#378: Today's Toxics Policies Are "Ethically Unacceptable," Says Great Lakes Commission

=======================Electronic Edition========================
RACHEL'S HAZARDOUS WASTE NEWS #378 
---February 24, 1994---
News and resources for environmental justice.
==========
Environmental Research Foundation
P.O. Box 5036, Annapolis, MD 21403
Fax (410) 263-8944; Internet: erf@igc.apc.org
==========
RACHEL-4CM = DIOXIN FOCUSED DIRECTORY Remote Access Chemical Hazards Electronic Library. Dioxinnz.com
========================Original Source========================

The long-awaited 7th biennial report of the International Joint Commission (IJC) was issued last week. The IJC is a government body with responsibility for maintaining and restoring environmental quality in the Great Lakes. Past IJC reports have recommended policies that, taken together, define an entirely new approach to the problem of persistent toxic substances.

The 7th IJC report once again calls for:

** phase-out ("sunsetting") of all persistent toxic substances from the Great Lakes ecosystem;

** a ban on the manufacture and use of chlorine;

** an end to reliance on risk assessment;

** a ban on solid waste incineration;

** a reversal of the policy that assumes chemicals are innocent until proven guilty;

** adoption of the principle of precautionary action (which says: wherever it is acknowledged that a practice could cause harm, even without conclusive scientific proof that it does cause harm, the practice should be prevented and eliminated);

** An end to chemical-by-chemical regulation, substituting an approach that eliminates whole classes of chemicals by "strategically preventing the formation of the persistent toxic substance in the first place."

The IJC defines toxic substances as anything that can "cause death, disease, behavioral abnormalities, cancer, genetic mutations, physiological or reproductive malfunctions or physical deformities in any organism, or its offspring, or which can become poisonous after concentrating in the food chain or in combination with other substances." The IJC defines a PERSISTENT toxic substance as one with a half-life in any medium (air, water, soil, sediment, or living things) greater than 8 weeks, or one that bioaccumulates in the tissue of living organisms. The half-life of a substance is the time it takes for half of the substance to degrade, go away or disappear.

The 1978 Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement, signed by the federal governments of the U.S. and Canada, insists that, "The discharge of toxic substances in toxic amounts be prohibited and the discharge of any or all persistent toxic substances be virtually eliminated." In its SIXTH BIENNIAL REPORT in 1992 the IJC said, "This statement is the cornerstone of the Agreement."

The 7th IJC report says that "conventional scientific concepts of dose-response and acceptable 'risk' can no longer be defined as 'good' scientific and management bases for defining acceptable levels of pollution. They are outmoded and inappropriate ways of thinking about persistent toxics," the report says.

The production and release of [persistent toxic] substances into the environment must, therefore, be considered contrary to the [1978 Water Quality] Agreement legally, unsupportable ecologically, and dangerous to health generally. Above all, they are ethically and morally unacceptable," the report says. It goes on to stress the need for a zero discharge policy for persistent toxic substances: "The limits of allowable quantities of these substances entering the environment must be effectively zero, and the primary means to achieve zero should be the prevention of their production, use and release, rather than their subsequent removal."

The IJC was created in 1909 by the governments of Canada and the U.S. to oversee the Boundary Waters Treaty, which guides Great Lakes-related behavior of the two nations. Starting in 1912, and again in 1945 and 1964 the IJC was asked by the two governments to report on water quality of the lakes. The studies revealed progressive deterioration. In 1972 and again in 1978 the two nations signed Water Quality 

Agreements aimed specifically at improving water quality in the lakes. The goal of the 1978 Agreement was broad: "to restore and maintain the chemical, physical and biological integrity of the waters of the Great Lakes Basin Ecosystem." It is up to the IJC to manage and monitor efforts to achieve the goals of the 1978 Agreement. In 1981, the IJC began issuing a report every two years, describing the condition of the lakes in relation to the goals of the 1978 Agreement.

The new (7th) report says, "The theme of this report is that the time has arrived for a major shift in the way decision-making takes place for the Great Lakes ecosystem. In particular, society must adopt a clear and comprehensive action plan to virtually eliminate persistent toxic substances that are threatening human health and the future of the Great Lakes ecosystem."

Early in the report, the IJC asks what might happen if people refuse to control persistent toxic substances? Here is a long, verbatim quotation from the report:

"We do not know what ALL of the effects of human exposure will be over many years. Future research will clarify whether low-level and long-term exposures, repeated exposures, or isolated short-term exposures at sensitive stages of fetal development are most critical. For the Commission, however, there is sufficient evidence NOW to infer a real risk of serious impacts in humans. Increasingly, human data support this conclusion.

"The questions then become: what--if any--risks of injury are we as individuals and as a society willing to accept? How long can we afford to wait before we act? Why take any risks of having such potentially devastating results? In this vein, the Commission poses a number of other specific but very fundamental questions:

"** What if, as current research suggests, the startling decrease in sperm count and the alarming increase in the incidence of male genital tract disorders are in fact caused in part as a result of IN UTERO [in the womb] exposure to elevated levels of environmental estrogens?

"** What if, as current research suggests, the epidemic in breast cancer is a result in part of the great numbers and quantities of estrogen-like compounds that have been and are being released into the environment?

"** What if the documented declining learning performance and increasing incidence of problem behaviour in school children are not functions of the educational system? What if they are the result of exposure to developmental toxicants that have been and are being released into the children's and parents' environment, or to which they have been exposed IN UTERO [in the womb]?

"The implications of ANY of the above questions being answered in the affirmative are overwhelming. The implications of ALL of the above questions being answered in the affirmative are catastrophic, in terms of human suffering and the potential liability for that suffering and attendant health costs. Mounting evidence points to the latter possibility. Surely, there can be no more compelling self interest to force us to come to grips with this problem than the spectre of damaging the integrity of our own species and its entire environment," the IJC said.

The new report puts risk assessment into perspective: "Risk assessment is useful in decision-making, especially in setting action priorities, but is not directly relevant to the basic virtual elimination commitment. The Commission does not accept the argument that the elimination of persistent toxic substances should be subject to a risk-benefit calculation, as that is not the approach of the [1978 Great Lakes Water Quality] Agreement," the report says.

