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Health Canada report ties asbestos to lung cancer

Byoliveridley

Health Canada sat for more than a year on a report by a panel of international experts that concludes there is a “strong relationship” between lung cancer and chrysotile asbestos mined in Canada.

Health Canada received the report in March 2008, resisting calls from the panel chairman to release the findings despite his plea last fall that the delay was “an annoying piece of needless government secrecy.”

Canwest News Service obtained the report under Access to Information legislation, but the request took more than 10 months to process.

Vancouver Sun

Yes, dog bites man anywhere else except Canada, which has a hard time accepting that it routinely exports products that kill people. The “annoying piece of needless government secrecy” is neither needless or annoying. It protects a dying industry with a few, powerful stakeholders in Quebec, an important swing political province, so there’s need for it! Annoying – your seat “buddy” on the bus yammering on their cellphone, cancer, well, I don’t know, you tell me!

Expect little to change from this report. It does mention that there is little danger from “Canadian exposure levels”, conveniently forgetting that 90% of the export is to developing countries where there are fewer safeguards. This feeds into the Canadian government line that “chrysotile” is safe if used correctly. If you think this line of reasoning is familiar, it is. The tobacco industry used it routinely till recently.

Shame.
n

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    The Goldman honours grassroots environmentalists all over the world.

  • Good Bye, Clean Water (Act)

    Byoliveridley

    Judith Lewis of the LA Weekly summarizes the issues before the Supreme Court currently debating the Clean Water Act. Among the things she says:

    One state’s boon is another state’s disaster, and it doesn’t much matter whether that state is red or blue: If you’ve seen what happens when your swamps disappear, as they have in Florida, you know why it’s important to protect them.

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    Reading Lithwick’s dispatch leaves me to believe that it’s going to be a close call. Justices Scalia and Roberts seem to be finely parsing language and displaying a contemptuous and obviously fake ignorance of watershed hydrology. Hopefully, the center (Kennedy) will hold, He is a “States Rights” kinda guy, though, which is scary. On the other hand, he likes European Law and Europe is the Queen of classic command and control environmental regulation. Help, I can’t stand the suspense, what do the Vegas lines say???! Here are some of the possible consequences of an unfavorable ruling –

    Under that topsy-turvy interpretation of the landmark 1972 law, more than half of all streams in the United States, as well as one-fifth of all wetlands, would no longer be protected, according to the federal Environmental Protection Agency. And waterways that provide drinking water for more than one in three Americans would be at risk. Nearly 150,000 miles of protected streams in California could be threatened.

    The federal government is arguing for the continuation of the CWA, which I guess is some relief, hope they want to win this one.

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    Byoliveridley

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    Pesticide Exposure and India's green revolution

    Byoliveridley

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    Green.view | Chemical generation | Economist.com:

    IF INDIAN newspaper reports are to be believed, the children of Punjab are in the throes of a grey revolution. Even those as young as ten are sprouting tufts of white and grey hair. Some are going blind. In Punjabi villages, children and adults rare afflicted by uncommon cancers.

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    Ignorance is part of the problem. The report includes details of a survey suggesting that nearly one-third of Punjabi farmers were unaware that pesticides come with instructions for use. Half of the farmers ignored these instructions. Three-quarters put empty pesticide containers to domestic uses.

    The article concludes by saying that the government is encouraging the use of techniques including organic farming, more crop rotation, etc, and how this is ironically “reversing” the green revolution. But two separate issues are getting mixed up here. The green revolution was not won on excessive use of fertilizers, monoculture, excessive water use, and so on. Instead, the development of new hybrid, high yielding varieties of rice and wheat kick started the revolution. The wholesale adoption of water and input intensive agricultural techniques came along for for the ride with the rest of the revolution.

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    California Ban on Diacetyl?

    Byoliveridley

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    I am all for California’s regulation. But as written, this law will only protect workers in California. They should also consider going one step further by restricting the use of diacetyl in food sold in California. Only then can the giant market that is California exert its influence on the diacetyl manufacturers and users.