pregnant, thyroid deficient or have low iodine levels are at heightened risk of exposure to the chemical.
Because perchlorate disrupts the production of thyroid hormones essential to normal brain development and is especially dangerous to fetuses and newborn babies, EPA's 30-member Children's Health Protection Advisory Committee has spent two and a half years pressing the agency to crack down on perchlorate pollution in drinking water.
EPA managers said nothing until Oct. 3, when they made a surprise announcement: the chemical posed no threat to most Americans, they declared, so EPA did not need to regulate it. The decision by EPA's front office, set to become final sometime next month, represented a major victory for the Pentagon and its clients -- defense and aerospace contractors responsible for perchlorate spills and reluctant to pay clean-up costs that could mount into the hundreds of millions of dollars.
Faced with what looked like a done deal, the children's health committee took the extraordinary step of posting a letter of protest on the EPA website.
The letter, signed by committee chair Melanie A. Marty, a senior career EPA official based in Oakland, warned that "the life-long consequences of impaired brain development are sufficient to merit" a federal safety standard for perchlorate pollution. Doing so, the letter said, "would mandate testing of public water supplies, and allow discovery of hot spots of contamination.
"This decision," the letter said, "does not recognize the science which supports the exquisite sensitivity of the developing brain to even small drops in thyroid hormone levels and the fact that neonates [newborn infants] have much diminished stores of thyroid hormone relative to adults." At stake, the letter said, were the fates of "millions of pregnant women and their fetuses, and lactating women and infants across the country."
EPA's 44-member Science Advisory Board [SAB] also filed a letter of protest, objecting to the agency's haste and lack of consultation with its science advisers. The letter, signed by board chair Deborah Swackhamer, a University of Minnesota environmental chemist, and Joan Rose, a Michigan State University microbiologist who chairs the science board's Drinking Water Committee, said that, "Given perchlorate's wide occurrence and well-documented toxicity to humans, the SAB strongly believes there must be a compelling basis to support a determination not to regulate perchlorate as a national drinking water contaminant."
The "compelling basis" standard, the letter implied, had not been met.
In an interview with EWG, Swackhamer says she and her colleagues on the science board did not understand why agency managers "seemed to be rushing to make a ruling on perchlorate.
"Whenever anything is contentious, it's appropriate to get more science input rather than less," Rose agreed. "Perchlorate is an issue in which there is industry and government involvement and strong opinions in the scientific community. We felt that all the science should be there, all the peer reviews should be out there, and there should be a lot of conversation before the determination moved forward."
Both panels criticized EPA's reliance on a computer model that is still undergoing peer review -- validation by disinterested specialists in the field of risk assessment. The children's health panel called the model's use "unorthodox" and "inappropriate." The model was devised by the Chemical Industry Institute of Toxicology (CIIT), a controversial chemical industry-created entity suspected of low-balling risk assessments for other environmental pollutants.
The SAB has asked EPA managers to give it time to formulate a considered response, but the agency has so far refused, signaling it will soon close the books on the issue. After the Jan. 20 Presidential inauguration, the Obama administration can take a fresh look at perchlorate pollution. But first, EPA's front office is due for a major scrub.
12th Annual Heinz Women's Health and the Environment Conference
Richard Wiles, the Environmental Working Group's Executive Director, and development associate Jocelyn Lyle joined more than 2,300 women for the 12th Annual Heinz Women's Health and the Environment Conference in Boston, sponsored by Teresa Heinz and Heinz Family Philanthropies.
Jocelyn's report:
When asked the question -- why women? -- Nena Baker didn't miss a beat but launched into a crisp, smart explanation of what she calls the" womb-to-tomb" exposure cycle." I had never heard the phrase before, but as I sat among 2,000 women nodding in unison, I realized how deeply we all felt about toxic chemicals that enter our bodies and those of our children through the air we breath, our food and water and consumer products
Before a baby is born, all its organs and tissues got through critical stages of development. The chemicals to which babies are exposed in the womb may cause permanent health problems.
