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Saving Environmental Health Leadership in California

2009-05-22T14:00:00Z

We have a whodunit on our hands here in California. Unfortunately it's a serious case, because the health effects will be far-reaching, and the ripples will hurt both people and science.

Under the cloak of the California budget crisis, a proposal has emerged from the Governor's office to completely eliminate California's Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment (OEHHA). OEHHA is the small office inside Cal/EPA where all the health scientists work. It's a strange target if the goal is to save money. The total amount of taxpayer money funding OEHHA is only slightly north of $8 million, and the proposed elimination and moving of statutory functions would probably cost almost that much. This is 'budget dust', not a real belt-tightening measure. So we need to look elsewhere for the real motive.

In fact, there are a lot of suspects in this case.

The Styrene Industry has a motive because OEHHA is poised to list this ubiquitous Styrofoam and plastic chemical as a known human carcinogen (the link above goes to a pdf action alert from the manufacturers trying to stop this!)
PG&E has a motive because OEHHA has been trying to finalize a safe drinking water level for chromium (remember Erin Brockovich?) way ahead of the U.S. government; this cleaner drinking water proposal has been held up in the Governor's office - a coincidence??
Big tobacco has a motive because OEHHA was the first agency in the world to declare second-hand smoke to be a breast carcinogen, and we know from history that Big Tobacco holds grudges.
Dow Chemical has a motive because OEHHA is poised to make a decision that may list its chemical, bisphenol A (BPA) as "known to cause birth defects or reproductive harm", a designation that no other agency has yet made. BPA is notorious because of its hormone-disrupting effects and presence in baby bottles and food cans, which may need to be labeled in California if this chemical is designated as causing reproductive harm.
Even other boards and departments in Cal/EPA might have a motive, since OEHHA reviews their risk assessments and calls them on it when the decisions are motivated by politics, not by science and health protection.

You get the idea. This is a feisty little office of scientists who are actually trying to do their job, which is to scientifically assess health and environmental risks in our air, water, food, soil, and consumer products, and to protect public health.

Funny how it is with these David vs. Goliath fights. Sometimes the little guy does win, but sometimes he gets stepped on. But if our David gets stepped on we all lose. That's because OEHHA's scientists have international reputations and guide state, federal, and global decisions on toxic chemicals in the environment. Where California goes, others follow, but if the leader disappears, we will have the blind leading the blind.

Fortunately the fight's not over. The California legislature has an opportunity to fix the problem by preserving OEHHA as an independent entity inside Cal/EPA, and strengthen it by consolidating other risk assessment functions there. Streamlining should happen at Cal/EPA, perhaps in pesticide registration where functions can be trimmed and merged to be more efficient. Also, this is the perfect place to use fees, since taxpayers shouldn't be paying for all of this work, polluters should.

The legislature will be accepting testimony on this on May 28th. With the monster budget sandstorm swirling through Sacramento, and the prospect that California will not be able to pay its bills come July, the air probably won't clear in time to help us solve the mystery in this case. But regardless of whodunit, we must do everything we can now to ensure that when a budget deal is struck, the little bunch of heroic, dedicated Davids in OEHHA are left standing to continue protecting all of us, and our environment from toxic chemicals

Flu Protection: Hand Sanitizer not Antibacterial Soap!

2009-05-01T20:17:04Z

It's amazing how confusing it can be when a new disease emerges, and advice starts flying around. One thing that I want to nip in the bud right now is the idea that "antibacterial" soaps can be helpful for fighting Swine Flu. Wrong!

Hand sanitizers, which are usually alcohol-based, and are designed for use when you're not near a sink, are beneficial against the flu. Antibacterial soaps are useless and could be dangerous. Here's why:

First, influenza is a virus, so antibacterial products are useless. That goes for antibacterial soaps and for oral antibiotics as well;

Second, the soaps that are sold as "antibacterial" have been tested and found to be no more effective than regular soap and water;

Third, some research suggests that these antibacterial soaps may actually create antibiotic resistance in bacteria; an article from the journal of Clinical Infectious Diseases that summarizes this issue is here: pdf.

Finally, the ingredients in antibacterial soaps - triclosan or triclocarban - have some serious toxicity concerns. These chemicals pollute rivers and streams, are toxic to wildlife, can enter and accumulate in people's bodies, and disrupt hormone systems (triclosan interferes with thyroid hormone, whereas triclocarban has a testosterone-like effect). Stay tuned for more on this soon.

The bottom line is:

Don't use antibacterial soaps! Do wash your hands frequently with regular soap and water, and do use hand sanitizers when you're not near a sink! Stay well!

Flu Pandemic Level 5: What to Do?

