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In researching PBDEs and flame retardants for my last post, I came across a recurring issue that I could not ignore: People of color in California are disproportionately impacted by the pervasive use of flame retardants, and have the highest exposure to toxic flame retardants nationwide!

Flame retardants are present in most furniture because the tobacco industry was forced to address fire safety, and wanted to do so without changing their product. Instead, the tobacco industry joined forces with chemical companies to “improve fire safety” by soaking household furniture in a toxic chemical stew. To add to the disgrace, the makers of flame retardants claim that flame retardants target the safety of low-income communities of color who disproportionately suffer from home fires. Instead we have seen that low-income communities of color in California have the highest exposure to flame retardants from household dust nationwide, and still suffer from higher rates of fire-related deaths.

The study that best exemplifies this inequity was conducted with California residents of Richmond, Salinas and Oakland-all predominately low-income communities of color. The study found that these communities live in homes where dust contains 5 to 10 times more PBDEs than the rest of the country, and about 200 times more than other developed countries. Dust is a primary route of exposure, especially for young children who often place their hands in their mouths and play and crawl on the floor. Similarly, research at the University of California, San Francisco, revealed that low-income pregnant women of color who are U.S. born and living in California have the highest recorded PBDE blood levels among pregnant women worldwide. They also found that African American children in California and other non-whites have higher levels of PBDEs in their blood than white children. Why the disparity?

Some attributing factors to the disproportionate impact of flame retardant exposure are:

• Characteristics of furniture:

-Older furniture. Low-income communities may get household items second-hand and cannot afford to replace them with newer, safer versions that may not be available in stores in their communities in addition to being cost-prohibitive.

• Housing Quality and Home Environment:

-Size and design of the home-building codes and regulations are not met including deteriorating infrastructure. -Ventilation system and lack of proper ventilation increases indoor air pollution.

• Physical and Social Characteristics of the Neighborhood Environment:

-Low-income communities of color have higher crime rates therefore many children cannot safely play outside and are limited to playing indoors where dust accumulates.

-Low-income communities of color are more likely to live in hazardous areas near industrial facilities.

Individual actions can be taken to reduce exposure to flame retardants. Unfortunately, many low-income communities of color cannot afford to take most of the suggestions to limiting exposure, such as buying safer couches and special vacuum filters. Washing your hands frequently is one of the most effective ways to reduce exposure, and if you cannot afford to purchase new products, this is the best alternative. Luckily, our government is beginning to respond to increasing concern about the impacts of flame retardant use.

A proposed replacement to the 1975 regulation, Technical Bulletin 117 which requires the use of flame retardants is currently under review. If the new California Flammability Standard-TB 117-2013 passes, it will improve fire safety without relying on toxic flame retardant chemicals. Technical Bulletin 117-2013 would help improve California’s public safety and eventually reduce racial and socioeconomic disparity. Unfortunately even after this law is fixed for the better, low-income communities will continue to be exposed to flame retardants in their homes, because most cannot afford to buy new furniture- nor should they be expected to “buy” their way out of the problem. This is why we need to test the safety of chemicals before they are released on to store shelves and into our bodies and into the environment. Without doing so, we have no way of knowing the effects they may have on our health and the planet. To take action urging our government to protect all families from toxic flame retardants please sign our petition!

You may have heard warnings about exposure to flame retardant chemicals in everyday products, and a recent article put out by environmentalhealthnews.org links flame retardant exposure with lower IQ, poorer attention and motor skills in children. This is yet another reminder why everyone, especially women of childbearing age, pregnant women and young children should avoid exposure to PBDEs and other toxic flame retardants.

What began as an attempt to save lives from fires in homes has now been linked to neurodevelopment effects in children; including higher probabilities of attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder, as well as lower reasoning, verbal, and IQ test scores.

