By Sonya Lunder, EWG Senior Scientist

Even though toxic flame retardant chemicals were banned in 2006, pregnant women in California carry high levels of the hazardous substances in their blood, according to a new study by scientists at the University of California-San Francisco's Program on Reproductive Health and the Environment.

The research team tested the blood of 25 central and northern California women in their second trimester of pregnancy for polybrominated diphenyl ethers, or PBDEs. The results found PBDE at several times higher levels than previous prenatal studies conducted in the U.S. and in other countries, including China, India, Japan, Korea, Sweden and Spain. The PBDE levels found in these women were similar to concentrations measured in EWG's 2003 study of breast milk from 20 U.S. mothers.

Even though PBDEs can no longer be made in the U.S., these chemicals clearly still litter our environment. They were used for years as fire retardants in foam furniture and the plastic casings of TVs and computer monitors. They accumulate in people and wildlife and disrupt brain development and hormone systems.

In the U.C.-San Francisco study, women with the highest PBDE levels were found to have altered thyroid hormone functions. Since these hormones affect fetal brain development, the findings suggest that PBDEs could have a serious impact on the child throughout his life. A recent study of pregnant women in New York City similarly found that babies exposed to more PBDEs in utero had lower IQ scores in childhood.

To get the full picture of the study, its results, and why California women are at heightened risk, read this interview with Ami Zota, the study's lead author, published in the Los Angeles Times on August 10.

[Thanks to flickr & wwarby for the flames]

By David Andrews, Ph.D., EWG senior scientist

Most people are - by now - well aware that overexposure to formaldehyde is unsafe. From the FEMA trailer fiasco (remember Katrina?) to the Obama administration's recent decision to classify formaldehyde as a known human carcinogen, it's hard to not know you should avoid formaldehyde-laced products.

On June 28th, the Cosmetic Ingredient Review panel, a self-policing body created by the mainstream cosmetics industry in hopes of averting federal regulation, belatedly declared formaldehyde to be unsafe in "cosmetic products that will be heated." That's code for formaldehyde-based hair-straighteners, the best known of which is Brazilian Blowout. Salon workers use hot flatirons and blow dryers to force the chemical mixture to penetrate the hair, where it forms chemical bonds, allowing the hair to be reshaped stick-straight (which people are getting sick for).

EWG investigation details straightener dangers
As Environmental Working Group detailed in an April 2011 report, Flat-Out Risky, the personal toll of banishing natural waves can be high. Formaldehyde hair straighteners expose salon personnel and customers to a cloud of carcinogenic, allergenic formaldehyde vapor. EWG's investigation turned up numerous complaints of hair loss, blisters, burning eyes, noses and throats, headaches and vomiting.

The Cosmetics Review Panel's conclusion that formaldehyde hair straighteners are risky is couched as tentative, pending a 60-day comment period and a September meeting to formalize the stand. This panel is not known for bold or forward-thinking action: in more than 35 years, it has only found nine chemicals unsafe for use in cosmetics. Formaldehyde's health dangers have been recognized for decades.

Despite numerous warnings about the chemical's toxic properties, in 2007, a handful of small businesses in the U.S. and overseas began making and marketing so-called "keratin treatments." That year, Allure Magazine reported its own lab tests showing that these straighteners were loaded with formaldehyde. Yet neither the industry nor the federal Food and Drug Administration made a move to disavow these products.

Big companies scramble to avert new rules
Why is the cosmetics industry coming down hard on formaldehyde use? One reason might be a health hazard warning issued to salon workers last April by the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration (i.e., writing - very clearly- on the wall). Another might be scattered state regulatory efforts. Or the Obama adminstration's June 10 declaration that formaldehyde is a potent carcinogen.

Our money is on politics. We think the mainstream industry is hustling to convince Congress as well as consumers that it can play by safety rules and discipline bad actors. Can it be a coincidence that the industry panel acted just four days after the Safe Cosmetics Act of 2011 was dropped in the hopper by Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-Ill.), Rep. Ed Markey (D-Mass.), and Rep. Tammy Baldwin (D-Wisc.). With Congress considering writing rules for cosmetics formulations, the industry's major players apparently don't want to be burdened defending the small, indefensible formaldehyde hair straightener business.