Users and producers of persistent toxic substances had told the Commission that phase-out of toxic substances would cause job loss outweighing any long-term health benefits. They said risk-benefit analysis showed that virtual elimination of persistent toxic substances would not pay. The Commission rejected that argument explicitly, saying, "to continue resisting a strategy that changes our production and consumption habits and moves away from reliance on persistent toxic substances, will be disastrous in the long term from all perspectives."

The Commission called upon industry representatives to stop denying toxics problems and to focus on solutions: "Representatives of industry, when presented with evidence of ecosystem health concerns about substances used in commerce, should react by embracing open dialogue, data sharing and fact finding, to resolve rather than deny, concerns and effect an orderly and timely transition to those solutions," the IJC says.

The Commission called for an end to incineration anywhere in North America that could affect the Great Lakes: "A growing number of incinerators operate within the Great Lakes region, contributing significantly to the load of contaminants, especially from the low-temperature incineration of industrial, commercial and household refuse containing plastics and solvents, coated papers and many other products," the report says. "Any strategy towards virtual elimination and zero discharge of persistent toxic substances must address the significant inputs from incineration," the report says. "The Commission urges the stringent regulation of existing facilities throughout North America, taking into account the need to ensure the zero discharge of persistent toxic substances from those stacks to the Great Lakes."

The report calls upon "Governments, industry and labour [to] begin devising plans to cope with economic and social dislocation that may occur as a result of sunsetting persistent toxic substances." It calls upon "Labour unions [to] include in their negotiations the issue of transition to a sustainable economy without persistent toxic substances." And it calls upon citizens to get involved: "Citizens should constantly ask political, social and industrial leaders about the effects of the use and discharge of pollutants on this and future generations," the report says, noting that "The patience of many citizens seems to be near a breaking point."

"Maintaining a healthy society means more than failing to discover disease," the report says.

GET: International Joint Commission, SEVENTH BIENNIAL REPORT ON GREAT LAKES WATER QUALITY (Washington, DC and Ottawa, Ontario: International Joint Commission, 1994), 58 pages, available free from the International Joint Commission, 1250 23rd Street, N.W., Suite 100, Washington, DC 20440; telephone: (202) 736-9000.

  --Peter Montague, Ph.D.

Descriptor terms: international joint commission; ijc; waler quality; water pollution; treaties; cn; canada; u.s.; regulation; toxic substances; toxics; sunsetting; chlorine; incineration; bans; zero discharge; reverse onus; precautionary principle; principle of precautionary action; persistence defined;

#378: Today's Toxics Policies Are "Ethically Unacceptable," Says Great Lakes Commission

=======================Electronic Edition========================
RACHEL'S HAZARDOUS WASTE NEWS #378 
---February 24, 1994---
News and resources for environmental justice.
==========
Environmental Research Foundation
P.O. Box 5036, Annapolis, MD 21403
Fax (410) 263-8944; Internet: erf@igc.apc.org
========== RACHEL-4CM = DIOXIN FOCUSED DIRECTORY Remote Access Chemical Hazards Electronic Library. Dioxinnz.com ================== Original Source ==================

The long-awaited 7th biennial report of the International Joint Commission (IJC) was issued last week. The IJC is a government body with responsibility for maintaining and restoring environmental quality in the Great Lakes. Past IJC reports have recommended policies that, taken together, define an entirely new approach to the problem of persistent toxic substances.

The 7th IJC report once again calls for:

** phase-out ("sunsetting") of all persistent toxic substances from the Great Lakes ecosystem;** a ban on the manufacture and use of chlorine;** an end to reliance on risk assessment;** a ban on solid waste incineration;** a reversal of the policy that assumes chemicals are innocent until proven guilty;** adoption of the principle of precautionary action (which says: wherever it is acknowledged that a practice could cause harm, even without conclusive scientific proof that it does cause harm, the practice should be prevented and eliminated);** An end to chemical-by-chemical regulation, substituting an approach that eliminates whole classes of chemicals by "strategically preventing the formation of the persistent toxic substance in the first place."

The IJC defines toxic substances as anything that can "cause death, disease, behavioral abnormalities, cancer, genetic mutations, physiological or reproductive malfunctions or physical deformities in any organism, or its offspring, or which can become poisonous after concentrating in the food chain or in combination with other substances." The IJC defines a PERSISTENT toxic substance as one with a half-life in any medium (air, water, soil, sediment, or living things) greater than 8 weeks, or one that bioaccumulates in the tissue of living organisms. The half-life of a substance is the time it takes for half of the substance to degrade, go away or disappear.

The 1978 Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement, signed by the federal governments of the U.S. and Canada, insists that, "The discharge of toxic substances in toxic amounts be prohibited and the discharge of any or all persistent toxic substances be virtually eliminated." In its SIXTH BIENNIAL REPORT in 1992 the IJC said, "This statement is the cornerstone of the Agreement."

The 7th IJC report says that "conventional scientific concepts of dose-response and acceptable 'risk' can no longer be defined as 'good' scientific and management bases for defining acceptable levels of pollution. They are outmoded and inappropriate ways of thinking about persistent toxics," the report says.

"The production and release of [persistent toxic] substances into the environment must, therefore, be considered contrary to the [1978 Water Quality] Agreement legally, unsupportable ecologically, and dangerous to health generally. Above all, they are ethically and morally unacceptable," the report says. It goes on to stress the need for a zero discharge policy for persistent toxic substances: "The limits of allowable quantities of these substances entering the environment must be effectively zero, and the primary means to achieve zero should be the prevention of their production, use and release, rather than their subsequent removal."

The IJC was created in 1909 by the governments of Canada and the U.S. to oversee the Boundary Waters Treaty, which guides Great Lakes-related behavior of the two nations. Starting in 1912, and again in 1945 and 1964 the IJC was asked by the two governments to report on water quality of the lakes. The studies revealed progressive deterioration. In 1972 and again in 1978 the two nations signed Water Quality Agreements aimed specifically at improving water quality in the lakes. The goal of the 1978 Agreement was broad: "to restore and maintain the chemical, physical and biological integrity of the waters of the Great Lakes Basin Ecosystem." It is up to the IJC to manage and monitor efforts to achieve the goals of the 1978 Agreement. In 1981, the IJC began issuing a report every two years, describing the condition of the lakes in relation to the goals of the 1978 Agreement.

