Fumes force school evacuation - Rockwell students and staff members overcome by pesticide fumes and taken to hospital By Abigail Crocker - 6/18/09
BRISTOL — Bristol Warren Regional School Department officials evacuated Rockwell Elementary School, located on Hope Street in Bristol, after eight elementary students and a school social worker were overcome by fumes entering the building at about 1 p.m. on Thursday, June 18. They were all transported to Rhode Island Hospital
and treated and released.
According to Superintendent Dr. Edward Mara, a pungent smelling pesticide was sprayed down the street from the school, on the corner of Hope Street and Gibson Road, and wafted into classrooms after winds kicked up. Some students started to feel nauseous and faint and were taken to Rhode Island Hospital by rescue personnel. One staff member, a male social worker, was also taken by crews to receive medical attention after fumes overcame him.
“It can cause respiratory issues. There was an adult with asthma that was affected right away,” said Dr. Mara.
Parents of the students who were taken by ambulance were alerted of the evacuation by school administration. Others found out by word of mouth.
“Parents are very technologically advanced. Some heard from police scanners and called each other to sign their kids out,” said Dr. Mara.
According to a school official, the school did not telephone all the parents of Rockwell students because both the Bristol fire and police chiefs asked the school to refrain as they felt there was no immediate danger.
Students were moved from their classrooms to the gymnasium while they waited to be picked up by their parents. Hall monitors holding clipboards to record sign outs patrolled the hallways as students ran around, some with tear-stained faces. Parents looking for information upon entering the school wore concerned looks. The bus schedule was
not changed for students who were not picked up by parents.
Kristen Placido, a parent of three Rockwell School students, was on her way to the school to help with an end of school party but she removed her children shortly after arriving. She said most of the children in the building were unharmed but visibly nervous after being evacuated outside the school and witnessing a staff member taken by
ambulance.
Her third-grade daughter, Alexa, said her class was told to move away from the school during recess but students could detect the odor.
“My grade was on the playground and we had to evacuate because there were fumes smelling like gas and stuff,” Alexa said. “Police made us back away from the playground and the street. There was a really bad smell.”
Theresa Medeiros was escorted by a police officer into the building to pick up her grandson who had vomited in the school.
As of 1:40 p.m., the school was empty and officials from the Rhode Island Department of Environmental Management were responding to the building to check the air quality in and around the school and determine what the chemical was.
At first, students were moved outside but were moved back into the building after chemicals could be smelled outside. Because of the wind direction, all side doors to the school were shut and parents were only allowed to get in through a front door.
Currently there have been no charges filed against the home owner whose property emitted the chemicals.
Friday, June 18, is the school's last day before summer vacation begins.
http://www.eastbayri.com/detail/129505.html
.........................................................................
Find safe and far more effective pest control alternatives:
http://www.thebestcontrol2.com
Monday, July 13, 2009
Sunday, July 12, 2009
Poisoned legacy - The Hiroshima of the chemical industry is still claiming victims.
Poisoned legacy - The Hiroshima of the chemical industry is still claiming victims – babies born 25 years later with serious birth defects. From Billy Briggs in Bhopal.
UNABLE TO steer safely in the mud, the driver of our rickshaw pulls into the side of the road to allow us to take shelter from torrential rain. There, under a shop's awning, a small crowd of people are standing together waiting for the weather to break. They include Sapna Sharma and her brother-in-law, Sanjay. Sanjay is holding his 18-month-old nephew, Anshul, who has kohl-rimmed eyes and silver bracelets on his ankles. As we stand talking, some of the people start pointing to the child's hands and feet while speaking animatedly to us in Hindi. Through our translator, Sapna then explains that her son was born with 12 toes and 12 fingers.
Shortly afterwards, about half a mile away in the Shankar Nagar area of Bhopal, we meet another Indian child with congenital defects, three-year-old, Raj, who is blind, cannot walk and whose head is oversized.
"The doctors said bad water could have been a cause of my son's condition. Older people here are gas victims and now the younger people are victims of the water," says his mother, Poona.
Here, in the capital city of Madhya Pradesh in India, hundreds of children are being born with deformities and mental health problems. As we walk back to our rickshaw after the interview we come across more afflicted youngsters who have followed us along the road out of curiosity. They include Rajesh, 12, who is barefoot and bald. The other children make fun of him - his mother, Yashdabai, explains that they do so because they believe that her son is "mad".