2009-04-29T23:27:36Z

Today the World Health Organization (WHO) raised the pandemic alert level for swine flu to 5. That's on a scale of 0-6, so the needle's creeping up into the red zone. A pandemic 5 means that there is human-to-human spread of the virus into at least two countries in one WHO region. Although that sounds techy, the declaration of Phase 5 is a strong signal that a pandemic is imminent and that the time is now for nations, cities, businesses, and regular people to finalize their response plans.

Seems like it's a good time for us all to know a bit more about the flu, and to decide how worried to be. The answer is...somewhat worried. This flu has some worrisome qualities:

It is a strain that people are not immune to;
It has some aspects of the dreaded 1918 Spanish Flu -- it is an H1N1 flu strain like that one;
Just like the 1918 flu, it seems to primarily affect younger people;
It has spread fairly quickly through the population and around the world.

But the key question is how virulent is it? In other words, how many people who have been sickened by it have died? That's a tough one, since in the U.S. the answer is very few, but it appears that in Mexico the answer may be different. So far in the U.S. cases, most people are getting regular flu-like symptoms, but are fully recovering, complete with immunity to this virus. That's great...if it stays that way.

But there's also a little problem with flu. It is known to undergo a phenomenon called "antigenic drift", in which individual epitopes on the coating of the virus change their amino acid composition, making them harder for our immune systems to deal with, and sometimes altering their virulence. So we can't assume that this flu will be a mild one.

For a nice and only somewhat technical summary of epitopes, antigenic drift, and antigenic shift, check out Dr. John Kimball's biology site.

So for now, here are my suggestions:

1) Talk with your family and your employer to make sure you have a plan in place. For example, what is your plan if your child's school or daycare center is temporarily closed? Is there a plan at your workplace for allowing non-essential employees to telecommute if necessary?

2) Wash your hands frequently. One of the major flu transmission routes is through hand-to-nose, hand-to-eye, or even hand-to-mouth contact, so keep your hands clean. So-called "anti-bacterial" soaps are useless for the flu (and can contain toxic chemicals), so just use regular soap. Alcohol-based hand sanitizers are a good choice if you can't get to a sink.

3) Consider having a few face masks or N95 paper respirators at home. These are useful anyway -- I have a stack of N95's in my basement for when I do dusty carpentry or gardening work. Regular paper masks are available at drug stores, and N95's at hardware stores. If a family member gets sick you'll be glad to have these at home, and if you need to go into an environment where there are likely to be sick people, you'll be happier too. These may sell out, so it's wise to get them early.

Finally, when you go to bed tonight, say a prayer for the public health heroes around the world that are working 24/7 to contain this epidemic. And when budget time rolls around (are you hearing me, policymakers?) please, please support a strong public health system! The CDC, the WHO, and all the local, county, tribal, and state health departments are the thin blue line that stands between all of us and these invading microbes. Let's support them!

Swine Flu: The Need for a Strong Public Health System

2009-04-27T22:40:07Z

The automated voice on my answering machine at first sounded like a telemarketing call. Yet as my finger moved to the 'delete' button, I stopped. "THIS IS A TEST OF THE DISASTER HEALTHCARE VOLUNTEERS NOTIFICATION SYSTEM," the mechanical voice intoned. "This test has been initiated in conjunction with recent Public Health and medical activities in response to the Swine Flu."

"This is a big deal," I thought to myself. "They're preparing to mobilize."

As a practicing physician in San Francisco, I registered many years ago with the California Disaster Healthcare Volunteer (DHV) system. The last time I was contacted as a healthcare volunteer was more than a month after Hurricane Katrina. By the time the Federal government finally got around to putting out the call for volunteers, I was already on-site in New Orleans with a team of NRDC experts performing an environmental assessment and planning environmental monitoring in consultation with local officials and community representatives. The Feds moved too slowly to mobilize the public health response to Katrina; it seems that they are avoiding that mistake this time.

But is it necessary to create all this fuss? An emergency declaration after only a couple dozen cases of influenza seems like it might be overkill.

As I went to the DHV website to confirm my contact information and willingness to be deployed, I thought: "better to act too soon rather than too late."

We live in a time when scientists predict an unusual array of health crises.

We are way overdue for an outbreak of pandemic influenza; outbreaks historically occur every 25-30 years, yet the last major outbreak was in 1918 (with the most recent pandemic in 1968, from the "Hong Kong" flu); antigenic shift in the virus leading to a virulent and infective strain to which most people are not immune is only a matter of time. The swine H1N1 strain could fit that bill -- we'll see.
Worldwide jet travel means that someone incubating a disease can get on a plane anywhere in the world, shedding virus as they go, and become ill in their destination country where they can spread the illness further.
World trade in goods including food and livestock also increases the odds of spreading disease from infected populations to naïve ones.
Poverty and overcrowding in many parts of the world mean that disease can spread rapidly, either person-to-person, or because of vectors such as mosquitoes.
Climate change is also projected to shift disease patterns by making some areas warmer and wetter; although this may not be as important for influenza, it's a big deal for other infectious diseases such as Dengue ("Breakbone") fever, malaria, cryptosporidium, and even salmonella.