The new (7th) report says, "The theme of this report is that the time has arrived for a major shift in the way decision-making takes place for the Great Lakes ecosystem. In particular, society must adopt a clear and comprehensive action plan to virtually eliminate persistent toxic substances that are threatening human health and the future of the Great Lakes ecosystem."

Early in the report, the IJC asks what might happen if people refuse to control persistent toxic substances? Here is a long, verbatim quotation from the report:

"We do not know what ALL of the effects of human exposure will be over many years. Future research will clarify whether low-level and long-term exposures, repeated exposures, or isolated short-term exposures at sensitive stages of fetal development are most critical. For the Commission, however, there is sufficient evidence NOW to infer a real risk of serious impacts in humans. Increasingly, human data support this conclusion.

"The questions then become: what--if any--risks of injury are we as individuals and as a society willing to accept? How long can we afford to wait before we act? Why take any risks of having such potentially devastating results? In this vein, the Commission poses a number of other specific but very fundamental questions:

"** What if, as current research suggests, the startling decrease in sperm count and the alarming increase in the incidence of male genital tract disorders are in fact caused in part as a result of IN UTERO [in the womb] exposure to elevated levels of environmental estrogens?"** What if, as current research suggests, the epidemic in breast cancer is a result in part of the great numbers and quantities of estrogen-like compounds that have been and are being released into the environment?"** What if the documented declining learning performance and increasing incidence of problem behaviour in school children are not functions of the educational system? What if they are the result of exposure to developmental toxicants that have been and are being released into the children's and parents' environment, or to which they have been exposed IN UTERO [in the womb]?

"The implications of ANY of the above questions being answered in the affirmative are overwhelming. The implications of ALL of the above questions being answered in the affirmative are catastrophic, in terms of human suffering and the potential liability for that suffering and attendant health costs. Mounting evidence points to the latter possibility. Surely, there can be no more compelling self interest to force us to come to grips with this problem than the spectre of damaging the integrity of our own species and its entire environment," the IJC said.

The new report puts risk assessment into perspective: "Risk assessment is useful in decision-making, especially in setting action priorities, but is not directly relevant to the basic virtual elimination commitment. The Commission does not accept the argument that the elimination of persistent toxic substances should be subject to a risk-benefit calculation, as that is not the approach of the [1978 Great Lakes Water Quality] Agreement," the report says.

Users and producers of persistent toxic substances had told the Commission that phase-out of toxic substances would cause job loss outweighing any long-term health benefits. They said risk-benefit analysis showed that virtual elimination of persistent toxic substances would not pay. The Commission rejected that argument explicitly, saying, "to continue resisting a strategy that changes our production and consumption habits and moves away from reliance on persistent toxic substances, will be disastrous in the long term from all perspectives."

The Commission called upon industry representatives to stop denying toxics problems and to focus on solutions: "Representatives of industry, when presented with evidence of ecosystem health concerns about substances used in commerce, should react by embracing open dialogue, data sharing and fact finding, to resolve rather than deny, concerns and effect an orderly and timely transition to those solutions," the IJC says.

The Commission called for an end to incineration anywhere in North America that could affect the Great Lakes: "A growing number of incinerators operate within the Great Lakes region, contributing significantly to the load of contaminants, especially from the low-temperature incineration of industrial, commercial and household refuse containing plastics and solvents, coated papers and many other products," the report says. "Any strategy towards virtual elimination and zero discharge of persistent toxic substances must address the significant inputs from incineration," the report says. "The Commission urges the stringent regulation of existing facilities throughout North America, taking into account the need to ensure the zero discharge of persistent toxic substances from those stacks to the Great Lakes."

The report calls upon "Governments, industry and labour [to] begin devising plans to cope with economic and social dislocation that may occur as a result of sunsetting persistent toxic substances." It calls upon "Labour unions [to] include in their negotiations the issue of transition to a sustainable economy without persistent toxic substances." And it calls upon citizens to get involved: "Citizens should constantly ask political, social and industrial leaders about the effects of the use and discharge of pollutants on this and future generations," the report says, noting that "The patience of many citizens seems to be near a breaking point."

"Maintaining a healthy society means more than failing to discover disease," the report says.

GET: International Joint Commission, SEVENTH BIENNIAL REPORT ON GREAT LAKES WATER QUALITY (Washington, DC and Ottawa, Ontario: International Joint Commission, 1994), 58 pages, available free from the International Joint Commission, 1250 23rd Street, N.W., Suite 100, Washington, DC 20440; telephone: (202) 736-9000.

 --Peter Montague, Ph.D.

Descriptor terms: international joint commission; ijc; waler quality; water pollution; treaties; cn; canada; u.s.; regulation; toxic substances; toxics; sunsetting; chlorine; incineration; bans; zero discharge; reverse onus; precautionary principle; principle of precautionary action; persistence defined;

#374: Asthma: Prevention May Be the Only Cure

=======================Electronic Edition========================
RACHEL'S HAZARDOUS WASTE NEWS #374 
---January 27, 1994---
News and resources for environmental justice.
==========
Environmental Research Foundation
P.O. Box 5036, Annapolis, MD 21403
Fax (410) 263-8944; Internet: erf@igc.apc.org
==========
RACHEL-4CM = DIOXIN FOCUSED DIRECTORY Remote Access Chemical Hazards Electronic Library. Dioxinnz.com
=======================Original Source========================

In 1990 the JOURNAL OF THE AMERICAN MEDICAL ASSOCIATION (JAMA) observed that death rates from asthma have been increasing in the U.S., Canada, England, France, Denmark and Germany. [1] Other sources report increasing death rates from asthma in Wales and Australia. [2] A new study of 10,526 asthma deaths in California during the period 1960-1989 confirms the U.S. trend. [3]

In the U.S., the increase has been rapid. Asthma death rates increased 31% between 1980 and 1987 (from 1.3 per 100,000 population to 1.7 per 100,000). The biggest increase occurred among children between the ages of 5 and 15.