Flame retardants were added to home furnishings in response to pressure on tobacco companies to address the issue of fire safety related to cigarette smoking. Instead of creating cigarettes that would self-extinguish, couches and other household items were doused in toxic flame retardants. Without government regulation that would require proof that exposure to flame retardants is safe, chemical companies have been able to profit while flame retardants have done far more harm than good. Fire safety experts and government studies conclude that flame retardants are ultimately ineffective. Furthermore, an investigation by the Chicago Tribune shows that these flame retardants are harmful and unnecessary!

PBDEs 101

Polybrominated diphenyl ether (PBDEs) is the second largest class of additives in the plastic industry used in home furnishings and in computers and other electronics.
PBDEs are considered Persistent Organic Pollutants (POPs), meaning they leach out into the air and dust, and are ingested by animals. Humans consume PBDEs through inhalation of dust and consumption of animal fats. PBDEs levels in dust exceed levels in food by up to a thousand times, making dust a primary route of exposure.

PBDEs are stored in our fatty tissue, where they remain for years. This makes them highly concentrated in breast milk, which poses an increased threat to nursing infants. Infants who are not breast-fed are still exposed to PBDEs in the womb from maternal blood.Children have higher levels of PBDE concentrations than adults because they tend to play on the ground where dust accumulates. Dust also gets onto their hands, which they often place in their mouths, increasing exposure.

Californians are even more susceptible to PBDEs exposure compared to the rest of the United States, and have levels seven to ten times higher than other states. The cities with some of the highest known levels of PBDEs were found to be Oakland and Salinas, areas where predominately low-income communities of color reside.

Although some flame retardants have been phased out, others remain in older furniture. This poses a higher threat to low-income families who do not have the financial means to purchase new home furnishings. Californians are likely to have the highest exposure because of the outdated flammability standard known as TB-117 (take a look at the tag under your couch- it’s likely that your couch complies with this standard).

While this all sounds overwhelming, you can take action! We need to let our elected officials know that we want to get toxic flame retardants out of our homes and our bodies. California Governor Jerry Brown’s administration is proposing new rules that would change California’s flammability standard. The changes would exempt many baby products including car seats, changing pads and infant mattresses from the flammability standard. There is a 45-day public comment period in which chemical companies will try to dispute the proposed changes. It is urgent that we show our support now!

Exposure to PBDEs is unavoidable, but there are things you can do to limit your exposure:

• Wash your hands frequently to reduce exposure from dust.
• Use a vacuum fitted with a high-efficiency particulate air(HEPA) filter, which can be found in most home improvement stores, and wet mop to reduce dust.
• Avoid products filled with polyurethane foam and instead purchase products with wool, organic cotton, or polyester fiberfill.
• Cover and seal rips in upholstery that may reveal polyurethane foam
• Reduce your consumption of animal fat, because PBDEs bio accumulate in fatty tissues
• Check the “Do Not Remove” label on your mattress to see if it contains PBDEs. If you cannot afford to buy a new, natural fiber mattress, you can purchase an allergen barrier casing for your mattress to reduce leaching.

Crossposted from our toxic-fighting parent organization, the Center for Environmental Health. 

Yesterday, for the first time since 1996, no players were chosen for induction into the Baseball Hall of Fame. Many first-time nominees, including Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, and several others were considered reputation-damaged, steroid-tainted players. In the run-up to the vote, the New York Times noted that this years’ scurrilous Hall of Shame nominees would hardly be exceptional additions in Cooperstown, which is already stocked with racists, gamblers, and drug users, among other miscreants.

But another Hall of Shame deserves some new (and some returning) inductees this year. Below, our choices (some current and some lifetime achievement nominees) for the corporate Hall of Shame.

Flame retardant chemical companies: The flame retardant industry deserves a lifetime achievement spot, based on their decades-long campaign (in concert with the tobacco industry, as the Chicago Tribune exposed in 2012) to mislead the public about their harmful products. The industry’s now defunct front group Citizens for Fire Safety and their lead “expert” witness Dr. David Heimbach deserve special mention for their dirty tricks campaigns and lying to public officials.