Baker, author of The Body Toxic: How the Hazardous Chemistry of Everyday Things Threatens Our Health and Well-being, spent 20 years writing for The Arizona Republic and The Oregonian, then left daily journalism behind to embark a journey seeking answers to questions about her world. What makes water-repellent jackets water-proof? Perfluorooctanoic acid. What exactly is in that yellow rubber ducky in your child's bathtub? Phthalates. Both are toxins.
"We are running a collective chemical fever that we cannot break," she says. "Everyone everywhere now carries a dizzying array of chemical contaminants, the by-products of modern industry and innovation that contribute to a host of developmental deficits and health problems in ways just now being understood."
At the Environmental Working Group, we are helping people understand this chemical fever and are working to change the way people think about chemicals. EWG 's pioneering biomonitoring work is creating common ground between the scientific and medical community and environmental organizations concerned with the effects of chemical contamination on human health.
Like Baker, EWG's search for the truth is motivated by the realization that pollution in people is the direct result of a weak federal statute, the Toxic Substances Control Act of 1976g, that does not require chemicals to be proven safe to be brought to market or stay there. The answer: the Kid-Safe Chemical Act, an overhaul of the federal government's approach to the toxins around us. For details about what EWG is doing to make this important legislation a reality, go to www.ewg.org/kidsafe.
Like Nena Baker and the other women in the room, EWG hopes our journey will lead us to the passage of the Kid-Safe Chemicals Act so our children can have a safer and healthier future.
There are studies. And then there are studies.
By now you're probably familiar with the controversy around the U.S. Food and Drug Administration's (FDA) failure to consider all available, credible scientific evidence before it reassured the public that chemicals used in baby bottles and other plastics were safe. In other words, it relied on industry-sponsored studies to reach a conclusion that its Science Board has since rebuked.
So I guess I shouldn't be surprised that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) did the very same thing when deciding whether to regulate perchlorate in our drinking water. In this case, agency leaders chose to ignore authoritative studies from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and instead relied on a chemical industry-funded consulting firm. Sounds all too familiar, doesn't it?
And it makes me more than a little upset because perchlorate interferes with normal thyroid function (right, my kids), may cause cancer and persists indefinitely in the environment, but is currently unregulated by state or federal authorities. Terrific! And the evidence that it's a health risk is strong:
In 2006 the CDC published the results of a study of 1,100 women that showed clear clinical signs of perchlorate toxicity at real-world exposure levels. When pressed by congressional allies of perchlorate polluters at a hearing of the House Committee on Energy and Commerce, the CDC said that decreases in critical thyroid hormone levels in women exposed to perchlorate were "consistent with causation" -- in other words, that perchlorate probably caused their hormone deficiencies.
As someone who was pregnant twice and breastfed two children at length, I'm angry that perchlorate is unregulated in our food and drinking water. As a mother, I couldn't be more serious about promoting my children's optimum health; it's tragic that these days that job requires more protecting than promoting. Risking their thyroid function by giving them food and water laced with perchlorate is outrageous, especially when the EPA is clearly ignoring the facts.
So I couldn't be happier that EWG is calling them out on this. Loudly. Here's a few snippets of what we said in a letter we sent to the EPA just yesterday:
EPA’s decision not to regulate perchlorate in drinking water in the face of such compelling facts is irresponsible and indefensible given the strength of the evidence for stringent regulation. In fact, EPA reached its decision by using flawed models and methodology.The scientific evidence clearly points to the need for EPA to set a health protective drinking water standard for perchlorate – that is, a standard lower than the level shown to be associated with altered thyroid hormone levels in American women with low iodine intake. Unfortunately, EPA has relied on questionable science, an even more questionable computer model, and circular logic to justify its proposal to not regulate this harmful contaminant at all in our nation’s drinking water. This is inexcusable.