In my opinion, we're already seeing many of these health crises beginning to emerge, and the Swine Flu cases so far are playing this script out exactly as predicted.

So what's the solution, other than staying home with your head under your pillow?

The solution is to have a U.S. public health system that is well-funded, well-run, and up to the job of protecting people. Unfortunately, over the past decade, the budgets for the U.S. public health system have been cut, so the government's ability to rapidly detect health threats, and quickly mobilize to respond, has been hampered. During the eight years of the Bush Administration, the federal government quietly eliminated or crippled more than a dozen essential monitoring programs. Budget cuts, restructuring, program termination, and removal of industry reporting requirements undermined or eliminated the information that alerts us to problems in our air, water, food, or communities. Programs that directly track human health were slashed, creating gaps in our information about infectious disease outbreaks, chemical exposures in people, and chronic disease. We predicted trouble in a report called "Deepest Cuts: Repairing Health Monitoring Programs Slashed Under the Bush Administration" released in December. Swine flu is a wake-up call: we have one of the best public health systems in the world, but it has been mismanaged and starved for resources for years.

Fortunately, the current administration seems to be aware of the problem. For example, the EPA has already moved to restore some monitoring requirements for toxic chemical hazards. This influenza outbreak reminds us of the need to focus on rebuilding the CDC. After all, CDC experts are at the forefront of the fight to protect us all from new and emerging health threats. So I'm hoping that Congress and the Administration act to increase the funding stream to CDC, so that they can build an even stronger health tracking network, and can prepare to respond rapidly and strongly to the crises of the 21st century, including emerging infectious diseases, and the health threats from climate change. It's not too late to get back on track.

My Toxic Dog: Personal Experiences with Flea Collars

2009-04-23T14:10:42Z

When my team at NRDC decided to study whether flea collars leave a hazardous residue on cats and dogs, we really didn't know if there was a problem. It seemed possible that we wouldn't find much, and that the residues would be far below levels of health concern -- after all, that's what the Environmental Protection Agency had concluded on several occasions. Yet we weren't satisfied with the EPA conclusions. Even a cursory review of the basis for EPA's decision revealed major flaws, not the least of which was the complete absence of any actual data on residues from flea collars. Obviously someone needed to collect some real data to figure this out.

I volunteered my dogs, Kanga and Cricket, as participants in the study. After all, with no young kids at home, it was free flea control (which meant no baths for the dogs) and an ability to collect some useful information. The negatives started to appear soon after the flea collars went on. First of all, the collars had a nasty odor, so the house began to smell; friends who visited sniffed distastefully, and some even commented. A noticeable powder bloomed on the surface of the collar, and sometimes a little was visible on the fur. Although the dogs didn't seem to notice the collars, I began to get concerned. The package directions advise avoiding direct contact with the collar. So each day I'd go through contortions to put their leashes on and take them off, and would grab for their leather collars to restrain them only to discover that I had the flea collar clenched in my hand instead. I washed my hands frequently, like I do when I'm working in the hospital, and the poor dogs begged for attention while I refrained from petting them. My partner bore with the entire procedure gamely until Cricket began scratching: "The dog has fleas! Damn it, I thought you said this collar would prevent fleas." Over the two week study, both dogs developed nasty cases of fleas - on their rumps, since the fleas wisely seemed to avoid the neck and back area.

It was such a relief when the experiment was over and we could give the dogs a good bath, wash their bedding, and rid ourselves of both the fleas and the chemical stench all in one frenzied cleaning session.

But the real problem was yet to come.

The results came back from the laboratory showing residue levels so high that the lab repeated the tests to be sure there was no error. There wasn't. When we plugged the numbers into standard risk assessment calculations, we had to stop and calculate again just to be sure.

The results were worrisome. After three days, half of the pets wearing collars with tetrachlorvinphos had enough residue on their fur to pose significant neurological risks for toddlers who spend about two hours per day with their pet. For toddlers who sleep with their pets, or have multiple pets, 80 percent of the dogs and all of the cats had residue that exceeded acceptable levels. The numbers for propoxur flea collars were even worse: all of the dogs (including mine) had residues on fur posing a neurological risk to toddlers. After two weeks, three-quarters of the pets had levels that exceeded the acceptable amount for average contact with a pet, and all of them had residue levels that could be dangerous for children with a lot of contact.