Rajesh's older sister, Sonia, a pretty girl with her black hair pulled back off her face, scolds the other children and tells us that she always has to protect her brother from bullies. Sonia is barefoot, too, and as she speaks a colleague notices that the young girl has huge feet.
This is the horrendous legacy the city of Bhopal is facing 25 years on from one of the world's worst industrial accident. The Bhopal gas disaster, as it became known, occurred shortly after midnight on December 3, 1984, when a cloud of poisonous gas escaped from a Union Carbide pesticide plant in the city. It has been dubbed the "Hiroshima of the chemical industry". The accidental release of 42 tonnes of methyl isocyanate (MIC) from the factory exposed more than 500,000 people to toxic gases and up to 10,000 inhabitants are thought to have died within the first 72 hours after the leak.
At least 25,000 people exposed to the gas have since died, and today in Bhopal tens of thousands more Indians suffer from a variety of debilitating gas-related illnesses such as respiratory and psychiatric problems, joint pains, menstrual irregularities, tuberculosis and cancers. More disturbingly, the escalating number of birth defects in children include cleft palates, webbed feet and hands, twisted limbs, brain damage and heart problems.
Shankar Nagar is a slum area of the city just north of the derelict Union Carbide factory site. For years local campaigners have been demanding that Union Carbide - now owned by US multinational Dow Chemicals - clean up the abandoned pesticide plant, but so far their pleas have been ignored.
In 1999, a Greenpeace investigation found severe chemical contamination of the environment surrounding the former Union Carbide factory, including pollution with heavy metals and chemical compounds.
The Greenpeace report also said: "Analysis of water samples drawn from wells serving the local community has also confirmed the contamination of groundwater reserves with chemicals arising either from previous or ongoing activities and/or incidents.
"As a result of the ubiquitous presence of contaminants, the exposure of the communities surrounding the plants to complex mixtures of hazardous chemicals continues on a daily basis. Though less acute than the exposure which took place as a result of the 1984 MIC release, long-term chronic exposure to mixtures of toxic synthetic chemicals and heavy metals is also likely to have serious consequences for the health and survival of the local population."
Amnesty International's 2004 Clouds Of Injustice report said: "Toxic wastes continue to pollute the environment and water supply and it is appalling that no-one has been held account for the leak and its appalling consequences."
The abandoned factory site is now a vast wasteland of weeds and trees that is home to packs of wild dogs. The buildings and structure have been left to rot while tank 610, from where the poison gas escaped, sits like an old rusting locomotive in the sun. Piles of dangerous chemicals are lying in the open air and inside one of the abandoned labs we saw dozens of dusty brown bottles containing chemicals. Campaigners say drums of Sevin - the pesticide Union Carbide was producing at the time using MIC - have never been removed from the site and remain locked in one of the sheds under police guard.
"There are sacks of poisons, mercury drops, toxic carbaryl rocks from which toxic tars ooze into the earth, and subsoil water and tarry liquids that overflow when the monsoon comes," explained our translator and guide, Sanjay Sharma, 24, a student who lost his three sisters, two brothers and parents in the 1984 disaster. He has one sister left after his only other brother, Sunil, committed suicide on July 26, 2006. Sunil had been 12 at the time of the disaster and was a vociferous campaigner on behalf of victims until be became severely depressed.
"My brother hanged himself. When they found him he was wearing a T-shirt that said, No More Bhopalis'."
Survivors campaigning for clean water petitioned the Supreme Court of India, which in May 2004 ordered that clean, safe water be piped into the communities, but to date the state government has ignored this order.
In January this year, a major study was embarked upon to try to ascertain the extent of the current health problems facing the population. The year-long investigation is being carried out by the Sambhavna Clinic in Bhopal, an innovative medical facility built in the centre of the city most badly affected by the gas leak. Researcher Santosh Kshatria said 22 different communities near the factory site were believed to be drinking from a contaminated water supply.
"There are 10 researchers. I'm covering 20,000 people in 17 neighbourhoods. So far I have surveyed 5000 people and found more than 200 cases of children with congenital defects. Many have twisted limbs and many have mental health issues. Anecdotally, this is a very high rate of incidence," she says.