EWG urges EPA to overhaul its poorly crafted assessment according to the points described in detail below and to live up to its mandate of protecting public health by setting a stringent drinking water standard for perchlorate.
Why? Because our health depends on it, and we parents can't do it all ourselves. Can we?
[photo courtesy of flickr creative commons]
The Disappearing Male documents concerning issues
Humans are polluted with hundreds of different industrial chemicals. Even babies are born polluted, as EWG's studies show. So, the new documentary "The Disappearing Male" should come as no surprise to the ones familiar with the topic. It will be a good resource for the ones that are not.
According to the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, the makers of the film:
"The Disappearing Male is about one of the most important, and least publicized, issues facing the human species: the toxic threat to the male reproductive system.
The last few decades have seen steady and dramatic increases in the incidence of boys and young men suffering from genital deformities, low sperm count, sperm abnormalities and testicular cancer. At the same time, boys are now far more at risk of suffering from ADHD, autism, Tourette's syndrome, cerebral palsy, and dyslexia.
The Disappearing Male takes a close and disturbing look at what many doctors and researchers now suspect are responsible for many of these problems: a class of common chemicals that are ubiquitous in our world.
Found in everything from shampoo, sunglasses, meat and dairy products, carpet, cosmetics and baby bottles, they are called "hormone mimicking" or "endocrine disrupting" chemicals and they may be starting to damage the most basic building blocks of human development."
Even though the film is new, the news is not. The 2007 study from the University of Pittsburgh has found that during the past thirty years, the number of male births has steadily decreased in the U.S. and Japan. The study found a decline of 17 males per 10,000 births in the U.S. and a decline of 37 males per 10,000 births in Japan.
With many of the issues that EWG works on, it is hard to pin point and say that exposure to one chemical over X years will lead to Y. But, what we can do, is look at the chemical exposure trough the global health trends and draw conclusions from there. The conclusions are very concerning, to say the least.
TSCA? No, thanks. Kid-Safe? Yes, please.
How old were you in 1976? I was 7, the #1 hit song was "Silly Love Songs" by Paul McCartney and Wings, and gas cost 59 cents a gallon. These and most things have changed in the last 32 years, but not our country's toxic chemical regulatory law, the Toxic Substances Control Act, which was passed that year. And it's never been amended. Never. Even though it declared safe some 62,000 chemicals already on the market at the time, despite having little or no data to support the policy. Since that time, another 20,000 chemicals have been put into commerce in the U.S., also with little or no data to support their safety.
Hardly the kind of protection I want for my family, especially during my two pregnancies, when exposures are so very potent. The result? Babies are born pre-polluted with as many as 300 industrial chemicals in their bodies when they enter the world. Our testing has identified 455 chemicals in people and, more astonishing still, no one has any idea if these exposures are safe.
We are at a tipping point, where the pollution in people is increasingly associated with a range of serious diseases and conditions from childhood cancer, to autism, ADHD, learning deficits, infertility, and birth defects. Yet even as our knowledge about the link between chemical exposure and human disease grows, the government has almost no authority to protect people from even the most hazardous chemicals on the market. Under TSCA, the EPA does not have the authority to demand the information it needs to evaluate a chemical's risk, and neither manufacturers nor the EPA are required to prove a chemical's safety as a condition of use.
It's high time that the weakest environmental law on the books is made stronger. The good news is the Kid Safe Chemicals Act, which will change all that. For the better. How? Let me count the ways:
- Kid-Safe requires that industrial chemicals be safe for infants, kids and other vulnerable groups
- Kid-Safe requires that new chemicals be safety tested before they are sold;
- Kid-Safe requires chemical manufacturers to test and prove that the 62,000 chemicals already on the market that have never been tested are safe in order for them to remain in commerce;
- Kid-Safe requires EPA to review "priority" chemicals, those which are found in people, on an expedited schedule;
- Kid-Safe requires regular biomonitoring to determine what chemicals are in people and in what amounts;
- Kid-Safe requires regular updates of health and safety data and provides EPA with clear authority to request additional information and tests;
- Kid-Safe provides incentives for manufacturers to further reduce health hazards;
- Kid-Safe requires EPA to promote safer alternatives and alternatives to animal testing;
- Kid-Safe protects state and local rights; and
- Kid-Safe requires that this information be publicly available.