As if neurological harm wasn't enough, we also calculated the cancer risks. Cancer risk calculations assume that people are regular users of these products for most of their lifetime. For adults we found a cancer risk of 56 to 558 excess cancers per million people exposed -- 50 to 500 times greater than what the EPA considers acceptable. When we used EPA guidelines to calculate the increased risks associated with exposures in children, cancer risk soared to 157 to 1,566 excess cancers per million. That's potentially as high as 1-2 cancers per thousand people exposed - and there are a lot of pet owners out there who use these products, which equals a lot of risk to a lot of people.

The full story on the results of our flea collar testing is here.

The good news in this whole sobering story is that it's so easy to control fleas without resorting to any of these toxic products. My family has had dogs for 14 years, and we easily keep fleas in check with baths every 2-3 weeks, laundering their bedding at bath time, and vacuuming the rugs weekly. It's really not a big deal, and as a bonus, the dogs aren't greasy and they smell nice.

For other flea control tips, or for information about flea control treatments, check out Green Paws.

FDA Mischief: Mercury in Fish

2008-12-16T23:17:11Z

When I give talks on health and the environment, I almost always get asked about mercury. People want to know whether it's safe to eat fish, whether the mercury in fish is dangerous, and how they can protect themselves. These questions are relatively straightforward to answer (see below for my three tips), but people are confused by all the conflicting advice emerging from the Federal government these days.

Back in 2004, the FDA and the EPA got together and issued a joint warning about fish and mercury. I complained a bit back then because I didn't think the warning was specific enough, but at least the two agencies were on the same page.

Now, in the waning days of the Bush Administration, the FDA has produced a bizarre draft document that ignores the science showing the harmful effects of prenatal exposures to mercury, and concludes that eating fish with relatively high levels of mercury can be beneficial. This conclusion stands in stark contrast to previous work by the National Academy of Sciences and EPA. EPA scientists were given only a few weeks to comment on the 433 page FDA report and their comments are scathing.

EPA's most important criticisms include:

1. The FDA analysis of the benefits of eating fish is based on the total amount of "average fish" consumed rather than distinguishing among types of fish. This ignores the science that shows some fish have low mercury levels and higher amounts of omega-3 fatty acids and some fish have high mercury with little benefit from omega-3s.

2. The FDA analysis of the harm of eating fish focuses on age at talking, rather than the more sensitive endpoints of cognitive and sensory function as the key endpoint in children. This allows them to overlook adverse impacts that occur at lower levels. This problem is compounded by modeling that has not been peer-reviewed or undergone sensitivity testing, meaning that it may be seriously flawed.

3. FDA downplays neurodevelopmental effects of mercury by omitting and mischaracterizing the scientific data. For example, FDA presents the fish benefit findings from a paper but does not mention the same paper's finding that the mercury in the fish has an adverse effect on brain development. In other cases, FDA inaccurately characterizes the studies - reporting findings and conclusions that cannot be found in the cited paper.

Even with these flawed assumptions, FDA admits that up to 10 percent of the population may experience adverse effects from eating diets that include significant amounts of high mercury fish. FDA dismisses this concern as unimportant alleging that such high mercury fish diets are "unusual", which is incorrect; albacore tuna, which is high in mercury, is a very common fish in the U.S. diet.

So here's my advice to women of reproductive age:

Steer clear of the high mercury fish, such as swordfish, shark, ahi tuna, and orange roughy;
Take it easy (once a week or less) for fish with intermediate mercury levels such as bluefish, grouper, bass, albacore tuna, and halibut;
Choose these low-mercury fish for plenty of Omega-3s: herring, salmon, sardines, flounder, sole, and tilapia.

You can get more information about which fish are high and which are low at our website, here, and you can even calculate your mercury intake or download a handy wallet card.

Meanwhile the FDA needs to get it's act together and give people advice that is grounded in science and reflects the facts.

Health Risks at Schools

2008-12-08T18:30:20Z

Last summer I stood in a school yard next to the huge cement kiln in the town of Oro Grande, California. It was hard not to be impressed. The school was new, and the soccer field was perfectly manicured. The playground had new play structures -- all courtesy of the cement company. Looming over the town was a dusty behemoth that was a source of annoyance to the townspeople because of the alkaline cement dust that ate the finish off their cars.

What they didn't know is that cement kilns also release significant quantities of dangerous heavy metals, such as mercury and chromium. In fact, we found contamination near this facility, and at other sites as well.

A new analysis by USA Today specifically mentions Oro Grande as a school at risk. But it's certainly not unique. The analysis identified over 400 schools in 170 cities that have potentially dangerous air quality due to nearby toxic emissions.

This is awful news for parents and children in all of those places, but it also reveals several deeper problems:

First, why isn't the EPA doing analyses like this, instead of leaving it to NGOs and reporters?

Second, why are the government regulators quoted in the USA Today story so reluctant to take action? These are children who need protection, after all!

Third, what will we do when the data disappear?

Yes, disappear.