These averages hide important facts about the people hardest hit. Among African-Americans, the age-adjusted death rate from asthma climbed from 1.9 per 100,000 in 1979 to 2.6 per 100,000 in 1984, a 37% increase in 5 years. Among whites, the age-adjusted increase during the same period was 25% (from 0.8 per 100,000 to 1.0 per 100,000). [4] The asthma death rate is nearly three times as high among African-Americans as among whites, and is worsening more rapidly.

In addition to asthma deaths, the PREVALENCE of asthma has been increasing steadily in the U.S. and elsewhere. According to JAMA, the best information on asthma prevalence comes from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Surveys (NHANES). NHANES data indicate that, among children ages 6 to 11, the prevalence of asthma increased from 4.8% in 1971-74 to 7.6% in 1976-1980, a 58% increase in a short period.

According to a 1988 study, among U.S. children ages 3 to 17, 9.5% (or 5.01 million) had been diagnosed by a physician, at one time or another, as having asthma, and 6.7% (3.54 million) currently have physician-diagnosed asthma. Among those currently having physician-diagnosed asthma, the prevalence of disease is 54% higher among African-American youths compared to all others (9.4% vs. 6.1%). [2]

All told, according to the American Medical Association (AMA), an estimated 9.9 million Americans suffer from asthma. [5] However, this number is flexible, depending upon who is defining the disease. By some estimates the number is as low as 7 million or as high as 20 million. [6] (In children, wheezing is likely to be caused by asthma; however, among adults, there may be several possible causes of wheezing, giving rise to differing estimates of asthma among adults.)

In any case, there is general agreement that asthma is increasing. Various studies have tried to explain away the increase: changes in the way the disease is defined; better diagnosis; better access to hospitals. The AMA says none of these reasons is persuasive: there really is more asthma occurring, and more people are dying of asthma.

No one knows for sure what is causing the increases. Asthma is a disease of the immune system. The immune system is an exceedingly complicated set of organs, tissues, and fluids, which, together, protect the body from outside invaders, such as bacteria and viruses. The immune system also protects against internal threats, such as cells that go haywire and start multiplying uncontrollably (i.e., cancer). In an asthmatic, the immune system overreacts to the presence of an external agent and ends up doing more harm than good. The bronchial tubes (which connect the throat to the lungs) become inflamed, produce excessive mucous, and also may constrict by muscular spasm. As a result, the person feels like he or she is drowning for lack of air, which is in fact the case. It is a nasty, debilitating disease. In inner cities, asthma is the leading cause of hospitalization among children ages 5 to 15. [7]

Although we know asthma is an immune system disease, this does not mean anyone knows much about its causes. The U.S. has been focused on cancer for two decades, spending $25 billion searching unsuccessfully for the holy grail (a cure), largely ignoring prevention. [8] As a result, research on the immune system has lagged behind.

Asthma in industrialized countries may be worsening because (a) there are more strange substances in the environment each passing day because of "better living through chemistry," and the immune system goes berserk responding to them (b) immune systems are knocked out of kilter by something new in the environment and then overreact to common substances like house dust or dog hair. Perhaps both are true.

It seems certain that asthma is triggered by common air pollutants, such as street-level ozone and nitrogen oxides, which are increasing as time passes. Fine particles definitely make asthma worse (see RHWN #373, but also see RHWN #131, #132b, #134 and #136). [9] Fine particles are pieces of soot or dust or smoke so small that they bypass the natural pollution traps in our nose and throat. In addition, the presence of fine particles in the air increases the incidence of non-asthma illnesses among asthmatics: chronic cough, bronchitis, and chest ailments increase among asthmatics as the concentration of fine particles increases. [10]

Furthermore, exposure to nitrogen oxides, sulfur oxides, and ozone are associated with increased asthma. [11] This should not be surprising since there is strong evidence that these air pollutants cause an increase in bronchitis, persistent cough, and chest ailments among people who do not suffer from asthma. [12]

On the other hand, there may be something more fundamental at work than mere pollutants irritating hyper-sensitive bronchial tubes. SCIENCE magazine, the voice of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, flatly attributes the asthma increase to damaged immune systems:

"In the 1980s, human immune systems were first faced with the blatant, destructive power of AIDS. Now, in the 1990s, humans--and immunologists--are encountering dramatic increases in yet another disturbing, though far more subtle, problem: Environmental pollutants are having a deleterious effect on immune systems. Indeed, everywhere these days doctors are seeing increasingly severe cases of immune-related diseases," said SCIENCE, specifically mentioning asthma. [13] What hope is there?

Asthma is one of those diseases that offers an opportunity to reassert our commitment to a prevention philosophy. The immune system is about as complicated as the nervous system, though not so well understood. It may take decades or longer before the physiological mechanisms of asthma are clarified. After that, many more decades of research will be needed to pin down which chemicals cause which effects. Interactions between multiple chemicals and immune systems will probably NEVER be understood: the problem is simply too complex for science to solve. In the meantime, asthma grows worse. The most realistic hope for reducing the costs of asthma is to reduce pollution and exotic chemicals in the environment. This means resurrecting a 19th century view of public health: curing most disease is impossible or impossibly expensive whereas prevention is often possible and affordable. Politicians and political appointees today say many of the right words about prevention, but so far this has not translated into deeds. 

                                                                         
--Peter Montague, Ph.D. 

=============== 

[1] A. Sonia Buist and William M. Vollmer, "Reflections on the Rise in Asthma Morbidity and Mortality," JOURNAL OF THE AMERICAN MEDICAL ASSOCIATION October 3, 1990, pgs. 1719-1720.

[2] Peter J. Gergen and others, "National Survey of the Prevalence of Asthma Among Children in the United States, 1976 to 1980," PEDIATRICS Vol. 81 (1988), pgs. 1-7.

[3] Marc B. Schenker and others, "Asthma Mortality in California, 1960-1989," AMERICAN REVIEW OF RESPIRATORY DISEASE Vol. 147 (1993), pgs. 1454-1460.