It's pretty clear that through the Kid-Safe Chemicals Act we can give our children a safer and healthier future. I know that's what I want.
Wanna learn more? Great! We have loads of user-friendly information on our Kid-Safe web page. Including a 1-page fact sheet that clearly compares what is (TSCA) with what could be (Kid-Safe).
In search of safe plastics
Following the inspiring example of Enviroblog’s Lisa Frack and her journey into post-plastic world, I started to wonder: what other convenient and ubiquitous uses of plastic in our lives act as a source of exposure to invisible, and yet very potent toxic chemicals. And the answer was not very far away as I opened my email on Friday morning and read the news of latest research on plastic safety - or, to be precise, lack of it.
On November 7, University of Alberta scientists reported in the journal Science that two chemicals leaking from plastic laboratory equipment were so biologically active they interfered with the function of a human brain protein and ruined a drug experiment. This finding has an uncanny resemblance to one of the early discoveries of Bisphenol A toxicity where BPA leaching from polycarbonate plastics stimulated the growth of breast cancer cells. The two substances found to leach from polypropylene labware - an antimicrobial chemical known as quaternary ammonium and a plastic softening agent called oleamide - now join the ranks of numerous other plastic polymer components that migrate into anything stored in these plastic containers.
According to the Toronto Globe and Mail, "The inadvertent discovery could have wide-ranging consequences because the chemicals causing the experiment to go awry were leaching from polypropylene, one of the most commonly used plastics in the world... The findings were so alarming to the researchers, from the university's faculty of medicine, that they issued a warning yesterday in the journal Science, alerting others scientists to the possibility that contaminants from plastic ware in their laboratories could put experiments at risk."
Where can we find polypropylene plastics in our homes? These plastics are marked by recycling code 5. Just now, running to check my refrigerator, I found a pack of cream cheese, a container of spreadable butter, and a yogurt tub, all packaged in number 5 plastic. Polypropylene is also used for manufacturing thermal coffee mugs, bottle tops, kitchen appliances, cutting boards, rugs, mats, bags and even baby bottles.
The most worrisome part of the story is that we don't know what chemicals may lurk in our tupperware, just as the University of Alberta researchers did not know what additives were present in their labware. This type of information is kept secret from the final users, guarded by the plastics manufacturers as proprietary information. The FDA, whose mandate is to ensure the health of the consumers, allows such secrecy, accepting the views of the industry rather than promoting honest public disclosure. So, is my thermal mug safe? I don't know, and that is making me very uncomfortable - and angry.
As EWG scientist Rebecca Sutton wrote EPA recently, quaternary ammonium compounds, common antibacterial agents, are reproductive and genetic toxicants linked to occupational asthma and immune sensitization. Released into wastewater, they persist in the environment and may lead to antimicrobial resistance.
Oleamide, routinely used to increase the malleability of plastics such as food wraps and adhesive coatings, can act as central nervous system depressant. Is this a kind of chemical I want in my morning coffee? I think not.
We need full disclosure of the chemicals plastic packaging leaches into our food. Manufacturers have no right to risk our health and the success of our biomedical research by hiding behind the claim of "proprietary information.”
Meanwhile, I am going to stick with my ceramic coffee mug.
Photo by davidking
Am I my water's keeper?
Pharmaceuticals and plastic chemicals in marine and fresh waters.
