American Pesticide Levels Are High

iVillage Member
Registered: 05-06-2003
American Pesticide Levels Are High
10
Tue, 05-11-2004 - 12:03pm
SAN FRANCISCO - Many U.S. residents carry unhealthy levels of pesticides in their bodies, with children, women and Mexican Americans disproportionately exposed to the toxic chemicals, according to a study to be released Tuesday.

The Pesticide Action Network analyzed data collected by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in a study of more than 2,648 people tested for levels of 34 pesticides, the environmental group said.

The PAN study — called "Chemical Trespass: Pesticides in Our Bodies and Corporate Accountability" — found that a large percentage of people who had their blood and urine tested carried pesticides above levels considered safe by government health and environmental agencies.

"The pesticide body burden data represents a failure of our approach to how we protect people from toxic pesticides," said Kristin Schafer, the study's lead author and PAN's program coordinator. "We really hope that it will help us move toward a different system of how we control pests in agriculture and all other areas."

San Francisco-based PAN, which advocates for alternatives to pesticide use for pest control, found that the average person in the study carried 13 of the 23 pesticides they evaluated. Many of the pesticides have been linked to infertility, birth defects, cancer and other serious health ailments, said Margaret Reeves, a senior scientist at PAN.

"A growing body of research suggests that even at very low levels, the combination of these chemicals can be harmful to our health," Reeves said.

The PAN study found that children between 6 and 11 years old were exposed to the nerve-damaging pesticide chlorpyrifos at four times the level deemed acceptable by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Chlorpyrifos is designed to kill insects by disrupting the nervous system.

"It does appear to have some validity," said Francis B. Suhre, of the EPA. "The crux of the matter is what does it all mean and is it reflecting past effects as opposed to current. At first blush, it requires further screening."

The study said one company — Dow Chemical Corp. — was responsible for 80 percent of the chlorpyrifos in Americans' bodies. The figure was derived from the amount of the chemical in the bodies of the people tested and a "conservative estimate of Dow's market share," said Skip Spitzer, a program coordinator for PAN and one of the study's authors.

Dow spokesman Garry Hamlin confirmed the company is the largest manufacturer of the pesticide in the country, but said the pesticide leaves the body quickly without doing harm. He said the CDC has noted that the measurement of an environmental chemical in a person's blood or urine does not mean that the chemical causes disease.

"Chlorpyrifos is widely used, and studies by the Centers for Disease Control suggest that people are exposed to chlorpyrifos at very tiny levels. ... When people are exposed, the product breaks down readily and is eliminated from the body in a matter of days," he said.

The report said that women carry "significantly" higher levels of three pesticides called organochlorines known to reduce birth weight and disrupt brain development in infants.

PAN's analysis also found that Mexican Americans carried higher levels of chemicals linked to the insecticides lindane, DDT and methyl parthion than other ethnic groups.

The PAN study didn't reveal why certain groups were more exposed to certain chemicals because the CDC data didn't include information about where the test subjects lived or what kinds of jobs they held. People are thought to ingest pesticides through air, water and food.

CDC spokeswoman Stephanie Creel said the center would not comment on the findings because it did not participate in the analysis.

PAN researchers believe pesticide makers should be held responsible for the "pesticide body burden" and its financial and health impacts.

"There's a case to be made that the primary responsibility for these pesticides in our bodies lies with the folks that manufacture and market them," Schafer said.

The study recommends that Congress investigate corporate responsibility for pesticide contamination, an EPA ban on using hazardous pesticides, and requiring manufacturers to demonstrate that a pesticide doesn't harm human health before using it.

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20040511/ap_on_sc/pesticide_study

----------------------------------

Food for thought, as we consider lifting bans on DDT...

iVillage Member
Registered: 07-25-2003
Tue, 05-11-2004 - 1:06pm
Food for thought, as we consider lifting bans on DDT...