Thank you for smoking for using formaldehyde-based hair-straighteners
Cast out as pariahs and rogues, three hair-straightener makers -- Cadiveu, Keratin Complex and Marcia Teixeira -- have taken a page from the playbook of the tobacco industry and formed their own trade group, the Professional Keratin Smoothing Council. According to its website this group boasts it represents "potentially one of the most lucrative categories to ever hit the industry" and to be "committed to the safety of salon professionals and consumers."

Notably absent is GIB, LLC, the Los Angeles-based maker of Brazilian Blowout, now the target of a consumer protection lawsuit by the California Attorney General's office. The council is looking for new members. You can join at pksc.org and pay dues on a sliding scale from $15,000 for a manufacturer to free if you are a "consumer supporter."

The council's scientific advisor is Doug Schoon, a chemist who has consulted for the industry and argued that the hair straighteners do not contain formaldehyde but rather methylene glycol. The American Chemistry Council, the voice of the American chemical industry, has dismissed this claim as nonsense on grounds that methylene glycol is aqueous formaldehyde, and to measure the formaldehyde content you add both the gaseous and aqueous forms. The Cosmetics Review Panel agrees.

FDA sees no evil, consumers left to protect themselves, again
Yet the FDA remains curiously mute on the issue. At the meeting in March, FDA officials said the agency still did not yet have enough information to go after formaldehyde in hair straighteners.

If you've gotten tired of waiting for the FDA (who wouldn't?), you can look up hair straightening products in EWG's brand-by-brand safety analysis. You'll also find a handy review of all the straightening options when you decide to ditch the formaldehyde.

By Paul Pestano, Research Analyst

After decades of debate, the Obama administration last week classified formaldehyde as a known human carcinogen, a label that is likely to advance regulatory steps to restrict this widely used hazardous chemical. The move came as the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services released the long-awaited 12th Report on Carcinogens, a Congressionally mandated report assembled by the National Toxicology Program of the National Institutes of Health.

The new report highlights animal and human studies that have produced evidence associating formaldehyde with an increased risk of nasopharyngeal and sinonasal cancers and myeloid leukemia. The International Agency for Research on Cancer, a branch of the World Health Organization, classified formaldehyde as a known human carcinogen in 2006.

The Environmental Protection Agency has expressed concern about formaldehyde's cancer-causing potential for many years but is still embroiled in a lengthy review process to determine whether EPA should declare categorically that the chemical causes cancer in humans.

That may change now that the federal government's scientific community has taken a definitive position with the publication of the 12th Report on Carcinogens.

Most of the 4.4 tons of formaldehyde produced in the U.S. annually goes to make adhesives for home construction materials such as plywood, particleboard, fiberboard and laminate flooring. The chemical is also used in embalming fluid and preservatives.

In recent years, a small but troubling market developed formaldehyde-based hair straighteners, the best-known of which is Brazilian Blowout. Environmental Working Group and the federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration warned hair salon workers and customers last April of significant health risks from exposure to formaldehyde in these hair products.

Regulatory Delay
The EPA issued a draft assessment in 1991 addressing evidence that formaldehyde causes cancer, but the chemical and wood products industries have successfully stalled any final determinations. A 2010 New Yorker article described the industry's substantial contributions to two senators who are largely responsible for the regulatory delay.

In 2004, Senator James Inhofe, R-Okla., then the chairman of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, demanded that EPA withhold a definitive statement on formaldehyde while the National Cancer Institute updated its information about incidence of cancer among workers exposed to the chemical.

In 2009, Senator David Vitter, R-La., held up the nomination of an assistant EPA administrator until the EPA agreed that the National Academies of Science should review the cancer assessment.

Both senators received donations from large petrochemical and forest product companies and their lobbyists.

Meanwhile, an amendment to the federal Toxic Substances Control Act signed by President Obama in 2010 set limits on formaldehyde emissions from composite wood products. This rule will go into effect in 2013.