Alpha Natural Resources: The largest mountaintop removal mining company, Alpha took over the notorious Massey Energy company, after that corporate criminal’s deadly Upper Big Branch Mine Disaster nearly sunk the company. According to the Appalachian Community Health Emergency, mountaintop removal mining sites are responsible for “shockingly disproportionate levels of cancer, heart disease, pulmonary disease, birth defects and other physical and mental illnesses. More than four thousand people die in West Virginia communities every year because they live near such sites.” Local residents and environmental groups have sued Alpha repeatedly for its polluting operations, but the company remains unabashed. After another mining company recently acknowledged the damage from mountaintop removal and reached a legal agreement to phase-out such operations, Alpha told reporters, “(T)his does not affect our mining plans.”

Monsanto: A shoe-in for lifetime achievement in creating polluting products (among other crimes and lies), Monsanto makes it this year for serving as the chief funder of the lie-filled campaign against California’s GMO labeling ballot initiative. With upcoming GMO labeling votes in New Mexico, Washington and other states, expect Monsanto to be a perennial Hall of Shame inductee.

Apple: Apple appeared to dodge the shameful bullet early last year, when reports on the company’s labor practices focused on the embellishments in a one-man show about the company and not on the documented abuses. In the fall, further reports of misdeeds by the company’s Foxxconn i-Phone contractor showed it was business as usual at Apple. Also in 2012, Apple quietly withdrew from the environmental standards group EPEAT, then returned to the group and won questionable approval for their environmentally-questionable MacBook Pro.

Bayer: Bayer makes the list this year for their neonicotinoid pesticides, chemicals that scientists have linked to bee colony collapse. The EPA gets an assist for this nomination: in 2003 the agency granted a “conditional” approval for clothianidin, the company’s widely sold neonicotinoid. Despite failing to meet the registration’s conditions, and despite the latest science about potentially devastating loss of bee populations, EPA ten years later still allows the company to sell the nasty pesticide. The problem is so bad that even the financial journal Forbes posted a plea last year for signatures on a petition to Bayer to stop production of the product.

Dennis Paustenbach: A Hall of Shame award for worst individual in service to dirty industries goes to Paustenbach, who has a long track record of shameful behavior. CEH first exposed Paustenbach in 2003, when he served on a state science panel convened to investigate massive water pollution by PG&E (including the revelations uncovered by Erin Brockovich in Hinckley, CA). Turns out Paustenbach had received large payments during his career for work with PG&E, but he claimed he had not worked for the company in years. In fact, at the time the panel was convened Paustembach’s company had a contract to work for PG&E on hexchrome. Given this history, we were not surprised when the Chicago Tribune outed Paustenbach for his contributions to the flame retardant industry’s dirty public relations campaign (see above).

Shell Oil: According to a UN report, the gas company (known formally as Royal Dutch Shell) holds primary responsibility for 50 years of oil pollution that devastated the Ogoniland region of Nigeria, part of the Niger Delta, home to 31 million people and one of the world’s most important wetland and coastal marine ecosystems. Yet the company has evaded responsibility for the damage caused by its hugely profitable oil operations. Last year, four Nigerian villagers again took Shell to court, this time to Dutch civil court in The Hague, the first such suit in the company’s home country. Shell denied responsibility, blaming Nigerian saboteurs for decades of the company’s pollution.

Aqua Bounty: The GMO salmon company is bemoaning the lengthy government review of their Frankenfish, which if approved would be the first lab-created animal food species allowed, unlabeled, into the food supply. This may not sound like something you’d want to rush to the dinner table, but if you complain, company CEO Ron Stotish thinks you’re just being “disingenuous.” This from a company that claims that releases of its GMO fish into the wild would be virtually impossible – unless you count the previous accidental release of their entire 2008 commercial-sized batch. Surely we should trust a company that’s always been open to the public – except when it came to light last year that in 2009 Aqua Bounty’s GMO fish were hit with a new form of a common salmon disease, a problem the company failed to report to the FDA in its lengthy approval documents.