In many cases these are the same families from the poorest slum areas who were decimated by the gas in 1984. They have no option but to drink the water and complain of aches and pains, rashes, fevers, eruptions of boils, headaches, nausea, lack of appetite, dizziness and constant exhaustion.
Lead, mercury and organochlorines have been found in the milk of nursing mothers living near the factory with the result that women are terrified to breastfeed their babies in case they are giving them poison.
Another legacy for Bhopali females is that men have reservations about marrying so-called "gas victims" so many young local women face living in dire poverty having been stigmatised and left single.
Investigations into the 1984 disaster revealed that something had gone fundamentally wrong with a tank that stored methyl isocyanate. During the early hours of December 3, 1984, large amounts of water entered tank 610, containing the highly toxic chemical. The resulting reaction increased the temperature inside the tank to more than 200C, raising the pressure to a level it was not designed to withstand and eventually releasing a large volume of toxic gases.
Union Carbide has always claimed that its Indian subsidiary - Union Carbide India Limited, which was 49%-owned by the state - was solely responsible for the management of the plant and that the accident was the result of sabotage.
Union Carbide was taken over by Dow Chemicals, one of the producers of Agent Orange, in 2001, and the latter insists that all liabilities were settled in 1989 when Union Carbide paid around £300 million to the Indian government to be allocated to survivors. Furthermore, Union Carbide says it did all it could to alleviate the human suffering following the disaster and that it paid for a hospital in Bhopal to offer free medical care to victims.
The company also denies allegations that it abandoned the plant and says UCIL removed tens of thousands of pounds of MIC from the plant and spent around £1.5m undertaking additional clean-up work. The firm also says that a 1998 study of water sources near the plant site by the Madhya Pradesh Pollution Control Board did not find any traces of chemicals linked to any substance used at the UCIL plant.
In 1991, however, Bhopal's authorities charged Union Carbide's chief executive, Warren Andersen, with manslaughter. To date the retired American has avoided an international arrest warrant and a US court summons. Andersen was declared a fugitive from justice by the Chief Judicial Magistrate of Bhopal in 1992 for failing to appear at court. Although orders were passed to the Indian government to press for his extradition from America, Bhopal campaigners say ministers have not pushed the case, fearing a backlash from foreign investors.
A quarter of a century on the campaign for justice in Bhopal continues unabated. In June, 27 members of the US Congress appealed to Dow Chemicals to pay to clean up the derelict site and to meet survivors' demands for medical and economic rehabilitation. The politicians also asked the company to send a representative to take part in court proceedings in India.
"Bhopal is widely regarded as the worst industrial disaster in human history, a catastrophe with widespread implications for the chemical industry, globalisation and human rights," they said in a letter initiated by Frank Pallone, a Democrat from New Jersey.
They say the polluter, rather than taxpayers, should bear responsibility for environmental damage. Meanwhile, Bhopal's environmental crisis continues. http://www.sundayherald.com/international/shinternational/display.var.2519438.0.0.php
UNABLE TO steer safely in the mud, the driver of our rickshaw pulls into the side of the road to allow us to take shelter from torrential rain. There, under a shop's awning, a small crowd of people are standing together waiting for the weather to break. They include Sapna Sharma and her brother-in-law, Sanjay. Sanjay is holding his 18-month-old nephew, Anshul, who has kohl-rimmed eyes and silver bracelets on his ankles. As we stand talking, some of the people start pointing to the child's hands and feet while speaking animatedly to us in Hindi. Through our translator, Sapna then explains that her son was born with 12 toes and 12 fingers.
Shortly afterwards, about half a mile away in the Shankar Nagar area of Bhopal, we meet another Indian child with congenital defects, three-year-old, Raj, who is blind, cannot walk and whose head is oversized.
"The doctors said bad water could have been a cause of my son's condition. Older people here are gas victims and now the younger people are victims of the water," says his mother, Poona.
Here, in the capital city of Madhya Pradesh in India, hundreds of children are being born with deformities and mental health problems. As we walk back to our rickshaw after the interview we come across more afflicted youngsters who have followed us along the road out of curiosity. They include Rajesh, 12, who is barefoot and bald. The other children make fun of him - his mother, Yashdabai, explains that they do so because they believe that her son is "mad".
Rajesh's older sister, Sonia, a pretty girl with her black hair pulled back off her face, scolds the other children and tells us that she always has to protect her brother from bullies. Sonia is barefoot, too, and as she speaks a colleague notices that the young girl has huge feet.