[4] R. Michael Sly, "Mortality from Asthma, 1979-1984," THE JOURNAL OF ALLERGY AND CLINICAL IMMUNOLOGY Vol. 82 (November 1988), pgs. 705-717.

[5] Kevin B. Weiss and Diana K. Wagener, "Changing Patterns of Asthma Mortality," JOURNAL OF THE AMERICAN MEDICAL ASSOCIATION Vol. 264 (1990), pgs. 1683-1687.

[6] Richard Evans III and others, "National Trends in the Morbidity and Mortality of Asthma in the U.S.," CHEST Vol. 91 No. 6 (June 1987) Supplement, pgs. 65S-74S.

[7] Philip J. Landrigan, "Commentary: Environmental Disease--A Preventable Epidemic," AMERICAN JOURNAL OF PUBLIC HEALTH Vol. 82 (July 1992), pgs. 941-943.

[8] Tim Beardsley, "A War Not Won--Trends in Cancer Epidemiology," SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN Vol. 270 (January 1994), pgs. 130-138.

[9] Alice S. Whittemore and Edward L. Korn, "Asthma and Air Pollution in the Los Angeles Area," AMERICAN JOURNAL OF PUBLIC HEALTH Vol. 70 (July 1980), pgs. 687-696; C. Arden Pope III, "Respiratory Disease Associated with Community Air Pollution and a Steel Mill, Utah Valley," AMERICAN JOURNAL OF PUBLIC HEALTH Vol. 79 (1989), pgs. 623-628; C. Arden Pope III, "Respiratory Hospital Admissions Associated With PM10 Pollution in Utah, Salt Lake, and Cache Valleys," ARCHIVES OF ENVIRONMENTAL HEALTH Vol. 46 (1991), pgs. 90-97; C. Arden Pope III and others, "Respiratory Health and PM10 Pollution," AMERICAN REVIEW OF RESPIRATORY DISEASE Vol. 144 (1991), pgs. 668-674; Robert A. Bethel, "Asthma & Air Pollution," MEDICAL/SCIENTIFIC UPDATE [a publication of the National Jewish Center for Immunology and Respiratory Medicine, Denver, Colo.] Vol. 6 No. 9 (October 1987), pgs. 1-4; David V. Bates and Ronnie Sizto, "Air Pollution and Hospital Admissions in Southern Ontario: The Acid Summer Haze Effect," ENVIRONMENTAL RESEARCH Vol. 43 (1987), pgs. 317-331.

[10] Douglas Dockery and others, "Effects of Inhalable Particles on Respiratory Health of Children," AMERICAN REVIEW OF RESPIRATORY DISEASE Vol. 189 (1989), pgs. 587-594.

[11] Bart D. Ostro and others, "Asthmatic Responses to Airborne Acid Aerosols," AMERICAN JOURNAL OF PUBLIC HEALTH Vol. 81 (June 1991), pgs. 694-702; Jane Q. Koenig and others, "The Effects of Inhaled Sulfuric Acid and Pulmonary Function in Adolescent Asthmatics," AMERICAN REVIEW OF RESPIRATORY DISEASE Vol. 128 (1983), pgs. 221-225; and "Bronchial Asthma and the Environment," LANCET No. 8510 (October 4, 1986), pgs. 786-787.

[12] Bart D. Ostro and Susy Rothschild, "Air Pollution and Acute Respiratory Morbidity: An Observational Study of Multiple Pollutants," ENVIRONMENTAL RESEARCH Vol. 50 (1989), pgs. 238-247; J.H. Ware and others, "Effects of Sulfur Oxides and Suspended Particles on Respiratory Health of Preadolescent Children," AMERICAN REVIEW OF RESPIRATORY DISEASE Vol. 133 (1986), pgs. 834-842; Charlotte Braun-Fahrlander, "Air Pollution and Respiratory Symptoms in Preschool Children," AMERICAN REVIEW OF RESPIRATORY DISEASE Vol. 145 (1992), pgs. 42-47; and Joel Schwartz, "Lung Function and Chronic Exposure to Air Pollution: A Cross-Sectional Analysis of NHANES II," ENVIRONMENTAL RESEARCH Vol. 50 (1989), pgs. 309-321.

[13] Richard Stone, "Immunology: Pollutants a Growing Threat," SCIENCE Vol. 256 (April 3, 1992), pg. 28.

Descriptor terms: asthma; morbidity statistics; mortality statistics; us; canada; england; debmark; france; germany; australia; wales; ca; children; respiratory disease; african-americans; race and health; nhanes; american medical association; ama; immune system; air pollution; ozone; nitrogen oxides; sulfur oxides; sulfur dioxide;

#375: Cancer Down On the Farm

=======================Electronic Edition========================
RACHEL'S HAZARDOUS WASTE NEWS #375 
---February 3, 1994---
News and resources for environmental justice.
==========
Environmental Research Foundation
P.O. Box 5036, Annapolis, MD 21403
Fax (410) 263-8944; Internet: erf@igc.apc.org ==========
RACHEL-4CM = DIOXIN FOCUSED DIRECTORY Remote Access Chemical Hazards Electronic Library. Dioxinnz.com =======================Original Source========================

The U.S. is losing its war on cancer, according to a long article in the January, 1994 SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN. [1] The basic measure of success or failure -- the age-adjusted cancer death rate -- continues to climb slowly year after year, despite $25 billion spent to find a cure since 1971 when Richard Nixon declared a national "war on cancer."

The cancer establishment--the largely male, largely white and largely elderly group of researchers who act as gatekeepers for cancer research dollars--try to put a good face on it. They point to reductions in deaths from childhood cancers, reductions in cancer deaths among young adults, and reductions in deaths from some specific cancers. Still the fact remains that the total age-adjusted death rate for cancer continues to climb year after year. The rise in the cancer death rate is particularly steep among people 65 and over.

The cancer establishment tends to blame cancer on individual lifestyles, such as diets high in fat and low in fiber. There is one major problem with this argument. Heart disease is known to be associated with cigarette smoking, heavy use of alcohol, and diets high in fat and low in fiber and low in antioxidants [beta-carotene, vitamin E and selenium, for example]. In several countries heart disease rates are decreasing. In the U.S., heart disease is down 40% from its peak in the 1960s. It therefore seems unlikely that recent increases in cancer are caused by the same factors that cause heart disease.