The nuclear power industry: The industry gets a lifetime achievement nod for their hilarious yet tragic “too cheap to meter” promises, given the failure of virtually all nuclear plants to be financially (let alone environmentally) sustainable without massive taxpayer subsidies (as outlined in this brief list of nuclear boondoggles). Fukushima was mostly reported as a “natural disaster,” but was actually the result of decades of mismanagement, lies, and “missed” inspections by Tepco. Similar problems at U.S. nuclear plants at San Onofre, Indian Point, and other plants came to light in 2012. (Looking for a fun party game? Everyone picks the name of a nuclear plant and googles it with the word “mismanagement.” Whoever gets the most results wins!)

The nuclear weapons complex: Another lifetime achievement shoe-in, for 2012 the nukers win a special award for the industry most likely to be toppled by your grandmother. Last year, one of our nation’s most guarded nuclear facilities was breached by an 82-year-old nun, Sister Megan Rice, who with her colleagues passed through four fences and walked around for two hours inside the Oak Ridge, Tennessee nuclear weapons facility. As Sister Megan told the New York Times, the group breached the plant to demonstrate against “(T)he criminality of this 70-year industry. We spend more on nuclear arms than on the departments of education, health, transportation, disaster relief and a number of other government agencies that I can’t remember.” This is hardly the first successful action by an octogenarian against the nuke weapons industry, and not even the first at Oak Ridge: in 2011, Father Bill Bichsel, an 86 year-old priest from Tacoma, Washington and 12 others were arrested for breaching the fences at Oak Ridge

Cross Posted from Center for Environmental Health’s Generation Green blog.

The holidays can be stressful, especially for those of us who are aware of all the harmful chemicals in too many products on the store shelves today. Sometimes I just want to look for gifts for my loved ones without having to wonder what dangerous toxins might be lurking in every product.

I also know it can be even more stressful for those who have to live with an eco-freak like me during the holidays. When my wife and I are shopping and she sees a purse she really likes, she knows I’m not thinking “That would make a great gift for her,” but more likely, “I wonder if that’s made with lead-tainted faux leather?” When she brings home a new toy she thinks will make a great gift for our daughter, she expects me to say, “But is that made with PVC?” Even my kids know that my adoring gaze when they’re drinking from their water bottles is also concealing the mad desire to rip the bottles from their hands and bring them to work to have them tested for hormone-altering properties.

Even if you’re not hyper-vigilant about toxic hazards, everyone deserves to be protected from these threats to our children and families. So this holiday season, we created the CEH Toxic-Free Guide to the Holidays (below). Our slideshow gives you tips on how to avoid many common health threats in everything from arts and crafts to wrapping paper. Considering new kitchenware for a gift? Our guide gives in-depth tips on what to look for and what to avoid. Thinking about jewelry for that special someone? We’ll show you how to avoid lead and cadmium risks. A nice basket of body lotions and skin products sounds nice, but our guide shows you how to avoid a widely used antibacterial and buy safer products.

Was your child’s school built before 1979?  It’s worth it to take a moment and find out!  If so, a group of chemicals called PCBs may be lurking in the light fixtures.  PCBs were previously used as insulation in electrical equipment until the federal government banned their use in 1979 after declaring their harmful impact on the environment and human health.  Unfortunately, these nasty chemicals are persistent, and they continue to be a hazard in buildings, including many schools.  Old light fixtures containing PCBs degrade as they age, leaking on to nearby surfaces or evaporating into the air and compromising indoor air quality.

Are PCBs still harmful?
Exposure to PCBs can cause a wide range of adverse health effects including skin irritation, reproductive and developmental effects, immune effects, and liver damage.  PCBs have a unique characteristic that allows them to accumulate in the fatty tissue of humans, remaining in our bodies and causing damage over time.  According to the EPA, the data strongly suggests that PCBs are probable human carcinogens.  If students or faculty are exposed to PCBs, it can pose short or long-term health effects.  Of greatest concern in a school setting, is that PCBs can negatively impact a child’s ability to learn and remember.  We want our kids to have the best learning environment in order to reach their potential!
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Last week I took my daughter Olivia in for her annual well visit with our pediatrician. I expected the eye examination, the flu shot, the questions about school, diet, etc. What I didn’t expect was for our doctor to ask Olivia if any of her classmates (she’s in the third grade) had gotten their periods yet, or if any of them were wearing a bra. And from the way she squirmed in her chair it was obvious she wasn’t expecting to have this conversation either.