<
Yet DDT, the very insecticide that eradicated malaria in developed nations, has been essentially deactivated as a malaria-control tool today. The paradox is that sprayed in tiny quantities inside houses -- the only way anyone proposes to use it today -- DDT is most likely not harmful to people or the environment. Certainly, the possible harm from DDT is vastly outweighed by its ability to save children's lives. >>

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F0071FFB3C5C0C728DDDAD0894DC404482

<>

http://www.theatlantic.com/issues/97aug/malaria.htm

Analyst and author Virginia Postrel has more:

http://www.dynamist.com/weblog/archives/001022.html


Edited 5/11/2004 1:08 pm ET ET by wrhen

Renee

iVillage Member
Registered: 05-06-2003
Fri, 05-14-2004 - 6:02pm
i knew you would respond to this. :)

small-scale use of ddt is one thing, but i was referring to lifting bans on the spraying of fields, etc - large-scale use, basically.

and given some recent studies showing a possible linkage of pesticide use and brain cancer, it's certainly something to think about.

personally, though, i'm not necessarily opposed to some household use of ddt - i think there are some countries in africa where that is legal.

but we're making quite a bit of progress in other methods of malaria control - widespread use of ddt may cut back on infection, but it also opens the door for some other serious health problems.

iVillage Member
Registered: 07-25-2003
Fri, 05-14-2004 - 6:59pm
<>

There are other pesticides that can be used on crops, even if DDT is relatively safe. Where it's really needed is for home & garden use to control mosquitos carrying malaria & west nile fever

<>

"t is banned or heavily restricted in most African nations, as in the United States..."


<>

no we're not

<<"HIV, TB, and malaria are among the most important infectious agents in the world," says Harold Varmus, the director of the National Institutes of Health. "There are no effective vaccines against them, and all have the same property of establishing chronic infection without an effective immune response." Malaria is perhaps the toughest of all, because, as a parasite, it has far more genetic material than a virus or a bacterium has. Never yet has a vaccine been proved successful against a parasite, and malaria is a particularly difficult target for a vaccine, because in each of the several stages it goes through, it has the opportunity to take hold in the host. >>

<< "Unfortunately, no major drug company in the world is involved in the research to develop new anti-malarials.">>

<>

may??? 2 million people, mostly children die of malaria in africa alone every year. it kills twice as many people world wide as aids. even greater is the number who manage to survive this painful horrid disease and become reinfected every year or live with it forever and the economic toll it takes on countries that are already poverty stricken is huge. it can keep people who are already struggling to survive at subsistence levels out of work for weeks at a time

<>

"DDT is one of the more benign pesticides known" and there is absolutely no comparision between the costs of using it and not using it

Renee

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-23-2003
Fri, 05-14-2004 - 9:12pm

Check out this info from Cornell University:


iVillage Member
Registered: 05-06-2003
Sat, 05-15-2004 - 12:55am
>>"t is banned or heavily restricted in most African nations, as in the United States..." <<

but not banned outright. it is used on a small-scale in some african countries.

>>no we're not <<

yes we are. bill gates can tell you all about it (or just about anyone at the hopkins school of public health, the tulane school of tropical medicine or any of a number of schools around the country with researchers working on this issue). that we're not making miraculous progress is obvious - but in what field are we? it also doesn't help that hiv/aids research is WAAAY overfunded and diverting monies that could go towards malaria and tb research.

>><< "Unfortunately, no major drug company in the world is involved in the research to develop new anti-malarials.">> <<

it is unfortunate that pharm companies are more concerned with the bottom line than saving lives. but sexual dysfunction is a more lucrative field than malaria.

>>may??? 2 million people, mostly children die of malaria in africa alone every year. it kills twice as many people world wide as aids. even greater is the number who manage to survive this painful horrid disease and become reinfected every year or live with it forever and the economic toll it takes on countries that are already poverty stricken is huge. it can keep people who are already struggling to survive at subsistence levels out of work for weeks at a time <<

lol. you ain't telling me anything i don't already know. i take anti-malarials every other year because of the time i spend in these countries. i work on this issue in my daily job. i'm studying so i can do research in this field. effectively, you're preaching to the choir. however, i'm not convinced that ddt is necessarily the answer - on a large-scale, anyway.

>>"DDT is one of the more benign pesticides known" <<

kind of like saying, 'mouth cancer is one of the least painful cancers to experience'.

all pesticides are harmful - that's why they work. the important question to answer is at what levels can we 'safely' use them?

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-18-2000
Sat, 05-15-2004 - 11:16am

>"reproductive dysfunctions, such as thin eggshells in some birds."<


I remember when the connection was made between this & DDT.


How sad it would have been to lose Bald Eagles.

cl-Libraone~

 


Photobucket&nbs

iVillage Member
Registered: 07-25-2003
Sat, 05-15-2004 - 5:36pm


Everything is harmful in the wrong concentrations.