The concept of product stewardship, cradle-to-cradle, or, in more technical language, "life cycle assessment," has now acquired unprecedented urgency. It is no longer sufficient for businesses merely to manufacture a consumer item - be it a potent antibacterial pesticide or a flame retardant-loaded plastic - and sell it in the marketplace. As we look aghast at discarded products polluting the environment, we demand to know, "Whose job is it to clean up the mess?"
Let's go step by step, starting with prescription drugs and antibiotics. We all recall a deep feeling of gratitude for those moments when we really needed medicines, for a migraine or for a severe infection. But when these chemicals pass through our bodies or when unused pharmaceuticals are disposed by hospitals, nursing homes, veterinary practices or concentrated animal feedlots, they end up in our water streams.
Yes, FDA and EPA lack data showing health effects from exposure to low levels of anti-inflammatory or anti-seizure medications that come with our tap water. But that does not mean they are safe. Last April, the U.S. Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works called a hearing to press for more data about the effects of pharmaceutical-polluted tap water, especially for vulnerable populations such as pregnant women and newborn babies. As Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-CA., put it, "Fish and wildlife that live in our waters are the familiar 'canaries in a coal mine.' Scientific evidence is growing that small levels of contaminants, including pharmaceuticals, can damage reproduction and development in fish and wildlife. Science is telling us: be careful."
Next month (December 2008) the National Academies of Sciences is scheduled to convene a workshop to discuss the potential human toxicity from low doses of pharmaceuticals. Afterwards, EWG researchers will report to you on the latest science.
And let us also hear from the silent constituency. As Dr. Seuss told us in "The Lorax," his allegory about development, somebody has to speak for the trees, the Truffula Trees, that is, and the Brown Bar-ba-loots and the Swomee-Swans - all the animals and plants who in real life cannot flee from urban, agricultural and industrial effluents. In a cradle-to-cradle approach, the pharmaceutical companies should act as the responsible stewards of their products, making sure that drugs do not poison marine ecosystems and all the creatures that live in them. Already, the presence of "intersex" fish with reproductive organs of both genders has been linked to the growing load of endocrine-active substances such as pharmaceuticals in streams and lakes.
Some major drug companies are beginning to address the problem by developing biodegradable drugs, according to a recent article in the Environmental Science and Technology.
But we need to devote much more attention to this problem. Under the current FDA regulation of new drugs, pharma companies basically get off scot-free; they are not required to conduct environmental assessments for their products. This loophole must be closed, and drug manufacturers must be held accountable for the downstream impact of their products. They must design less ecologically toxic pharmaceuticals and embark on drug collection programs for proper, safe disposal at qualified facilities.
Pharmaceutical manufacturers, working with municipalities should develop and fund new wastewater treatment technologies able to cope with increasing loads of potent, biologically active water contaminants. Municipal water utilities also need to work with the EPA to test for pharmaceuticals in drinking water. We need to know the full scale of the problem in order to build support for change.
Let's also consider plastic pill bottles. The U.S. Geological Survey recently identified the toxic plastic component bisphenol A (BPA) as one of five most common ground water pollutants in national drinking water sources. Production and use of BPA-laden polycarbonate plastics and epoxy resins are the likely culprits. Again, marine life downstream is most at risk from this ubiquitous synthetic sex hormone. Plastic trash in the ocean is not just an eyesore but also a global transporter of pollutants - not only BPA but also PCBs and nonylphenol, which are endocrine disruptors and cancer-promoting chemicals. They accumulate in bodies of marine animals and threaten the very foundation of life on our planet.
These sobering studies bring us back to the need for stewardship. Reduce, reuse, and recycle. You make it -- you take responsibility for it, beginning to end.
Photo by Nuevo Anden
EWG Says: The BPA's Gotta Go
Well BPA sure has been in the news a lot lately, huh? And with good reason. We're following the goings on closely, and adding our voice to the debate. We recently sent a letter to top infant formula and canned food producers requesting that they take immediate steps to remove the endocrine-disrupting chemical from canned infant formula and other canned foods.