The modeling software that USA Today used for their analysis relies on data from the Toxics Release Inventory (TRI). Last year, the Bush Administration made sweeping changes to the TRI which will dramatically decrease the amount of information that polluters need to report. So if someone repeats the analysis next year, the picture may look a lot rosier - even though it's not.

Last week, we released a report called "Deepest Cuts: Repairing Health Monitoring Programs Slashed by the Bush Administration". Check out the report here. The report shows a pervasive and systematic unraveling of the tracking and monitoring programs that keep tabs on the safety of our air, water, food, and health. This is really a priority job for the new administration.

Children and parents that I met in Oro Grande, and across the country want their communities to be swept clean, not swept under the rug.

Monitoring: For Your Health

2008-12-04T05:58:08Z

Maybe it's because I'm a doctor, or maybe it's just that I'm a nerd; but data and numbers are really important to me. When I see patients in clinic, I monitor their vital signs, try to do a good physical exam, and check lab tests. I do these things even in seemingly healthy patients. To do otherwise would be malpractice. When the patient is sick, the importance of close monitoring is even clearer. The beeping of monitors in the intensive care unit is a reassuring sound, because it means that every patient in there is being watched and supported at all times.

The kind of monitoring that is done by doctors to track our health is parallel to the monitoring that has gone on for years to check on the health of our air, water, and food. Checking the vital signs of our environment requires careful reporting and tracking of industrial emissions, and the lab tests include assays for contaminants in our drinking water and air. This critical job is usually done by the federal government.

I'm sickened to report that the final legacy of the Bush Administration is monitoring malpractice on a huge scale.

Over the past year, my team of researchers has been monitoring the governmental monitoring programs. First we found that the thresholds requiring industries to report toxic releases had been changed, allowing polluters to report less information about toxic substances they release into the air or dump into the water. Soon after that, water utilities were no longer required to test drinking water for certain widespread hazardous chemicals. More recently, the White House made a last-minute change that lets hundreds of lead polluters off the hook for air monitoring.

But that's not all. Over the past eight years, budget cuts have slashed deeply into critical programs at agencies ranging from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), to the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS). Programs tracking foodborne illness at CDC have suffered, as have programs that measure toxic chemical residues in people. The USGS program that measures stream flow has been cut, even though climate change will increase our need for information about flooding. Worse still, just a few months after Congressional hearings about the widespread presence of pharmaceutical residues in water, the USGS program that tests for pharmaceuticals and other contaminants in our nation's waterways was destroyed by budget cuts. The details of our findings are in a report released today.

These cuts have hacked at the scientific foundation of environmental and public health protections in our country. It's like walking into the ICU and instead of the reassuring beeps of the monitors, there is only ghastly silence.

The new administration needs to plug in the monitors, get their finger back on the patient's pulse, and send some samples off to the lab STAT. Otherwise the long-term prognosis for this patient will be poor.

Pesticides and Reproductive Harm: New Developments on Dursban

2008-11-19T17:34:16Z

I took a friend who's visiting from Ireland to our local flea market this weekend. It's quite a cultural experience. She found some unique (and inexpensive) gifts to bring home. I trolled for my favorite stuff - toxic junk. Sure enough, for $3 I scored a battered and filthy metal sign reading "For use as a motor fuel only: Contains Lead (Tetraethyl)". What a find! It's already in my office today, next to the old DDT sprayer with the label "Fly Ded".

At one end of the market, I stumbled on some cans of household insecticide. These weren't so old - less than 10 years of rust accumulation, so it was still possible to clearly read the ingredient: chlorpyrifos. Dursban TM. My old nemesis. It feels like just yesterday that I was fighting to get this chemical banned from household insecticides. And this week I'm going back into the fray once more.

In the 1990's, as study after study emerged showing that chlorpyrifos interferes with normal brain development in infants, the urgency to take action grew. Fortunately, in 2000, the EPA banned chlorpyrifos from household products. Studies since then have shown that the levels of this chemical in the bodies of urban pregnant women and children declined by five-fold from 2001-2004, showing that this kind of regulatory intervention really works.

Unfortunately, chlorpyrifos, one of the most toxic insecticides that's still on the market, is still in widespread use in agriculture. Farmworkers and communities are exposed to this stuff on a regular basis, and residues are still widespread on food. In fact, recent California data show that the use of this toxic chemical on food has increased in recent years to about 2 million lbs per year in California alone.

Tomorrow, a scientific panel in Sacramento will decide whether to list chlorpyrifos as a chemical that is "Known to the State of California to cause birth defects or reproductive harm". A decision to list the chemical would mean that discharges of this toxin into sources of drinking water would be forbidden. It would also mean that people would need to be warned if they are being exposed to the chemical. For example, this could mean warnings in many rural communities in California, or even warnings on foods, if the residues are high enough.