<>

Pharmaseutical companies spend billions on R&D on devastating diseases that thankfully don't occur in enough people for the drug companies to ever come close to making a profit, and I hardly think that someone who dismisses a product that saved 100 million lives, and has never been shown to be related to any deaths, simply because of fear mongering and bad science has much room to judge them.

<>

We're spending money. That doesn't mean we're making progress. I can't seem to find any information about a vaccine being developed any time soon.

<< you're preaching to the choir. however, i'm not convinced that ddt is necessarily the answer - on a large-scale, anyway.>>

Then what is? Your anti-malarials that keep you safe as you come and go can't be used on a large-scale, and nothing new is available to deal with the immediate need.

"An article entitled "Balancing Risks on the Backs of the Poor" in the July 2000 issue of the journal Nature Medicine called this attempt to broaden the ban on DDT "eco-colonialism that can impoverish no less than the imperial colonialism of the past did" and said it shows the developed world is once "again to embrace indifference, and the pursuit of environmental goals on the backs of the world's sickest and poorest." The charges are made because DDT is the most cost-effective means of fighting mosquitoes that carry malaria, which kills millions of people, mostly in poor countries, every year.

Environmentalists charge that DDT is dangerous to humans and animals, but the first study to find an elevated risk of breast cancer from exposure to DDT "has now failed to be replicated at least eight times," with some studies even finding "significantly" reduced risk � and there were similar findings for "multiple myeloma, hepatic cancer, and non-Hodgkin lymphoma" (Attaran et al. 2000, 731, 730). Amir Attaran, who was one of the leaders in the successful effort to prevent the total banning of DDT for disease (malaria) vector control, added that although "hundreds of millions (and perhaps billions) of people have been exposed to elevated concentrations of DDT...the literature does not contain even one peer-reviewed, independently replicated study linking DDT exposure to any adverse health outcome" (Attaran and Maharaj 2000)."

http://healthfactsandfears.com/featured_articles/jun2002/ddt061402.html

Renee

iVillage Member
Registered: 07-25-2003
Sat, 05-15-2004 - 5:51pm
<<>"reproductive dysfunctions, such as thin eggshells in some birds."<

I remember when the connection was made between this & DDT.

How sad it would have been to lose Bald Eagles.>>

The problem with junk science is that the initial reports get everyone's attention, but the refutation of it seldom does.

http://www.junkscience.com/ddtfaq.htm#ref6

VI. Egg-shell thinning

DDT was alleged to have thinned bird egg shells.

# Many experiments on caged-birds demonstrate that DDT and its metabolites (DDD and DDE) do not cause serious egg shell thinning, even at levels many hundreds of times greater than wild birds would ever accumulate.

.") ]

#Experiments associating DDT with egg shell thinning involve doses much higher than would ever be encountered in the wild.



#Laboratory egg shell thinning required massive doses of DDE far in excess of anything expected in nature, and massive laboratory doses produce much less thinning than is seen in many of the thin-shelled eggs collected in the wild.



#Years of carefully controlled feeding experiments involving levels of DDT as high as present in most wild birds resulted in no tremors, mortality, thinning of egg shells nor reproductive interference.



#Egg shell thinning is not correlated with pesticide residues.



#Among brown pelican egg shells examined there was no correlation between DDT residue and shell thickness.



#Egg shells of red-tailed hawks were reported to be six percent thicker during years of heavy DDT usage than just before DDT use began. Golden eagle egg shells were 5 percent thicker than those produced before DDT use.



To the extent egg shell thinning occurred, many other substances and conditions could have been responsible.

#Oil has been associated with egg shell thinning.



#Lead has been associated with egg shell thinning.



#Mercury has been associated with egg shell thinning.



#Stress from noise, fear or excitement and disease are associated with egg shell thinning.



#Older birds produce thinner shells.



#Normal egg shells become 5 percent thinner as developing embryos withdraw calcium for bone development.



#Larger birds tend to produce thicker-shelled eggs.



#Dehydration is associated with thinner egg shells.



#Temperature extremes are associated with thinner egg shells.



#Decreased illumination is associated with thinner egg shells.



#Human and predator intrusion is associated with thinner egg shells.



#Simple restraint interferes with the transport of calcium throughout the body of birds, preventing adequate calcium from reaching the shell gland and forming good shells.



#Uncovering eggs after parent birds are removed or frightened off exposes eggs to potentially fatal chilling, especially in northern or high altitude locations.