This is the horrendous legacy the city of Bhopal is facing 25 years on from one of the world's worst industrial accident. The Bhopal gas disaster, as it became known, occurred shortly after midnight on December 3, 1984, when a cloud of poisonous gas escaped from a Union Carbide pesticide plant in the city. It has been dubbed the "Hiroshima of the chemical industry". The accidental release of 42 tonnes of methyl isocyanate (MIC) from the factory exposed more than 500,000 people to toxic gases and up to 10,000 inhabitants are thought to have died within the first 72 hours after the leak.
At least 25,000 people exposed to the gas have since died, and today in Bhopal tens of thousands more Indians suffer from a variety of debilitating gas-related illnesses such as respiratory and psychiatric problems, joint pains, menstrual irregularities, tuberculosis and cancers. More disturbingly, the escalating number of birth defects in children include cleft palates, webbed feet and hands, twisted limbs, brain damage and heart problems.
Shankar Nagar is a slum area of the city just north of the derelict Union Carbide factory site. For years local campaigners have been demanding that Union Carbide - now owned by US multinational Dow Chemicals - clean up the abandoned pesticide plant, but so far their pleas have been ignored.
In 1999, a Greenpeace investigation found severe chemical contamination of the environment surrounding the former Union Carbide factory, including pollution with heavy metals and chemical compounds.
The Greenpeace report also said: "Analysis of water samples drawn from wells serving the local community has also confirmed the contamination of groundwater reserves with chemicals arising either from previous or ongoing activities and/or incidents.
"As a result of the ubiquitous presence of contaminants, the exposure of the communities surrounding the plants to complex mixtures of hazardous chemicals continues on a daily basis. Though less acute than the exposure which took place as a result of the 1984 MIC release, long-term chronic exposure to mixtures of toxic synthetic chemicals and heavy metals is also likely to have serious consequences for the health and survival of the local population."
Amnesty International's 2004 Clouds Of Injustice report said: "Toxic wastes continue to pollute the environment and water supply and it is appalling that no-one has been held account for the leak and its appalling consequences."
The abandoned factory site is now a vast wasteland of weeds and trees that is home to packs of wild dogs. The buildings and structure have been left to rot while tank 610, from where the poison gas escaped, sits like an old rusting locomotive in the sun. Piles of dangerous chemicals are lying in the open air and inside one of the abandoned labs we saw dozens of dusty brown bottles containing chemicals. Campaigners say drums of Sevin - the pesticide Union Carbide was producing at the time using MIC - have never been removed from the site and remain locked in one of the sheds under police guard.
"There are sacks of poisons, mercury drops, toxic carbaryl rocks from which toxic tars ooze into the earth, and subsoil water and tarry liquids that overflow when the monsoon comes," explained our translator and guide, Sanjay Sharma, 24, a student who lost his three sisters, two brothers and parents in the 1984 disaster. He has one sister left after his only other brother, Sunil, committed suicide on July 26, 2006. Sunil had been 12 at the time of the disaster and was a vociferous campaigner on behalf of victims until be became severely depressed.
"My brother hanged himself. When they found him he was wearing a T-shirt that said, No More Bhopalis'."
Survivors campaigning for clean water petitioned the Supreme Court of India, which in May 2004 ordered that clean, safe water be piped into the communities, but to date the state government has ignored this order.
In January this year, a major study was embarked upon to try to ascertain the extent of the current health problems facing the population. The year-long investigation is being carried out by the Sambhavna Clinic in Bhopal, an innovative medical facility built in the centre of the city most badly affected by the gas leak. Researcher Santosh Kshatria said 22 different communities near the factory site were believed to be drinking from a contaminated water supply.
"There are 10 researchers. I'm covering 20,000 people in 17 neighbourhoods. So far I have surveyed 5000 people and found more than 200 cases of children with congenital defects. Many have twisted limbs and many have mental health issues. Anecdotally, this is a very high rate of incidence," she says.
In many cases these are the same families from the poorest slum areas who were decimated by the gas in 1984. They have no option but to drink the water and complain of aches and pains, rashes, fevers, eruptions of boils, headaches, nausea, lack of appetite, dizziness and constant exhaustion.
Lead, mercury and organochlorines have been found in the milk of nursing mothers living near the factory with the result that women are terrified to breastfeed their babies in case they are giving them poison.
