The alarming rise in diseases like Alzheimer’s, Autism,Parkinson’s and other Central Nervous system disorders makes me think that the large number of chemicals that have entered the human body over the past 100 years of rapid industrialization are taking their toll.The recent study that detailed the presence of nearly 250 chemicals in children’s blood in rising proportions should make us think twice about exposing us and our children to these chemicals. In one study, the precursor chemical for Teflon, about the most ubiquitous material used in our lives,has been found to be carcinogenic.The question remains how we can defend ourselves against these poisons short of banning all such chemicals.
To use a more earthy term, business has turned our entire planet into a shithouse and there is simply no escape from the consequences of our folly in pursuit of the “good” life.
Laziness, the mother of invention, will be the death of the earth as we know it if we do not stop the mindless release of byproducts and products of our manufacturing systems into the environment with no thought for the consequences.
Uninhabitable is a strong term. I prefer George Carlin’s view, which goes something like this: “Everyone’s running around saying ‘Save the earth! Save the earth!’ Well, the earth’s gonna be just fine – after it shakes us off like a bad case of fleas!”
Perhaps, though, we will mutate into creatures that will be able to handle the pollution in creative ways. I mean, who wouldn’t want teflon skin?
btw, KlatooBaradaNikto I love your handle. Please tell the robots to stop destroying our planet.
You raise a valid concern. While not all chemicals are harmful, the prudent way these materials should be handled is using some version of the “precautionary principle,” as practiced in the EU – a chemical cannot be marketed until it is shown not to have environmental or health effects. Now, we may not be able to check for everything beforehand – there are some things we just don’t know enough to check for – but where we can check, we should.
Unfortunately, in the US (and I believe Canada; someone please correct me if I’m wrong) the approach is the opposite – a chemical is essentially “innocent until proven guilty,” and only certain classes of chemicals need to undergo extensive health and environmental effect checks before marketing (e.g. pesticides).
Pharmaceuticals are checked for health effects, but the environmental effects have been given short shrift, so that we are now starting to learn of possible health effects of pharmaceuticals in the environment (one example – birth control pills. Think of all the women using the pill in a major city, and what happens when all that hormone-containing pee ends up in the river (wastewater treatment plants by and large do not address pharmaceuticals well). It is having effects like skewed sex ratios and reproductive system abnormalities in fish and amphibians.
As I indicated above, we cannot anticipate everything – when chlorofluorocarbons [Freon(tm)] were first introduced, they were so totally inert they were believed to be totally harmless. It took 40 years to discover that since they were so inert, they diffused throughout the atmosphere, up into the highest levels, where under intense UV light they broke down and catalyzed the destruction of the ozone layer. My point here is that there will always be unexpected surprises, possibly even for chemicals we previously thought safe, so we also need to remain open to that possibility in designing our laws and regulations.
The GAO has determined that the EPA needs to move towards an approach like Europe’s; that the current regulatory scheme in the US is totally inadequate. Senators Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ), Hillary Clinton (D-NY), John Kerry (D-MA), Barbara Boxer (D-CA) and Jim Jeffords (I-VT) [notice a pattern there?], have introduced the Child, Worker and Consumer Safe Chemicals Act (aka the Kid Safe Chemicals Act) to address this issue. It would take until 2020 to address the thousands of chemicals in commerce today, but it is a step in the right direction. Rep. Henry Waxman (D-CA) has introduced the bill in the House of Representatives. You can find the bill itself here.
Once the US and EU are on a common path, it might be possible to harmonize the two programs (this would be in the interests of the chemical firms as well, to avoid duplication of effort) and perhaps get the job done somewhat sooner. For example, the EU has already banned 450 chemicals (the US has banned under a dozen), and only a limited amount of testing (and primarily a review of the EU test results) might be needed for the EPA to address those chemicals. The important thing is to change the course of current regulations in the US, however, and this bill is certainly a major step in that direction.
You want to stop the poisoning?
Stop it YOURSELF first.
In your own home.
Buy organic whenever possible.
Stop using mainstream drugs if at all possible. If you are young enough not to have yet gotten on the pharmacological carousel to any great degree…STAY OFF OF IT!!! 95% of life’s little discomforts can be ameliorated with proper diet (including supplements when necessary), exercise, thorough elimination and herbs. Another 3% or 4% can be SERIOUSLY helped by acupunture and related disciplines that clear blockages of the nervous system.
Stop ingesting poisonous products like mainstream toothpastes and mouthwashes or using equally poisonous soaps on your body.
YUCK!!!
May as well wash your mouth out with the effluvia of chem plants and refineries.
THOROUGHLY rinse your dishes when you wash them. If your finger does not squeak on them after they are rinsed…which does not happen very often in dishwashers, I might add…then you are ingesting chemical soaps with every bite.
Step AWAY from the non-stick pan and aluminum cooking utensils.
Poison poison poison poison poison poison poison.
Do not wear artificial fabrics or sleep under or on them.
Do not sleep under strong electrical force fields like electric blankets. Hell, a great down comforter is a pleasure, not a drawback. Same with good down pillows.
And finally…are you hearing the words “tinfoil hat” here?
If you are, then you have been totally hypnotized by your exposure to mainstream media and the massive publicity efforts of Big Pharma, Big Medicine, Big Chem, and all their other little Big Brothers.
They will sell you ANYTHING for short-term profit.
From tobacco right on through Thalidomide and Vioxx.
Wise up and clean out.
You be bettah off if you do.
BET on it.
Later…
AG
Keep in mind that the rise of SOME diseases (e.g. Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s) is largely connected with the rise in life span. Doesn’t mean there aren’t other factors, but many diseases are becoming a problem now because people are living longer and our bodies do break down eventually.
Having said this, let me excerpt from one of my past newsletters:
This illustrates that even if we ARE living longer, we are also, indeed, poisoning ourselves. World population and life expectancy has not peaked yet. But if we continue as we are, it probably will.
When the Ohio river caught fire in the sixties.