#Phosphorus deficiency is associated with thinner shells.



#Calcium deficiency is associated with thinner shells.



#Egg shell deficiencies were attributed to DDT and DDE by U.S. Fish and Wildlife researchers even though the birds had been placed on low-calcium diets.



#Cutting illumination from 16 hours daily to 8 hours daily at the same time as DDT feeding began had no significant adverse effect on shell quality. Shell quality was only adversely impacted after large amounts of DDE were injected into birds.



#DDT was blamed for egg shell thinning even though a known egg shell thinner (dieldrin) was also added to the diet.



#No significant correlation between DDE and egg shell thinning in Canadian terns even though the eggs contained as much as 100 parts per million of DDE.



***********************

VII. Bald eagles

DDT was blamed for the decline in the bald eagle population.

# Bald eagles were reportedly threatened with extinction in 1921 -- 25 years before widespread use of DDT.



#Alaska paid over $100,000 in bounties for 115,000 bald eagles between 1917 and 1942.



#The bald eagle had vanished from New England by 1937.



#After 15 years of heavy and widespread usage of DDT, Audubon Society ornithologists counted 25 percent more eagles per observer in 1960 than during the pre-DDT 1941 bird census.



#No significant correlation between DDE residues and shell thickness was reported in a large series of bald eagle eggs.



#Thickness of eggshells from Florida, Maine and Wisconsin was found to not be correlated with DDT residues...

#U.S. Forest Service studies reported an increase in nesting bald eagle productivity (51 in 1964 to 107 in 1970).



#U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service biologists fed large doses of DDT to captive bald eagles for 112 days and concluded that "DDT residues encountered by eagles in the environment would not adversely affect eagles or their eggs."



#Wildlife authorities attributed bald eagle population reductions to a "widespread loss of suitable habitat", but noted that "illegal shooting continues to be the leading cause of direct mortality in both adult and immature bald eagles."



#Every bald eagle found dead in the U.S., between 1961-1977 (266 birds) was analyzed by U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service biologists who reported no adverse effects caused by DDT or its residues.



#U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service biologists linked high intake of mercury from contaminated fish with eagle reproductive problems.



#Shooting, power line electrocution, collisions in flight and poisoning from eating ducks containing lead shot were ranked by the National Wildlife Federation as late as 1984 as the leading causes of eagle deaths.



**********************

VIII. Peregrine falcons

DDT was blamed for the decline in the peregrine falcon population.

#The decline in the U.S. peregrine falcon population occurred long before the DDT years.



#Peregrine falcons were deemed undesirable in the early 20th century. Dr. William Hornaday of the New York Zoological Society referred them as birds that "deserve death, but are so rare that we need not take them into account."



#Oologists amassed great collections of falcon eggs.



#The decline in falcons along the Hudson River was attributed to falconers, egg collectors, pigeon fanciers and disturbance by construction workers and others.



#The 1950's and 1960's saw continuing harassment trapping brooding birds in their nests, removing fat samples for analysis and operating time-lapse cameras beside the nests for extended periods of time), predation and habitat destruction.



#Changes in climate (higher temperatures and decreasing precipitation) were blamed for the gradual disappearance of peregrines from the Rocky Mountains.



#Falconers were blamed for decimating western populations.



#During the 1960's, peregrines in northern Canada were "reproducing normally," even though they contained 30 times more DDT, DDD, and DDE than the midwestern peregrines that were allegedly extirpated by those chemicals.



#There was no decline in peregrine falcon pairs in Canada and Alaska between 1950 and 1967 despite the presence of DDT and DDE.



#The peregrine with the very highest DDT residue (2,435 parts per million) was found feeding three healthy young.



#Shooting, egg collecting, falconry and disruption of nesting birds along the Yukon River and Colville River were reported to be the cause of the decline in peregrine falcon population.



#The decline in British peregrine falcons ended by 1966, though DDT was as abundant as ever. The Federal Advisory Committee on Pesticides concluded "There is no close correlation between the declines in populations of predatory birds, particularly the peregrine falcon and the sparrow hawk, and the use of DDT."



#During 1940-1945, the British Air Ministry shot about 600 peregrines (half the pre-1939 level) to protect carrier pigeons.

#Peregrine falcon and sparrow hawk egg shells thinned in Britain prior to the use of DDT.