Because, as we've discussed here on Enviroblog before, if the FDA won't protect public health, consumers will act with their wallets by buying safer products, and advocates - like us - will request that manufacturers make needed changes. Here's what we told the producers:
"Liquid formula is the biggest culprit in exposing infants to a toxic hormone-disrupting chemical, but kid-friendly foods like canned chicken noodle soup and ravioli also have high levels of BPA,” said EWG Senior Analyst Sonya Lunder. “BPA was initially used as a sex hormone. It should never have been allowed to come into contact with infant formula.”“The evidence is overwhelming that FDA has been the industry’s lapdog,” Lunder said. “Manufacturers must immediately repackage formula and canned food to remove this chemical, shown by many studies to cause brain and reproductive system damage in crucial stages of development."
Read our full comments on BPA in liquid formula here.
And for consumers, we put together an updated advisory for parents, including answers to nine common questions. Lunder sums up the situation way:
Although completely eliminating exposure to bisphenol A (BPA) may not be possible, there are steps you can take to reduce your family's exposure to this chemical by avoiding common sources and limiting exposure for the highest risk groups.The developing fetus and baby are the most vulnerable to BPA’s toxic effects. Unfortunately they also have the most intense BPA exposure of any age group. Many parents who have replaced their polycarbonate baby bottles are unaware that BPA contaminates liquid baby formula sold in metal cans. Since formula can make up 100% of a baby's diet over her first 6 months of life, parents should choose BPA-free types.
Lunder (clearly a busy woman!) also testified recently to a BPA expert panel convened by the FDA’s advisory Science Board to evaluate an FDA staff risk assessment that termed bisphenol A (BPA) safe (!!) in food packaging. She highlighted seven shortcomings of FDA's risk assessment, every one of which the expert panel confirmed. See our side-by-side comparison here and our full comments here. One way or another, we'll be sure to get our message across. And we're hopeful that the FDA is listening.
[Photo courtesy of Wiki Commons]
I survived. I'm changed. No, really.
In case you didn't catch my post last week on our plastic free week, it's over. I did it! Well, truth be told, I almost did it. Which is definitely better than not doing it at all because I am changed. Call me post-plastic.
What did I do? Survived seven days without buying anything made of or packaged in plastic. I used plenty of plastic we already own, mind you, that made the week a whole lot easier. I also roped my husband and live-in cousin to do it, too.
Why? Simple: the great Pacific garbage patch.
Was it hard? Not really. But we did go without a few things as a result: among them sliced sandwich bread, because it seems to go hand-in-hand with its signature plastic bag, yogurt, and bulk items when I brought too few reused plastic bags. And cauliflower. Because it's white, it gets wrapped in plastic so it doesn't get bumped and ugly in transit. Who knew? My sense is that it gets easier over time because you learn what stores have the things that make it easier: bulk pasta, local produce, and ceramic coffee mugs, to name a few.
Of course, seven days isn't long enough to bump into real denial. Need new Crocs, get 'em next week (they're made of a resin called 'croslite,' not rubber as I had hoped). But, the longer you do it, the more alternatives you find. They're out there, and thanks to Beth of Fake Plastic Fish, they're listed all in one convenient place!.
Now what? I plan to focus on all that low-hanging fruit since, uh, I hadn't exactly plucked it yet. We all know to do it, but of course knowing is not acting, and doing it when convenient or you happen to remember (my old way) is far different than committing to it. Bringing your own grocery bags seems so e-a-s-y, so obvious, so yesterday's environmentalism. But if we're not all doing it, then it's still today's job.
Theories of behavioral change tell us that we're less likely to tackle the big stuff (solar house, selling the car) if we've not yet overcome the small stuff. So, for starters I'm going to stick with the small stuff, but in a committed way. Meaning... I'll walk back to the car to get my reusable bag, not buy the saran-wrapped bagel (for freshness!), and buy bulk food in my own reused/reusable bags. I will always bring my own reusable coffee cup, even though I'm not fond of lugging around the used ones. And I'm even going to try making our own yogurt, which, between you and me, is a little out there for me. We'll call it medium high fruit.
