Pesticides

Byoliveridley

farmerA friend pointed me in the direction of this letter by EPA union leaders about the upcoming re-registration of some very commonly used organophosphate and carbamate pesticides. This ens-newswire article provides an excellent summary.

In the absence of “a robust body of data” the union leaders remind Johnson that the Food Quality Protection Act requires the EPA to use “an additional 10-fold safety factor in its risk assessments when setting pesticide tolerances.

This is the key point, and the reason that Pesticide industry and the EPA came up with the infamous “CHEERS” study (talk about Kafkaesque naming!) to study children’s exposure knowing fully well that they would not be able to accurately assess health effects on children with an observational study. The hope was that using a short term “study” that assessed acute toxicity, they would be able to “prove” no significant harm to children and get rid of the safety factor. A factor of 10 is big, and the pesticide manufacturers hate it because the tolerances become low enough that people will be over-exposed.

Isn’t that the whole point of a safety factor? We are still figuring out what happens at low levels of exposure to certain pesticides. This is truly an Environmental Justice issue. It is not the children of EPA administrators eating non-organic fruits and veggies that are going to be exposed. The gains from eating organic food vs. non-organic are dwarfed by the incidental exposure of the families of farmworkers and other people applying pesticides. Yes, you guessed it, they do not tend to be particularly rich or influential, but they are most in need of protection from government to ensure that their children do not get exposed to levels that may be harmful. This is not about shopping at Whole Foods, which is where most of elite America hears about pesticides, this is about the people being exposed to much higher doses. The safety factor is a must to keep them safe.

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    Al Franken is good for health

    Byoliveridley

    You know what's in your food and many beauty products. Senator Al Franken wants to make it possible to see exactly what's in your household cleaning products as well.The Minnesota Democrat introduced a bill in the U.S. Senate requiring producers to fully disclose all ingredients on their product labels, including those suspected of causing long-term harm. Currently the warnings on cleansers are designed to prevent immediate harm due to swallowing, splashing in eyes or other unintended uses.

    via Kare 11

    It would seem common sense to have information on labels, especially on the harsh and powerful chemicals we use every day. You may not understand what they mean, or how to pronounce the chemical names, but you don’t have to! Organizations such as the Environmental Working Group have extensive information on common high volume chemicals so people can match what they see on the label with what they would like to avoid.

    But it is not the law of the land in the US, or Canada for that matter. Al Franken, comedian, talk show host and an intelligent man turned senator would like to change that in the US. Of course, we in Canada would benefit as well.

    Chemical manufacturers aren’t having any of this.

    There’s always a concern about turning labels into encyclopedias,” Brian Sansoni of the Soap and Detergent Association, in Washington, D.C., told KARE Tuesday.

    Pretty insulting, claiming that your consumer does not like encyclopedias, or is not capable of reading and googling.

    Information helps drive consumers to safer alternatives. If you see two cleaners, both of which claim to work equally well, a quick read of the ingredients will drive you to the safer (or simpler) choice. Clearly, sale by obfuscation is the preferred marketing strategy here.

    If I were American, I would call my senator/congressperson and ask them to support Al Franken.

  • Trade Agreements Create Pollution Havens

    Byoliveridley

    Interesting paper out of the Berkeley Global Economy Journal
    Trade Agreements and the Environment: An Industry Level Study for NAFTA
    Raymond MacDermott. Global Economy Journal Volume 6, Issue 3 2006 Article 3

    We find strong evidence of both the pollution-haven hypothesis and the positive impact of the NAFTA on FDI.  In addition, we find the trade agreement exacerbates the pollution-haven effect.  That is, the incentive to invest in countries with weak environmental regulations is greater under a trade agreement such as the NAFTA.  Surprisingly, stronger evidence of this effect is found in lower polluting industries than in higher polluting industries.

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    India's Environmental Portal

    Byoliveridley

    Home | India Environment Portal

    This is a very useful undertaking by the Centre for Science and Environment (CSE) to gather up a lot of technical information about India’s environmental research and activism.

    They have a small multimedia section as well and I found this movie, appropriately titled Faecal Attraction to be an informative watch…

    [youtube=’http://in.youtube.com/watch?v=bUlkOLLa31s’]

  • Wow, Conventional Milk makes Twins!

    Byoliveridley

    44m.jpgHoly tentacular twins, Batman! This is crazy news, the first study linking the incidence of twins with environmental factors. The culprit is growth hormone fed to cows to increase milk production. According to this Wikipedia article, a third of all dairy cattle use Monsanto’s rBGH (or rBST) brand Posilac®, so obviously, use is widespread.

    FEED – July 2006 (from the Union of Concerned Scientists)

    1. Engineered hormone in milk may be linked to twinning. A recent study found that women who consumed dairy products were five times more likely to give birth to twins than vegan women. The study suggested that the use of engineered bovine growth hormone/bovine somatotropin (BGH/BST) to boost milk production in dairy cows may be related to the higher level of twinning. BGH is known to increase twinning in dairy cows. In addition, the rate of human twinning is twice as high in the United States, where BGH is used, as in Britain, where BGH is banned. BGH affects twinning rate by increasing insulin-like growth factor (IGF), a protein produced in the milk of both animals and humans, that promotes ovulation and may help early-stage embryos survive. A separate study found that levels of IGF were 13 percent lower in vegan women than in women who consumed dairy products. Read a press release about the study, which was published in The Journal of Reproductive Medicine.

    If true, no woman should ever drink “conventional” milk (non-organic, non rGBH free, etc). Twins are fun, I love my twin nieces very much, but they are much more difficult to carry and deliver, and there are more complications.

    Scary, but I suspect this is the tip of the iceberg as far as environmental effects on childbirth are concerned.

  • White House Refused to Open Pollutants E-Mail

    Byoliveridley

    The White House in December refused to accept the Environmental Protection Agency’s conclusion that greenhouse gases are pollutants that must be controlled, telling agency officials that an e-mail message containing the document would not be opened, senior E.P.A. officials said last week.

    White House Refused to Open Pollutants E-Mail – NYTimes.com

    No, this headline is not from the Onion, I repeat, this is an accurate account of the workings of the world’s most powerful government as it delays action on climate change!

  • E.P.A. Says 17 States Can’t Set Emission Rules for Cars

    Byoliveridley

    Shameful. I did not blog much, or anything about the recently passed energy bill because I thought it was a watered down compromise that subsidized coal, oil and ethanol industries at the expense of renewable energy, public transportation and public health. But these are the consequences of passing such a bill, it allows the EPA to claim that something major has already been done, so noting needs to be done any more .

    The E.P.A. administrator, Stephen L. Johnson, said the proposed California rules were pre-empted by federal authority and made moot by the energy bill signed into law by President Bush on Wednesday. Mr. Johnson said California had failed to make a compelling case that it needed authority to write its own standards for greenhouse gas emissions from cars and trucks to help curb global warming.

    E.P.A. Says 17 States Can’t Set Emission Rules for Cars – New York Times

    This is truly absurd. The energy bill does not address CO2 emissions. California has used its right to set stronger standards many times in the past, and nothing in this bill preempts this right.

    I guess this is Supreme Court bound, where that one man decision making machine Justice Kennedy will no doubt set the standards for this country.

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