Chlorpyrifos shouldn't be allowed on the market anymore - it's too dangerous and there are plenty of safer alternatives. That's why NRDC and the Pesticide Action Network of North America petitioned EPA to ban this chemical altogether. The action taken by the California scientific panel tomorrow is far short of a ban, but it's one more step toward informing people about the serious risks from this brain-damaging chemical.

More Monitoring Mischief: EPA and Lead Pollution

2008-10-22T00:29:39Z

The other day I got a call from one of my colleagues, Joe Lyou, from Southern California. Joe runs a great group called the California Environmental Rights Alliance. CERA advocates for environmental justice in communities unlucky enough to have major pollution sources in their backyards. Such as lead smelters.

Joe told me about Exide Technologies, a nasty smelter that needs to clean up. According to the LA Times, this facility melts down about 40 truckloads of old car batteries each day, five days per week. People nearby were complaining about smoke and ash from the facility. Just a few months ago, an investigation by the local air district found high levels of lead, and the facility was required to cut back on production by 50% until it cleans up its act. Go get 'em Joe!

But due to last-minute White House meddling with the lead standard, the EPA would not require air monitoring downwind from the Exide smelter. You see, Exide only releases 0.6 tons of lead per year (that's 1200 pounds of this toxic metal) and that doesn't meet the threshold for monitoring under the new EPA rule.

Although I support the new EPA lead standard, I complained a lot last week when I saw how few air monitors the Agency is planning to deploy. Now documents have emerged that show that EPA was planning to require monitors downwind of all polluters that emit more than 1/2 ton of lead per year, but the White House insisted on a higher threshold of one ton per year. Doubling the threshold means that more than 200 polluters nationwide that should have lead monitors, won't. Could it be a coincidence that the organization that represents Exide and other lead smelters was meeting with White House officials right before the 11th hour change was announced?

Folks living in Cass County, IN; Charlevoix County, MI; Lawrence County, PA; Cuyahoga County, OH; Oswego County, NY; Harris County, TX; and Dakota County, MN; to name just a few, won't have the benefit of lead monitors downwind of the cement plants, refineries or smelters in their communities, thanks to this last-minute change in the monitoring threshold.

To find out if your community has a facility that should have an air monitor (but won't), check out our map of lead polluters.

Those of us who are sick of the White House meddling in EPA rules are calling on the Agency to reconsider their monitoring network. The monitors need to be downwind of all the major lead polluters. Children in these 200 communities deserve protection from lead poisoning.

New Standard for Lead in Air: A Giant Step Forward

2008-10-16T02:58:19Z

Just a few days ago, I wrote on this blog that I'm in the mood for some good news, and today I'm happy to announce that I have some great news! EPA has just announced that it will follow the advice of its science advisors and will lower the air quality standard for toxic lead by ten-fold. The standard is being reduced from the antiquated 1.5 micrograms per cubic meter, to 0.15. That's great news for all the children in the U.S. It's also long overdue, since the lead standard has not been updated in 30 years.

The devil remains in the some of the details. For example, the standard will be averaged over a 3-month period (rolling average). The EPA science advisors and the public health community advocated for a 1-month averaging period or even shorter. That's because short spurts of lead from polluting factories or smelters might not cause a violation if they're averaged over a 3-month period of lower emissions, but they can still cause a health hazard. That's because the lead doesn't go away, but instead it falls to earth - on playgrounds and in backyards - where children get it on their hands and into their mouths. The battery industry was meeting with the White House as recently as the beginning of October to advocate precisely for this longer averaging period because they knew it would allow these bursts of pollution.

The standard won't come fully into effect until 2017, which is too long. The babies living near these lead polluters shouldn't have to wait until they're 9 years old to be protected from toxic lead. That's too late! We've already waited 30 years for this new lead standard, and it's crazy to wait almost 10 more years for it to come into effect.

Then there's the little problem of the lead monitoring network. I've complained about this before, but bear with me. As a scientist it burns me up when scientific information vanishes. Yet half the lead air monitors in the U.S. have vanished over the last ten years, and with them the data on what's going on in most communities across the country. EPA must rebuild the air monitoring network, or all of the good standards in the world won't help us, because nobody will be able to enforce them. Their proposal is not sufficient. For example, they propose only one lead monitor in cities with more than 500,000 people, and they don't commit to keeping monitors downwind of the big polluters. Also there are thousands of major lead polluters in the U.S., and EPA is talking about only 236 "new or relocated" monitors. Get with the program guys! How will anyone know if the standard is being met if nobody's monitoring?

So today, I'm congratulating EPA on a job well-done. But I also want them to know that we're watching. If those lead monitors don't start appearing in our communities and at the fencelines downwind of the big polluters, then EPA will be failing our children. Not only is the devil in the details, the proof is also in the pudding.