Doing what I do, it shouldn’t be any surprise to hear that eight-year-old girls are getting their periods. How many times have I written “early puberty” in a blog post myself? It’s quite a different thing entirely, however, when the reality of what that could mean for your own little girl presents itself.

It’s no big surprise then, that companies like Kotex, who make feminine hygiene products, are beginning to market them to younger girls . If we ever needed proof that early puberty is a new reality, it’s that. Rather than letting companies capitalize on this new market space we parents should be fighting with everything we’ve got the industries and chemicals that have helped to create this new market.
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Working for a public health nonprofit can get you in trouble with your friends. I’ve been accused of trying to spoil everything from burgers to candy, Valentine’s Day to Halloween. So with Thanksgiving just around the corner, it seemed like time to take on yet another beloved American obsession.

No, I’m not talking turkey – meat eaters’ Thanksgiving dinner is safe from CEH (for now). But dessert time is another matter.

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Californians have a chance next Tuesday to support our right to know what’s in our food. Proposition 37, the GMO Right-to-Know Act calls for labels to inform consumers when food is genetically modified (GMO).

If this seems like common sense, it is. Dozens of other countries require labeling on GMO foods, but in the U.S., the biotech, pesticide and food industries teamed up with FDA bureaucrats, who overruled the agency’s scientists (who said that GMOs could trigger new allergies, cause toxic effects in food, and result in other health problems) and decided that GMOs would not be subject to labeling laws (not terribly surprising, given FDA’s track record of dubious drug approvals).

But of course, Monsanto (the leading maker of GMO seeds) and their allies are spending millions of dollars to run anti-choice ads that spread lies about Prop 37 and our right to know about GMO food. Even after being exposed for lying, the pesticide makers’ campaign continues to mislead Californians about this simple labeling measure.

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Paul Hawken spoke at the Center for Environmental Health’s gala last month. For readers who haven’t heard of him before, I’ll just say that Paul’s many environmentally-focused businesses, writings, and countless other forms of activism have changed the courses of multiple industries and many people’s lives. On September 10th, he told us how it all started with the smallest possible arena for activism: one person’s body. Paul described how he was born with asthma, medicated every day of his life for twenty years because of it, and then suddenly found a way to make it disappear: Read the rest of this entry →

Parents continue to be alarmed at findings about toxic flame retardants in our homes – not only in our furniture but in many products for our kids. Writing for the Baltimore Post-Examiner, Sara Michael calls herself “a first-time mom with Type A tendencies,” and those tendencies serve her well in her excellent review of the flame retardants controversy. These chemicals are still in wide use primarily due to a California flame retardant standard that encourages companies to use flame retardants even though federal government studies have found they provide little or no fire safety benefit.

As the Baltimore-based first-time mom found, this California rule has national implications: she found tags noting the use of flame retardants in her son’s pajamas and his foam changing pad. As she notes, these flame retardants are wholly unnecessary, and worse, they threaten our children’s health. Numerous recent studies have linked flame retardant chemicals to lower IQs, reduced fertility, hormonal changes, and hindering neurological development in infants and children, among other health threats.

What’s more, studies show that these chemicals are in our blood, in our kids, in our pets and in the environment. Studies have also found flame retardants in breast milk, leading to a recent comment by TV and film star Fran Drescher warning moms about the dangers of breast milk. The star of the forthcoming Hotel Transylvania is making a great contribution drawing attention to the environmental factors related to disease with her nonprofit Cancer Schmancer. And who wouldn’t be concerned when we hear that breastmilk can dose our newborns with toxic flame retardants and other harmful chemicals?  Read the rest of this entry →