*******************

IX. Brown pelicans

DDT was blamed for the decline in the brown pelican population.

#Brown pelicans declined in Texas from a high of 5,000 birds in 1918 to a low of 200 in 1941, three years before the presence of DDT.



#Disappearance of the brown pelicans from Texas was attributed to fisherman and hunters. Gustafson AF. 1939. Conservation in the United States, Comstock Publ. Co., Ithaca, NY. (Repeated in U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Report No. 1, 1970)]

#Brown pelicans experienced no difficulty in reproducing during the DDT years.



#Brown pelicans did suffer reproductive problems following the 1969 Santa Barbara oil spill. Oil on eggs is a known cause of embryo death



#Among brown pelican egg shells examined (72 percent), there was no correlation between DDT residue and shell thickness.



#An epidemic of Newcastle disease resulted in millions of birds put to death to eradicate the disease.

The epidemic among U.S. birds was caused by the migration of sick pelicans along the Mexican coast.



**********************

X. Bird populations increase during DDT years

Widespread declines in bird populations during the DDT years is a myth.

#In congressional testimony, Charles Wurster, a biologist for the Environmental Defense Fund, noted the abundance of birds during the DDT years, referring to "increasing numbers of pheasants, quail, doves, turkeys and other game species."



#The Audubon Society's annual bird census in 1960 reported that at least 26 kinds of birds became more numerous during 1941 - 1960.



#Statistical analysis of the Audubon data bore out the perceived increases.



#The white-tailed kite, a raptor, was "in very real danger of complete extirpation in the U.S." in 1935, but "by the 1960's, a very great population increase and range expansion had become apparent in California and the breeding range had extended through the Central American countries."



#Great increases inmost kinds of hawks during the DDT years were reported by the Hawk Mountain Sanctuary Association (Hawk Mountain, Pennsylvania).



#National forest studies from Wisconsin and Michigan reported an increase in nesting osprey productivity from 11 young in 1965 to 74 young in 1970.



#A study of fish-eaters at Funk Island (on the North Atlantic coast) reported that, despite diets contaminated with DDT, gannet and murres pairs increased by 1,500 percent and 10,000 percent from 1945 to the early 1970s.



#Herring gulls reportedly increased from 2,000 pairs in 1941 to 35,000 pairs in 1971. Ironically, the Massachusetts department of Natural resources permitted the Audubon Society to poison 30,000 of the pairs on Tern Island. The Audubon-ers preferred terns. Audubon Society scientist William Drury stated, "it's kind of like weeding a garden."



#Some birds multiplied so well during the DDT years that they became pests:

*6 million blackbirds ruined Scotland Neck, North Carolina in 1970, polluting streams, depositing nine inches of droppings on the ground and killing the forest where they roosted at night.



*77 million blackbirds roosted within 50 miles of Ft. Campbell, KY increasing the risk of histoplasmosis in humans.



*Ten million redwings were reported in a small area of northern Ohio.



*The Virginia Department of Agriculture stated, "We can no longer tolerate the damage caused by the redwing ... 15 million tons of grain are destroyed annually enough to feed 90 million people."



*The phenomena of increasing bird populations during the DDT years may be due, in part, to (1) fewer blood-sucking insects and reduced spread of avian diseases (avian malaria, rickettsial-pox, avian bronchitis, Newcastle disease, encephalitis, etc); (2) more seed and fruits available for birds to eat after plant-eating insects were decimated; and (3) Ingestion of DDT triggers hepatic enzymes that detoxify carcinogens such as aflatoxin.

Renee

iVillage Member
Registered: 05-06-2003
Mon, 05-17-2004 - 12:42pm
>>Everything is harmful in the wrong concentrations.<<

so I ask again - at what levels can we safely use it?

>>I hardly think that someone who dismisses a product that saved 100 million lives, and has never been shown to be related to any deaths, simply because of fear mongering and bad science has much room to judge them. <<

LOL, are you upset at me because I don't think DDT is the miracle chemical? I'm not dismissing it, I'm being cautious.

DDT, and most pesticides for that matter, can cause long-term harmful effects in both the environment and in humans. Because we don't know about the bioaccumulative effects of DDT, we have to be careful.

And don't forget that after the 'miraculous' effect of DDT spraying in the 50's and 60's, we actually saw a resurgence of malaria due to increasing resistance of the vector.

In any case, it wasn't judgement, it was fact - pharm companies are loath to work on malaria vaccines because there isn't much money in it.