Now a group of younger cancer researchers is advocating a return to the fundamental principles of public health developed during the 19th century, based on prevention. Much of cancer is thought to be preventable because rates of occurrence and death vary substantially from one population to another. Environmental factors are likely to account for much of this variation.

Between 1969 and 1986, several cancers increased significantly among persons aged 64 to 84 in six industrial countries. [2] Multiple myeloma [cancer that starts in the bone marrow and spreads to various bones, especially the skull], melanoma of the skin, and cancers of the prostate, bladder, brain, lung and breast are increasing in the general population of several industrial countries. Except in the case of lung cancer, these increases remain largely unexplained.

In the last two years, cancer prevention researchers have focused new attention on environmental chemicals. Devra Lee Davis and others have developed a hypothesis about the cause of breast cancer in women. For a long time researchers have known that exposure to estrogen (the female hormone) increases a woman's risk of breast cancer. Now Davis has shown that many fat-soluble industrial chemicals, widely distributed in the environment, mimic or amplify the biological effects of estrogen. [3] [See RHWN #369.] The National Cancer Institute is now planning to establish a laboratory to study "hormonal carcinogenesis" (hormones as causes of cancer).

Now a second hypothesis has been developed by Devra Davis, Aaron Blair, Sheila Hoar Zahm, Neil Pearce, Joseph Fraumeni, and others at the National Cancer Institute, asking about the role of pesticides in certain cancers. The hypothesis begins by examining the health of farmers.

Two million farm workers, and three million farmers and their families, form a large occupational group exposed to toxic chemicals. [4] Farmers are a relatively healthy group. For any given age, farmers have a low overall mortality rate, indicating general good health. Compared to the general public, farmers have lower risk for ischemic heart disease [narrowing of the coronary arteries], and for all causes of cancer combined. [5] Farmers also have lower risks for cancers of the lung, esophagus, bladder, colon, liver, and kidney.

Low rates of cancer for lung, esophagus, and bladder, and low rates of heart disease, can be explained by low prevalence of smoking among farmers, which has been noted in numerous studies.

In addition, farmers have a low percentage of body fat, and a high measure of physical fitness, probably because they perform hard physical labor that keeps them in good shape. This good physical condition probably contributes to lower risks for heart disease and colon cancer, both of which are associated with a sedentary lifestyle.

Farmers also eat a relatively large amount of fruits and vegetables, compared to the average American, and relatively small amounts of processed foods. As a consequence, farmers' diets are most likely higher in fiber than the average diet. Furthermore, in general, farmers reside in areas with little air pollution.

However, despite their generally good health, farmers have higher-than-general-population risks for certain cancers: non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, skin melanomas, multiple myeloma, leukemia [cancer of the blood-forming organs], and cancers of the lip, stomach, prostate, and brain.

These high rates of a few select cancers among farmers, against a background of low risks for most cancers and for non-cancer diseases, suggests that work-related exposures may be causing specific cancers among farmers.

These patterns may have broad public health implications since several of the high-rate tumors among farmers are the same cancers that appear to be increasing in the general population of many developed countries: multiple myeloma, non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, melanoma of the skin, and cancers of the prostate and brain.

There are several factors that could be causing these cancers among farmers: farmers are out in the sun a lot, and ultraviolet sunlight is associated with melanoma and cancer of the lip. Exposure to phenoxy herbicides (2,4-D, 2,4,5-T, acilfluorfen, CNP, erbon, mecoprop, and others) has been linked to non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, and to soft tissue sarcoma. [6] Exposure to insecticides has been associated with leukemia, multiple myeloma, and brain cancer. It is possible that animal viruses may play a role in some farmers' cancers because elevated risks of leukemia, soft tissue sarcoma, and non-Hodgkin's lymphoma have been seen in slaughterhouse workers and veterinarians.

But there is also another possibility. Perhaps something in the environment damages the immune systems of farmers, who then fall prey to cancers that healthy immune systems would have been able to ward off.

It is noteworthy that the same cancers that affect farmers also affect people whose immune systems have been damaged by disease, or by medical intervention. Patients with AIDS (acquired immune deficiency syndrome) experience striking excesses in non-Hodgkin's lymphoma. (However, the AIDS epidemic does not provide a complete explanation for the increase in non-Hodgkin's lymphoma among the general population. The general increase started before the AIDS epidemic began. In the U.S., the greatest increases in non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, multiple myeloma, and leukemia have occurred in rural agricultural areas of the central region of the country.)

People who have organ transplants are given drugs to suppress their immune systems because the immune system would normally reject a foreign organ; these people, too, have high rates of non-Hodgkin's lymphoma. Brain and skin cancers occur among bone marrow transplant recipients; soft-tissue sarcomas, skin melanomas, and squamous cell carcinomas of the skin and lip occur in kidney transplant patients; leukemia and stomach cancers occur in people with immunodeficiency diseases.

This similarity between cancers associated with immunosuppression and cancers among farmers suggests that farmers' cancers may be caused by environmental factors that damage the immune system.

There is a large and convincing body of evidence showing that pesticides harm the immune systems of laboratory animals. [7] However, the number of human studies is very small. In humans, pesticide exposures have been linked to a variety of immune system effects including decreased host resistance to disease; suppressed T-cell activity; enhanced B-and T-cell immune response; and contact hypersensitivity. T-and B-cells are particular kinds of cells that circulate in the blood and protect the body by fighting off bacteria, viruses and cancer cells.

Increasingly, the general public is exposed to the same chemicals that farmers are exposed to. And, as we saw last week,#374 there is evidence that immune disorders are increasing in the general population. The hypothesis of Davis and her colleagues, that chemicals (or other factors) on farms are increasing the cancer rates among farmers, could have important consequences for us all. It represents a new kind of tough, creative thinking that has been missing from the war on cancer up until now.

--Peter Montague, Ph.D.