Formaldehyde in Cosmetics
Last April, EWG released a report on the presence of formaldehyde in hair straighteners like the popular Brazilian Blowout. EWG found that these products, including some marketed as "formaldehyde-free," released large concentrations of gaseous formaldehyde inhaled by salons workers and customers. EWG obtained federal Food and Drug Administration "adverse event" complaints through several Freedom of Information Act requests that revealed that numerous individuals have reported severe reactions to these products.

Inexplicably, FDA continues to drag its feet on hair straighteners, even though it has known of the issue since 2007. It has so far declined to take action against companies making deceptive claims about their hair straighteners' formaldehyde content or to address related health concerns. FDA officials have said only that they are studying the situation.

EWG has petitioned FDA to act more assertively on chemical hair straighteners to protect public health.

By Leeann Brown and Lisa Frack

U.S. pediatricians are putting their considerable muscle behind the calls for Congress to overhaul the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA), a failed federal law that has exposed millions of children, beginning in the womb, to an untold number of toxic chemicals.

In its statement, Chemical-Management Policy: Prioritizing Children's Health, the American Academy of Pediatrics recommends that the 35-year-old Toxic Substances Control Act be "substantially revised," as it has "been ineffective in protecting children, pregnant women, and the general population from hazardous chemicals in the marketplace." Environmental Working Group would agree.

EWG President Ken Cook welcomed the pediatricians into this important effort to protect children's health:

"When the nation's pediatricians sound the alarm, it's time for everyone to act. These are the doctors who see and treat more and more children with autism, ADHD, cancer and other health problems that are on the rise in the U.S. and are associated with exposures to toxic chemicals.

It is my hope that all members of Congress take the AAP's call for reform seriously and think about the children they represent when it's time to vote."

Senator Frank R. Lautenberg (D-NJ) took the charge to reform the outdated law once again, and recently introduced the federal Safe Chemicals Act of 2011. Lautenberg's legislation would establish a protective standard by which chemicals' safety would be determined.

It would go a long way to eliminating spurious claims of confidential business information, which currently allow health and safety information of common chemicals to be withheld from the public, medical professionals and even within the Environmental Protection Agency. The EPA would set priorities among more than 84,000 chemicals in the agency's inventory, insuring the most problematic and hazardous chemicals are acted upon first.

Dr. Harvey Karp, a nationally renowned pediatrician and EWG board member sums it up well:

"People are innocent until proven guilty, but toxic chemicals should not be. The chemical industry must take the necessary steps to ensure its products are safe for human health before enter commerce and work their way into our children's vulnerable bodies."

Hear, hear. It's past time to reform TSCA. We're glad the to have this esteemed group of pediatricians on board to make it a reality.

By Jason Rano, EWG Senior Legislative Analyst

Once again, Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.) is leading the effort to try to contain the constant onslaught of dangerous industrial chemicals on our bodies. This week, Lautenberg, along with Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) and Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.), introduced the Safe Chemicals Act of 2011 to reform the broken and failed Toxic Substances Control Act. Lautenberg's bill will establish a system for ensuring that the thousands of chemicals to which Americans are exposed are safe. In 2011 style, the Senator announced his bill on You Tube:

It's not news to any of EWG's fans that regulation of toxic industrial chemicals is virtually non-existent. In the 35 years since President Gerald Ford signed the Toxic Substances Control Act into law - it's the only major environmental law never to be reauthorized - the Environmental Protection Agency has required testing on only 200 chemicals. Only five substances have been restricted or banned. The 1976 law is so weak that the agency was unable to ban asbestos - one of the most carcinogenic substances ever known.

There is little debate that the current law has failed and is in desperate need of an overhaul. We know, thanks in large part to EWG's biomonitoring research projects, that babies are being born pre-polluted with hundreds of chemicals. In recent years we've learned more and more about the risks associated with some of those chemicals. But we still don't know enough about most of them.

Lautenberg's Safe Chemicals Act of 2011 would require chemicals to be tested against a standard that protects the most vulnerable among us, including children. It proposes the same safety standard that has already proved effective and feasible when determining the safety of pesticides. And don't forget, many companies that make chemicals for consumer product also make pesticides.