Another legacy for Bhopali females is that men have reservations about marrying so-called "gas victims" so many young local women face living in dire poverty having been stigmatised and left single.
Investigations into the 1984 disaster revealed that something had gone fundamentally wrong with a tank that stored methyl isocyanate. During the early hours of December 3, 1984, large amounts of water entered tank 610, containing the highly toxic chemical. The resulting reaction increased the temperature inside the tank to more than 200C, raising the pressure to a level it was not designed to withstand and eventually releasing a large volume of toxic gases.
Union Carbide has always claimed that its Indian subsidiary - Union Carbide India Limited, which was 49%-owned by the state - was solely responsible for the management of the plant and that the accident was the result of sabotage.
Union Carbide was taken over by Dow Chemicals, one of the producers of Agent Orange, in 2001, and the latter insists that all liabilities were settled in 1989 when Union Carbide paid around £300 million to the Indian government to be allocated to survivors. Furthermore, Union Carbide says it did all it could to alleviate the human suffering following the disaster and that it paid for a hospital in Bhopal to offer free medical care to victims.
The company also denies allegations that it abandoned the plant and says UCIL removed tens of thousands of pounds of MIC from the plant and spent around £1.5m undertaking additional clean-up work. The firm also says that a 1998 study of water sources near the plant site by the Madhya Pradesh Pollution Control Board did not find any traces of chemicals linked to any substance used at the UCIL plant.
In 1991, however, Bhopal's authorities charged Union Carbide's chief executive, Warren Andersen, with manslaughter. To date the retired American has avoided an international arrest warrant and a US court summons. Andersen was declared a fugitive from justice by the Chief Judicial Magistrate of Bhopal in 1992 for failing to appear at court. Although orders were passed to the Indian government to press for his extradition from America, Bhopal campaigners say ministers have not pushed the case, fearing a backlash from foreign investors.
A quarter of a century on the campaign for justice in Bhopal continues unabated. In June, 27 members of the US Congress appealed to Dow Chemicals to pay to clean up the derelict site and to meet survivors' demands for medical and economic rehabilitation. The politicians also asked the company to send a representative to take part in court proceedings in India.
"Bhopal is widely regarded as the worst industrial disaster in human history, a catastrophe with widespread implications for the chemical industry, globalisation and human rights," they said in a letter initiated by Frank Pallone, a Democrat from New Jersey.
They say the polluter, rather than taxpayers, should bear responsibility for environmental damage. Meanwhile, Bhopal's environmental crisis continues. http://www.sundayherald.com/international/shinternational/display.var.2519438.0.0.php
Tuesday, July 7, 2009
Millions of us have poison in our pants
Millions of us have poison in our pants - Monday, July 6, 2009
Some 8.7 million pairs of pants and knickers in Britain contain a toxic pesticide, says a campaign group. Cotton sprayed with endosulfan often ends up as underwear in budget clothing shops and accounts for one in 50 pairs sold here.
There is no danger to wearers of the poison briefs but Pants to Poverty says farming communities suffer birth defects and neurological problems from the chemical.
Endosulfan is banned in 62 countries but is still widely used in India and elsewhere.
Pants to Poverty is planning a campaign to make chemical giant Bayer stop distributing it.
http://www.metro.co.uk/news/article.html?Millions_of_us_have_poison_in_our_pants&in_article_id=697981&in_page_id=34
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The real danger is for the farmers directly exposed to the pesticide POISONS used in cotton farming – the Environmental Justice Foundation 20,000 agricultural workers are killed annually because of exposure to pesticides.
Some 8.7 million pairs of pants and knickers in Britain contain a toxic pesticide, says a campaign group. Cotton sprayed with endosulfan often ends up as underwear in budget clothing shops and accounts for one in 50 pairs sold here.
There is no danger to wearers of the poison briefs but Pants to Poverty says farming communities suffer birth defects and neurological problems from the chemical.
Endosulfan is banned in 62 countries but is still widely used in India and elsewhere.
Pants to Poverty is planning a campaign to make chemical giant Bayer stop distributing it.
http://www.metro.co.uk/news/article.html?Millions_of_us_have_poison_in_our_pants&in_article_id=697981&in_page_id=34
...............................................................................