A mere week changed my habits and really bolstered my commitment. And it felt good. In one small way I'm closer to aligning my actions with my beliefs. So go ahead, commit to really use all those cloth bags you have, buy a few reusable produce bags, and show the world that you're the boss of how your family interacts with plastic, not manufacturers and retailers.
Some tips for success. Prepare ahead and shop where you can succeed. Not your forte? Mine either! But because most of our retail stores depend heavily on plastic to protect, showcase, and transport products, you have to arrive prepared - meaning find and bring the right alternatives. Make it on easy on yourself and shop where you'll find low-plastic items and staff will accommodate your requests ('can I get that to go in my own container?').
My plan? Keep an unplastic box in our car trunk containing a few simple but important items: reusable grocery bags, used plastic or reusable produce bags, a few reusable coffee mugs, and some eating utensils (I ate once with my hands last week to avoid a plastic to-go fork and prefer utensils, personally). Nothing hi-tech, all critical.
Anything profound about this? For me, yes. I realized that buying local is a good idea for yet another reason: transport = plastic. That eating fresh also = less plastic. That asking for the unplastic version raises consciousness ('can I get that cheese in my reused ziplock, please?'). I also ate in instead of taking out, which improved our week in a slow-food kind of way.
In the end, I came to see plastic as symbolic of our obsession with convenience, our hurried lives, and disconnection from the source of things. I also realized that making change doesn't have to mean going without. It just means going about it differently.
Wanna learn more? Get inspired by the pros! Check out Fake Plastic Fish and Life Less Plastic. It feels good to finally just do it, instead of just talking about it, already.
Come on, you do it! Tell you what, if you can get your family to do this for a week, let us know. We'd love to share your story.
Tips from the make-up artist
Prior to working at EWG, I was the happy ignorant consumer. I got my cosmetics at the regular drug stores, believing that what I buy is safe, because, otherwise it wouldn’t be there.
Since working here, however, my beliefs and my shopping habits have changed. I no longer shop without paying close attention and I am even getting better at reading labels.
More and more people are becoming aware of the ecological impact that cosmetics have. A lot of chemicals we put on ourselves are absorbed into our skin and are therefore as important as those we put in our body. Our studies show that we often can find those ingredients in human blood and that they even pollute pre-born babies. In addition, as we remove the cosmetics from our body, the go down the stream to pollute water sources.
Slowly but surely, people are realizing the impact of personal care products. People dealing with make up, like make up artists, are often the leaders of the trend.
This is no different for Paige Padgett, recently selected as one of three green makeup artists for the 18th Annual Environmental Media Awards in Los Angeles. Page made it her goal to be environmentally conscious in her profession, investigating ingredients, packaging and chemicals and is working hard to help people reduce their CCF (Cosmetic Carbon Footprint)
Some of her tips for consumers are:
1) Read labels. Shopping for cosmetics is like shopping for groceries.
You have to read the ingredients. Chemicals to watch out for:
A. Parabens--a preservative linked to breast cancer, weight gain
and hormone disruption. Its prefixes are ethyl, methyl, butyl, isobutyl or propyl.
B. Talc--contains a chemical that is similar to asbestos and can increase the risk of certain ovarian cancers.
C. Fragrance--this term is used to mask hundreds of chemical ingredients including phthalates, which disrupts the endocrine system and may cause reproductive and developmental harm.
2) Plan ahead. Make shopping easier by checking online first for chemically safe companies at www.safecosmetics.org or check brands and ingredients on the Environmental Working Group's Skin Deep database at www.cosmeticdatabase.com. I can't live without these resources.
3) Trash disposables. Purchase organic cotton wash clothes and natural sponges that you can wash and reuse.
Great suggestions! To read some of EWG’s tips, click here
Photo by ИoИ