===============

[1] Tim Beardsley, "A War Not Won--Trends in Cancer Epidemiology," SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN Vol. 270 (January 1994), pgs. 130-138.

[2] Devra Lee Davis, David Hoel, John Fox, and Alan Lopez, "International Trends in Cancer Mortality in France, West Germany, Italy, Japan, England and Wales, and the USA," THE LANCET Vol. 366, No. 8713 (August 25, 1990), pgs. 474-481.

[3] Devra Lee Davis and others, "Medical Hypothesis: Xenoestrogens As Preventable Causes of Breast Cancer," ENVIRONMENTAL HEALTH PERSPECTIVES Vol. 101 (October 1993), pgs. 372-377.

[4] Marion Moses, "Pesticide-Related Health Problems and Farmworkers," AAOHN [AMERICAN ASSOCIATION OF OCCUPATIONAL HEALTH NURSES] JOURNAL Vol. 37 (March 1989), pgs. 115-130.

[5] Devra Lee Davis and others, "Agricultural Exposures and Cancer Trends in Developed Countries," ENVIRONMENTAL HEALTH PERSPECTIVES Vol. 100 (1992), pgs. 39-44. And: Aaron Blair and others, "Clues to cancer etiology from studies of farmers," SCANDINAVIAN JOURNAL OF WORK, ENVIRONMENT AND HEALTH Vol. 18 (1992), pgs. 209-215.

[6] See studies of farmers and others reviewed in the Institute of Medicine's study, VETERANS AND AGENT ORANGE: HEALTH EFFECTS OF HERBICIDES USED IN VIETNAM (Washington, D.C.: National Academy Press, 1993).

[7] P.T. Thomas and others, "Immunologic Effects of Pesticides," in Scott R. Baker and Chris F. Wilkinson, editors, THE EFFECTS OF PESTICIDES ON HUMAN HEALTH (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton Scientific Publishing, 1990), pgs. 261-295.

Descriptor terms: cancer statistics; mortality; morbidity; diet; fat; fiber; antioxidants; heart disease; prevention; multiple myeloma; melanoma; skin cancer; prostate; bladder; brain; lung; breast; estrogen; agriculture; farm workers; farmers; smoking; air pollution; sunlight; phenoxy herbicides; viruses; soft tissue sarcoma; non-Hodgkin's lymphoma; aids; organ transplants; immune system; studies; hypotheses;

#377: Scientists Pretending

=======================Electronic Edition========================
RACHEL'S HAZARDOUS WASTE NEWS #377 
---February 17, 1994---
News and resources for environmental justice.
==========
Environmental Research Foundation
P.O. Box 5036, Annapolis, MD 21403
Fax (410) 263-8944; Internet: erf@igc.apc.org ==========
RACHEL-4CM = DIOXIN FOCUSED DIRECTORY Remote Access Chemical Hazards Electronic Library. Dioxinnz.com =======================Original Source========================

For the past 3 or 4 years, evidence has been accumulating that many industrial chemicals (including many common plastics, pesticides, and by-products of combustion) mimic hormones. These hormone mimickers disrupt reproduction and development in humans and in many other species of mammals, birds, and fish. A growing body of evidence also indicates that these same chemicals may cause some of the most common and fastest-increasing cancers: breast cancer in women, and cancers of the testicles and prostate in men.

The American Chemical Society [ACS] recently affirmed the following phenomena: [1]

** Sperm count in men worldwide has dropped to 50% of what it was 50 years ago.** The incidence of testicular cancer has tripled in some countries in the last 50 years and prostate cancer has doubled.** Endometriosis--the growth outside the uterus of cells that normally line the uterus--which was "formerly a rare condition, now afflicts 5 million American women," the ACS said.** In 1960, a woman's chance of developing breast cancer during her lifetime was one in 20. Today the chances are one in nine.** Female common terns (sea birds) are sharing nests near a PCB-contaminated site in New Bedford Harbor, Mass., an unnatural female-female pairing.** Young male alligators in pesticide-contaminated lakes in Florida are growing up with penises so small that they are "sexually incompetent."

In January, the federal National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences [NIEHS] convened a meeting of 300 scientists who presented papers on estrogens and estrogen mimickers in the environment. Many of those scientists think there's probably a connection between diminished sperm counts, increasing endometriosis, female-to-female pairing in birds, sexually incompetent alligators, and breast cancer in women. The connection is poorly understood, they say, but the common link is probably chemicals dumped into the environment that mimic, or interfere with, hormones.

Slowly, mainstream scientific thinking has been coming to grips with this accumulating bad news. First the American Chemical Society began to write about it. [2] Then the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences [NIEHS], a division of the U.S. National Institutes of Health, started writing about it. [3]And this month the JOURNAL OF THE AMERICAN MEDICAL ASSOCIATION (JAMA) broke the story for its readers: "Estrogen and [chemical] agents that mimic it appear to be more pervasive and problematic then ever suspected," JAMA said February 9th. [4]

Estrogen is usually considered a female hormone, but males produce estrogen too, in small amounts. In the developing fetus, in both humans and animals, a specific ratio of estrogen to androgens (male hormones) must be maintained for proper sexual differentiation to occur; in other words, for a male to become a male and a female to become a female --regardless of the species --a certain balance of male and female hormones must be present in the mother between the time of fertilization and the time of birth or hatching.

If the hormone balance is disturbed, the offspring will be born with two sets of partially developed sex organs (intersex), or with a single set that is incompletely or improperly developed. Diminished sperm count, or future cancer, may be set at this early stage.

All plants and animals are composed of cells --tiny bags of fluid that work cooperatively together to carry out metabolism (extraction of energy from nutrients) to maintain life. The human body is composed of roughly 50 trillion individual cells that all cooperate and communicate with each other. Hormones are chemical messengers, essential to the body's healthy cooperation and internal communication. Hormones are present at very low levels (parts per billion or even parts per trillion), and often for only short periods of time, yet they have very powerful, long-lasting effects on growth, development, and metabolism.