>>We're spending money. That doesn't mean we're making progress. I can't seem to find any information about a vaccine being developed any time soon. <<

Quite a lot of progress has been made in identifying likely antigens and proteins for vaccines. Early stages yes, but there is progress. Once again, funds are lacking.

With the publishing of the genome of the virus, there are some promising leads in recombinant DNA research.

ITNs shouldn't be too readily dismissed either - they're cheap and easy to use and require a minimum amount of effort.

>>Then what is? Your anti-malarials that keep you safe as you come and go can't be used on a large-scale, and nothing new is available to deal with the immediate need. <<

Sanitation, better housing/development, ITN's, small-scale use of DDT and other pesticides, some of the newer anti-malarials, better medical and health care and training, education, and more time, money and attention on malaria vaccines.

>>the literature does not contain even one peer-reviewed, independently replicated study linking DDT exposure to any adverse health outcome<<

given that ddt is a poc and a neuroendocrine disruptor, i'm skeptical. i've also read recent studies showing possible links between ddt use and developmental issues in young children.

but again, part of this has to do with the lack of studies on long-term effects of chronic ddt exposure.

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-18-2000
Tue, 05-18-2004 - 8:57am
U.N. chemical blacklist takes effect.
Many experts say 'dirty dozen' list too short.

http://www.cnn.com/2004/TECH/science/05/17/environment.chemicals.reut/index.html


A "dirty dozen" of industrial chemicals blamed for causing deaths and birth defects will be outlawed beginning Monday by a U.N. pact with many experts wanting other poisons added to the blacklist.


Inuit hunters in Canada, among those most exposed because many toxins are swept to the Arctic by ocean and air currents, plan to celebrate the ban with a feast of whale, seal stew, fish and caribou in Iqaluit, Baffin Island.


The 2001 Stockholm convention on persistent organic pollutants (POPs) takes effect on May 17 after ratification by 50 states, ending use of a range of pesticides, dioxins and polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs).


"The convention will save lives and protect the natural environment ... by banning the production and use of some of the most toxic chemicals known to humankind," said Klaus Toepfer, head of the U.N. Environment Programme.


Even so, it will takes years for POPs -- used in everyday items like plastics or paints as well as pesticides -- to break down. And everyone on the planet has traces of POPs in their bodies, UNEP says.


Many experts say the "dirty dozen" list is too short.


"Some of the old classical pesticides are in decline in some areas," said Lars-Otto Reiersen, head of the Aortic Monitoring and Assessment Program. "What alarms us most is that levels of new products like brominated flame retardants are increasing."


Flame retardants are used for example in sofas, clothing or television sets. Some are restricting their use because of worries about their environmental impact.


"Brominated flame retardants are a possibility (for addition to the list) as are many other chemicals," Jim Willis, head of UNEP's chemicals division, told Reuters. Canadian environmentalists also want the pesticide lindane outlawed.


'Poisoned from afar'

POPs can cause cancer and damage the nervous, reproductive and immune systems of people and animals, UNEP says.


High levels of POPS have been found in Inuit breast milk and POPs have even been blamed for deforming the sexual organs of female polar bears and making them look like hermaphrodites.


"We are being poisoned from afar," Sheila Watt-Cloutier, the head of the Inuit Circumpolar Conference that represents 155,000 Inuit, said last week.


POPs like the pesticides DDT, aldrin or dieldrin have been long banned in many nations. Even so, anyone scraping off old paint from a window frame, for instance, may release PCBs.


POPs build up in fatty tissues -- the world's whale population is probably swimming around with tens of tons of POPs lodged in blubber. The Inuit hope the ban will make traditional fatty foods, like seal or fish, less risky.


The Stockholm convention will unlock spending of about $500 million, partly to help destroy stockpiles and seek alternatives to POPs. About 25 nations, including South Africa and Ethiopia, will be allowed to keep using DDT to spray malarial mosquitoes.


The WWF environmental group expressed worries that global warming could exacerbate the POPs problem -- higher temperatures might wash out chemicals that have been locked in glaciers, or flooding might release buried POPs.


European Environment Commissioner Margot Wallstrom, a Swede, said she was screened last year for 77 toxins including POPs. "I had 28 in my body, including PCB and DDT," she said. "I was told that my result was below the average of the group tested."

cl-Libraone~

 


Photobucket&nbs