The legislation would put the onus on chemical companies to prove their products are safe before they reach consumer products. It would give the Environmental Protection Agency authority to require companies to conduct further testing. It would impose some balance on out-of-control confidential business claims. In 2009, EWG released a report that showed that the public had no access to any information to about 17,000 chemicals in EPA's inventory. Since 1976, industry has claimed confidentiality of the chemical identity of nearly two-thirds of the 20,403 new chemicals that came on the market.

While the EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson has used her agency's limited authority to require testing and restrict chemicals - including eliminating many spurious confidentiality claims - scientists know much more about risks posed by industrial chemicals than they did 35 years. We can't sit idly by and believe that a law passed more than three decades ago will effectively protect us.

Throughout his distinguished career, Frank Lautenberg has been a tireless advocate for protecting public health. Since 2005 he has led the charge to reform the Toxic Substances Control Act. Environmental Working Group is honored to stand with him on this important issue.

By Jane Houlihan, EWG Senior Vice President for Research

Two weeks ago (Feb. 17), fellow activists proclaimed the upbeat news that the European Union had banned xylene and five other toxic chemicals that pose risks to human health and the environment. These would be the first compounds to be targeted for oblivion under Europe's much-touted chemical safety law known as REACH (for Registration, Evaluation, Authorization and Restriction of Chemicals).

That would be big news indeed, given that xylene is a component of gasoline. We were thrilled to see five toxic and largely replaceable chemicals on the list, but puzzled over how car owners would manage.

Our colleagues clarified the issue for us. It turned out that it was "musk xylene," a synthetic fragrance, not the kind in gasoline, that was on the hit list. That's a big difference, but still reason to celebrate. Musk xylene is a hormone disrupter that contaminates breast milk. The other five on the list are three phthalate plasticizers that the EU had previously banned in toys, a toxic fire retardant called hexabromocyclododecane and the cancer-causing epoxy resin and adhesive chemical 4,4'-diaminodiphenylmethane.

Well done, we say to those an ocean away who worked hard to get this done! Safer consumer products for all of us will surely follow.

But reporter Cheryl Hogue of Chemical and Engineering News soon enough reminded us of the limits of a REACH "ban." For one thing, a company can continue selling or using a banned chemical if it can demonstrate that the risks can be controlled or that economic or societal benefits outweigh those risks.

And then a policy expert in the E.U. confirmed -- the announcement marks the beginning of an authorization process that will determine whether the chemicals will be banned -- or not.

Suddenly our instinct to celebrate felt a bit like (oops) clapping after the first movement of a symphony. Hold the applause until the end, please.

REACH became law in 2006. In a universe of around 100,000 chemicals, the six just listed are the first to reach this point, the first step toward a ban that may not be a ban five years from now. Three years ago, European activists briefed us on their disappointment when the EU regulators original priority list of 1,500 toxic, high-priority chemicals was slashed to 15. And now it's down to six.

My EWG colleague David Andrews has found that there is rapid turnover in the chemical market. EPA spent more than a decade gathering toxicity information for thousands of high production volume chemicals, only to find that roughly 40 percent of those it studied are no longer being widely produced. About two newly invented chemicals are registered for use every single day - a fact that sets the pace for any agency that hopes to assess chemical toxicity in a timely way. How else will those reviewing the safety of chemicals here or in Europe keep up with this quickly shifting market?

We look forward to having the massive database of basic chemical safety data that REACH requires the industry to generate. But how - and how quickly - will the U.S. EPA evaluate these data for their own chemical safety determinations? We look forward to finding out.

In the U.S. this will all be just prelude to what EWG and many others have been pushing hard to achieve - a legislative overhaul of the tepid and toothless Toxic Substances Control Act we've been stuck with since 1976 (under which, as has been widely reported, EPA could not even ban asbestos).

Bravo to the European Union for coming up with its first list of six. Now it's time for everyone to pick up the tempo. We need to move markets, change minds, and - in Washington - pass a reform bill.

And please, hold the applause until the baton is down.

[Thanks to flickr CC and blatantnews.com for the EU flag]