By Katie Scarvey
kscarvey@salisburypost.com
Toxic chemicals ó 287 different ones ó showed up in the blood of 10 Americans tested in 2004.
Ken Cook, president of the Washington D.C.-based Environmental Working Group (EWG), shared that disturbing statistic Thursday as he spoke to a large crowd at Catawba College’s Center for the Environment.
The information came from a research project undertaken by the EWG that analyzed blood samples.
The chemically polluted blood, however, did not come from adults.
It was taken from the umbilical cords of 10 newborn babies, who apparently are not such clean slates after all.
The chemicals broke down this way:
– 28 were waste by-products, like dioxins.
– 47 were consumer product ingredients, like flame retardants.
– 212 were industrial chemicals and pesticides ó including some like DDT that were banned 30 or more years ago.
“The placenta is not filtering out chemicals,” Cook said. “Industrial pollution begins in the womb.”
Close to half of the 287 chemicals are known carcinogens; more than half are also linked to birth defects.
The EWG, whose stated mission is “to use the power of public information to protect public health and the environment,” has embarked on The Human Toxome Project, Cook said. The project seeks to define the human “toxome” ó the full scope of industrial pollution in human beings. Volunteers are tested for industrial chemicals that enter the body through pollution or even through consumer products such as deodorant.
The chemicals are measured in parts per billion, and Cook says that people frequently assume that the small concentrations of chemicals that show up in blood samples are benign.
After all, he said, one part per billion is comparable to a single pancake in a stack of pancakes 4,000 miles high.
Cook pointed out, however, that many pharmaceuticals achieve their desired effects at low doses. One dose of Cialis ó the erectile dysfunction medication ó is concentrated in the bloodstream at only 30 parts per billion. Same for Paxil, a depression medication. And yet those drugs are having very real impacts on those who take them.
“Low doses can matter,” Cook said. “They can have effects,” whether adverse or therapeutic.
“We need to prevent chemical exposures,” he said, adding that in recent years we have seen disturbing health trends that can’t be explained by genetics.
The condition of hypospediasis, a urological deformity in males, has doubled in recent years, for example. Rates of childhood cancer increased 33 percent from 1975-2002. Childhood brain cancer increased 57 percent during the same time period. Rates of autism and asthma are increasing, and more couples are having problems conceiving and carrying pregnancies to term. Sperm counts have been decreasing by one percent annually.
“Chemicals are interacting with our genes,” Cook said.
We can’t avoid chemicals completely, Cook said, but there are some ways to minimize chemical exposures.
Certain fruits and vegetables, including peaches and bell peppers, are known to carry high levels of pesticide residue. Buying the organic versions of such higher-risk produce items can reduce exposure, he said.
We can also filter our tap water and eat low-mercury fish. We can use cast-iron cookware instead of Teflon, which research has shown to be a likely carcinogen. We can avoid fragrance in products.
Still, Cook said, we can’t “shop our way out” of the problem. Government has a role to play.
The 1976 Toxic Substances Control Act, the only major law on the books dealing with toxic chemicals, is inadequate, he said, and has never been updated. It does not require companies to test chemicals for potential impacts on human health.
Although pesticides and pharmaceuticals do have to undergo safety testing before they are introduced, most new chemicals are rubber-stamped, Cook said.
We need “a modern safety net” for toxic chemicals, Cook believes. Legislation dubbed the “Kid-Safe Chemical Act,” which would require that companies prove the safety of their chemicals for children, is about to be reintroduced.
Cook urged his audience to contact their representatives to make their voices heard and convince legislators of the need to protect our children.
For more information about the Environmental Working Group, go to www.ewg.org.