The female hormone, estrogen, and chemicals that mimic estrogen, operate inside cells by fitting themselves into "estrogen receptors" (proteins) the way a key fits into a lock. Once the key is in the lock, the key-and-lock together can move into the nucleus of a cell and attach to the DNA, releasing messenger RNA which then causes a cascade of changes in cells, tissues, and organs throughout the body.

No, the story of estrogen mimickers is not simple. Some estrogen mimics fit into the lock wrong, filling up the space that the "correct" key would have used, thus interfering with natural estrogens; these are called estrogen antagonists. Some estrogen mimickers fit into locks that weren't ever intended to have an estrogen fitted into them. The amount of natural estrogen in the mother is usually much greater than the amount of estrogen mimickers. However most natural estrogens are bound up by sex-hormone-binding proteins in the blood stream, which are not able to bind estrogen mimickers. This increases the effective dose of the mimickers. The many ways estrogen mimickers can cause problems are just now beginning to be appreciated.

"The structural diversity of estrogenic chemicals is enormous," says John A. McLachlan, chief of the reproductive and developmental toxicology laboratory at NIEHS, according to JAMA.

In other words, you cannot simply observe a molecule and tell, by its chemical structure, whether it will act as an estrogen mimic or not.

"Compounds with widely different structure bind to estrogen receptors even though they bear no obvious structural resemblance" to estrogen, says John A. Katzenellenbogen, professor of chemistry at University of Illinois.

Examples of estrogen mimickers are DDT and its breakdown by-product DDE; Kepone; dieldrin; dicofol; methoxychlor; some PCBs; 3,9-dihydrooxybenz[a]anthracene; and alkyl phenols from penta-to nonylphenol, as well as bisphenol-A (the building block of polycarbonate plastics) which is used in many common detergents, toiletries, lubricants, and spermicides. Many estrogen mimickers are persistent (they resist breaking down in the environment) and highly soluble in fat (causing them to accumulate in the bodies of fish, birds, and mammals, including humans). Many of them cross the placental barrier and pass from the mother to the developing fetus.

It is not simple to distinguish estrogens from non-estrogens. "Historically, we think of the receptor as a switch," turning on or off the body's reactions. But it is not that simple, says George M. Stancel, head of the department of pharmacology at University of Texas Medical School. Estrogen-like chemicals can form "many molecular configurations" that can "act in differing ways," Stancel told JAMA. The same chemical can also act differently in different tissues, Stancel said.

To complicate the picture further, some cells appear to have estrogen receptors on their surface, rather than inside. So "even if compounds do not manage to get inside cells, they may still be estrogenic," says Cheryl Watson, associate professor of biological chemistry at the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston.

Finally, JAMA reported that estrogenic chemicals have a cumulative effect. David Feldman, professor of medicine and endocrinology at Stanford University, says, "The cumulative effect may be much greater than any individual molecule." Ana M. Soto at Tufts University combined 10 estrogen mimickers, each at one-tenth of the dose required to produce a minimal response; she found that the combination produced an estrogenic response.

This last bit of information has far-reaching implications for the regulation of chemicals. For 50 years the U.S. has regulated chemicals one by one, by conducting laboratory experiments on animals, and by experimenting on workers. If rats or workers get sick, then a particular chemical may be regulated to a level 10 times (or 100 times) lower than the lowest amount that caused an observable effect.

If chemicals at low ("safe") levels combine to produce an effect, this means that chemicals will have to be regulated in combination. "Testing mixtures is right on the mark" says George M. Stancel, at University of Texas Medical School. Kenneth Olden, head of NIEHS, agrees. "[W]e cannot ignore this milieu we live in that has all these estrogens. We have polluted our environment. It is polluted. Now we have to allocate resources to sort out the different effects of agents and learn whether they are synergistic, additive, inhibitory, or antagonistic. We don't know," Olden says, meaning we must try to learn whether chemicals in various combinations are weaker or stronger than each chemical alone.

But these are scientists pretending. Pretending that science can do something it cannot actually do. There is not sufficient money to study the full effects of individual chemicals, much less combinations of chemicals.

Scientists can pretend that they can discern "safe" levels of hundreds of different chemicals, all acting in combination. They can pretend that they can understand all the ill effects of multiple hormone mimickers on each type of cell, each tissue and each organ at every stage of development from conception to birth, through youth and puberty and into maturity, in each of the thousands of affected species. They can pretend to know these things, but they cannot ever actually know them. They are just pretending.

Scientists can pretend, but in so doing they perform a great disservice, preventing decision-makers from seeing what really needs to be done: we need to abandon the practice of chemical-by-chemical regulation. We need to regulate whole CLASSES of chemicals. And the dangerous classes need to be phased out and banned. Zero discharge. Pollution prevention. These are the keys to sustainability and survival.

 --Peter Montague, Ph.D.

===============

[1] Bette Hileman, "Environmental Estrogens Linked to Reproductive Abnormalities, Cancer," C&EN [CHEMICAL & ENGINEERING NEWS] January 31, 1994, pgs. 19-23.

[2] Bette Hileman, "Concerns Broaden over Chlorine and Chlorinated Hydrocarbons," C&EN [CHEMICAL & ENGINEERING NEWS] April 19, 1993, pgs. 11-20.

[3] Theo Colborn, Frederick S. vom Saal, and Ana M. Soto, "Developmental Effects of Endocrine-Disrupting Chemicals in Wildlife and Humans," ENVIRONMENTAL HEALTH PERSPECTIVES Vol. 101 No. 5 (October 1993), pgs. 378-384.

[4] Paul Cotton, "Environmental Estrogenic Agents Area of Concern," JOURNAL OF THE AMERICAN MEDICAL ASSOCIATION Vol. 271 (February 9, 1994), pgs. 414, 416.

Descriptor terms: endocrine disruptors; estrogen; androgens; hormones; wildlife; endocrine system; reproductive system; niehs; national institutes of health; national institute of environmental health sciences; nih; american medical association; ddt; dde; pesticides; plastics; dicofol; methoxychlor; pcbs; polychlorinated biphenyls; alkyl phenols; bisphenol-a; polycarbonate plastics; detergents; toiletries; lubricants; spermicides; pentaphenol; nonylphenol; 3,9-dihydrooxybenz[a]anthracene;