Fighting Fleas on Pets...Safely

2008-10-14T05:15:46Z

Scratch, scratch, scratch....

The sound of Cricket's toenails digging into his belly woke me last night at 3:00 AM. How annoying. The little guy has a flea, and that means today's bath day. Our dogs recognize the bath day ritual pretty quickly. When their beds get stripped and everything goes into the washing machine, they both get that worried look. Then when I put on the red running shorts, they know the time has come. In the past, Cricket - the little scamp - would try to flee and we'd have to chase him down, corner him, scoop up his 30 pounds of indignation, and carry him into the shower. Kanga had a more Gandhi-esque approach to the whole thing. She would curl up on the couch and refuse to move. Since she weighs a full 60 pounds, we'd sometimes practically need a crowbar to get her up and prod her toward the bathroom. Now they seem to recognize the inevitability, so both dogs come - heads hanging low - and submit to the indignity. Afterwards they cavort in gleeful joy for having survived yet again. That night Cricket asks to hop up on the bed, and sometimes we let him because he's so clean, fresh and fluffy...not to mention cute.

Lots of people ask me how to control fleas on pets, and as a pet owner I can relate. I hate fleas. But a trip to the pet store can be a bewildering experience, with all kinds of pesticide products on the shelves marketed to protect our best friends from vermin. Over the past year or so, my team of researchers at NRDC has been looking at these products and we've learned a few things that made me go with my current shower plan.

First of all, just because a pesticide is legally on the shelves doesn't mean it's safe. Many of these products contain potent chemicals that can have adverse effects on pets and kids. I'm especially concerned about flea collars because many of them contain really toxic chemicals - such as tetrachlorvinphos and propoxur - that should probably not be on the market anymore. The collars are designed as a 'slow release' device for the pesticide, and spread a pesticide residue across the animal's fur for weeks. That's fine unless you ever touch your pet. The problem is that the residue gets on your hands (or worse still children's hands) and then can be absorbed through the skin or accidentally ingested.

Even some of the "natural" flea control products can be a problem, since some of these chemicals can cause allergic reactions such as dermatitis and even asthma in sensitive people. There are lots of products out there, but we found relatively few that we can really recommend as safe. For information about specific flea control products that you use, check out the product guide on the "Green Paws" website.

In medical school, I took a course on the history of medicine. I learned the disgusting fact that in the past people were routinely infested with vermin such as lice and fleas. All kinds of chemicals, including DDT, were used for de-lousing humans even within the past 50 years. Fortunately, vermin on people isn't generally a problem in the United States today. That's because most of us bathe and wash our clothes on a regular basis. So why not apply this same rule to our pets? In my house, every two weeks, the dogs get a bath and all of their bedding gets cleaned. Every week the carpets get vacuumed well to remove any possible flea eggs. Guess what - it works! Every so often one of them picks up a flea at the dog park, but as soon as we see the scratching, out comes the flea comb, and that little blood sucker is soon drowned in a cup of soapy water. It's really easy once the whole family has the routine down. And it's great to have dogs that smell and feel clean. Better still, it's great to have dogs that aren't covered with a toxic residue.

Check out my clean and now flea-free doggies:

The Battery Industry in the White House

2008-10-12T13:00:00Z

So I'm barely back from sabbatical, and stuff is happening thick and fast. The EPA is under a court order to issue an updated standard for lead in the air by this Wednesday, October 15th. The current standard was set 30 years ago, and would be a joke except that it leaves so many kids vulnerable to lead poisoning and lets about 16,000 lead polluters continue to contaminate our air. Anyway, we're working for a standard that will protect children, but now it looks possible that we may not get it.

We found out that the battery industry had a closed-door meeting with the White House in early October. The official public comment period closed months ago, so folks like us can't be heard anymore. But those guys can still get in the door, and we can get a peek through the crack. It's easy enough to know what went on in that White House meeting. These battery guys are hoping they will get a break - they'll save money by not having to buy pollution-control equipment, and the kids who live near their factories...well...let's not think too much about them.

I blogged about one of those families in the past, and there are countless other folks living downwind of these facilities.

I've blogged a lot about lead. It's something I feel passionate about because the science is absolutely clear that it is hugely harmful to health, and the political shenanigans to try to 'explain away' the science really burn me up.

This is a "deja vu" situation, since it wasn't so long ago that the White House intervened to force EPA to set a weak air quality standard for ozone (smog). A standard that the science (and EPA's Clean Air Scientific Advisory Committee) said was not sufficient to protect the health of asthmatics. I blogged about that at the time, and worried that we'd see a rerun of this bad movie when lead came around. Here it is, with an October 2008 release.

But giving up isn't an option, and fortunately we don't have to. The Clean Air Act is a good law and it forces EPA to focus on the science and health and forbids distractions like the whining in the battery industry letter. That's why I'm glad to work with a bunch of lawyers, because at a certain point, when the scientific evidence is all on the table and they're not paying attention, that's when we need a hammer.

To learn more about lead polluters near you, check out the NRDC maps. http://www.nrdc.org/health/effects/lead/lead_emitters_maps.asp.

Post-Sabbatical Dreams

2008-10-11T22:13:02Z

It has been a while since I blogged on Switchboard, but it's good to be back. This summer, after 12 years as a Senior Scientist at NRDC, I took a four month sabbatical. It wasn't exactly relaxing, since I used the time for Spanish immersion in Guatemala and Mexico, and also for starting a new job at the medical school.

You see, in addition to my work at NRDC, I am also on the faculty at the U.C. San Francisco (UCSF) School of Medicine. This summer I became Director of the residency program in occupational and environmental medicine. It's exciting that one of the nation's top medical schools has decided to increase their emphasis on environmental health, and I'm happy to be a part of the effort.

After all, there's way too much work for me and my NRDC colleague Sarah Janssen (check out her great blog!), so I'm determined to crank out more bright, committed, physician-scientists who can help move us forward toward a healthier environment. So if you know any smart medical students, interns, residents...heck, even mid-career physicians looking for a change, send them my way, will you? Or have them check out the UCSF program (I can't resist a plug, since I know you Switchboard readers are well-connected!).

So I'll be an intermittent presence here on Switchboard, blogging when I want folks to know about especially exciting or egregious developments related to health and the environment. Maybe it's just that I'm rejuvinated by the sabbatical, but despite the economy and all the grim news, I'm thinking there will also be sparkles of good news to share.

Bisphenol A: Is it Gone? What's Next?

2008-04-18T21:27:39Z

The dominos are really starting to fall, as major manufacturers and retailers line up to announce that they are removing bisphenol A (BPA) from their products, or are pulling these products from their shelves. Although it’s gratifying to see this happening, it’s my job to always keep a weather-eye on the horizon and to worry about what’s next. Do the announcements by Nalgene and others today really solve the problem?

Not quite yet....

For years, we have been working to painstakingly pull together the science on BPA and to make the case to various regulatory agencies and legislative bodies (mostly unsuccessfully) that they should pay attention to what the science shows. For over a year we have had guidelines on our website telling consumers what they can do to avoid BPA. Meanwhile, studies by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) have showed that almost all Americans have this chemical in their bodies at levels that are likely to be significant. It’s frustrating to look at the science and then to look around you at the world and realize that nobody knows, and the key people don’t seem to care. It’s worse than frustrating when you realize the implications of the science could mean significant health problems ranging from promotion of breast cancer, to abnormalities of reproductive function, to alterations in fat storage in the body (ie. obesity).

When the tipping point finally happens, and BPA becomes a household name, that’s a good thing, because consumers and the public can finally drive agencies such as the EPA to do what they should have done years ago. Better still, companies take action right away when they realize the writing’s really on the wall.

There are two remaining problems that I’m worrying about today. One is that what is probably the biggest source of BPA seems to be entrenched and isn’t making a change, and the other is that we need to be wary of moving from the devil we know to the devil we don’t.

Some studies suggest that the biggest exposures to BPA come from eating canned food and drinking canned beverages. If you open a can of tomato sauce, empty it out, and peer inside, you’ll see a beige material lining the inside of the can. This stuff is a polycarbonate resin that’s designed to help prevent the metallic taste from the can from getting into the food. Since BPA imparts no flavor, it’s a great choice as the building block of this lining – except for the inconvenient fact that it’s toxic. Take a flashlight and peer deep within a soda can; you’ll see the same beige lining. Yet the canned food industry says they haven’t found an alternative yet, so the consumer will have to wait. Or maybe not...since we can buy our tomato sauce in glass jars or cardboard boxes and our vegetables frozen.

A while ago, the Sigg company removed the BPA lining from their nifty stainless steel water bottles. They were ahead of the curve and deserve special praise for their foresight. We withheld our praise, however, when they refused to disclose what chemicals they were using instead. Nalgene’s announcement today garnered lots of public attention, but my attention went to their “Tritan copolyester”, with questions about what’s in it. Camelbak has similarly announced their “genderbender free” bottles (love the name!) without disclosure of ingredients.

The real issue here is that two principles need to be put into place in the consumer marketplace:

First, chemicals that go into consumer products need to be tested for safety before they are put in the products, so we don’t have to wait for years before we discover that a chemical’s a problem.
Second, consumer products should all be required to list ingredients. That way, scientists like me can evaluate what’s in things and whether they’re safe, and the informed public can read the label if they want to avoid any particular ingredients.

We’ve got labeling on food, why can’t we do it with other consumer products?