The real danger is for the farmers directly exposed to the pesticide POISONS used in cotton farming – the Environmental Justice Foundation 20,000 agricultural workers are killed annually because of exposure to pesticides.
Monday, July 6, 2009
‘Public markets must start organic-produce section’
‘Public markets must start organic-produce section’ By Jonathan L. Mayuga / Correspondent - 7/5/09
WITH a growing number of health-conscious Filipinos going for “healthier” food free of toxic chemicals, it’s about time public markets have their own section on “organic” produce.
Efren Moncupa, lead convenor of Go Organic! Philippines, a consortium of nongovernment organizations advocating organic farming in the Philippines, said even some grocery stores now have a section for organic rice, fruits and vegetables.
Some restaurants, he added, now have a menu for organic food for health-conscious customers.
“Filipino consumers are becoming more conscious of their health, particularly on the food they eat. The problem is they don’t know where to buy organic food. Public markets should have an organic section where organically grown produce, such as rice, fruits and vegetables, can be accessed,” he said.
Go Organic! Philippines promotes organic farming and is taking the lead in implementing the Organic Fields Support Program of the Department of Agriculture and the Bureau of Soils and Water Management.
Phase 1 of the project, launched by Agriculture Secretary Arthur Yap last November, ended in April. Phase 2 of the project is currently in the pipeline.
“Local government units [LGUs] should similarly put up an organic-food section in the market, where organically grown products can be bought. It is also ideal that LGUs put up a bagsakan center for organically grown agricultural products, as well as byproducts, in support of the growing organic industry,” said Moncupa, a former agrarian-reform undersecretary and is now with the Malasimbu Agricultural Cooperative.
Officials of Alaminos City, Pangasinan, and Samal, Bataan, have initiated the move to turn their towns into organic zones. Aside from promoting organic farming among farmers, Alaminos City Mayor Hernani Braganza had ordered the administrator of the public market in the city to put up an organic section.
He said one way of promoting organic farming is to institutionalize support such as access for consumers and organic-food producers.
Mayor Rolando Tigas of Samal, who wants the entire town to go organic, is spearheading the move to convince farmers to shift from conventional to the more sustainable organic farming to boost their income.
Tigas has asked members of the Municipal Council to pass several resolutions in support of organic farming, including declaring the municipality an organic zone and one day a week as organic farming day, and a portion of the Samal public market a wholesale section for organic products.
...........................................................................
Learn How to really go organic - http://www.thebestcontrol2.com
WITH a growing number of health-conscious Filipinos going for “healthier” food free of toxic chemicals, it’s about time public markets have their own section on “organic” produce.
Efren Moncupa, lead convenor of Go Organic! Philippines, a consortium of nongovernment organizations advocating organic farming in the Philippines, said even some grocery stores now have a section for organic rice, fruits and vegetables.
Some restaurants, he added, now have a menu for organic food for health-conscious customers.
“Filipino consumers are becoming more conscious of their health, particularly on the food they eat. The problem is they don’t know where to buy organic food. Public markets should have an organic section where organically grown produce, such as rice, fruits and vegetables, can be accessed,” he said.
Go Organic! Philippines promotes organic farming and is taking the lead in implementing the Organic Fields Support Program of the Department of Agriculture and the Bureau of Soils and Water Management.
Phase 1 of the project, launched by Agriculture Secretary Arthur Yap last November, ended in April. Phase 2 of the project is currently in the pipeline.
“Local government units [LGUs] should similarly put up an organic-food section in the market, where organically grown products can be bought. It is also ideal that LGUs put up a bagsakan center for organically grown agricultural products, as well as byproducts, in support of the growing organic industry,” said Moncupa, a former agrarian-reform undersecretary and is now with the Malasimbu Agricultural Cooperative.
Officials of Alaminos City, Pangasinan, and Samal, Bataan, have initiated the move to turn their towns into organic zones. Aside from promoting organic farming among farmers, Alaminos City Mayor Hernani Braganza had ordered the administrator of the public market in the city to put up an organic section.
He said one way of promoting organic farming is to institutionalize support such as access for consumers and organic-food producers.
Mayor Rolando Tigas of Samal, who wants the entire town to go organic, is spearheading the move to convince farmers to shift from conventional to the more sustainable organic farming to boost their income.
Tigas has asked members of the Municipal Council to pass several resolutions in support of organic farming, including declaring the municipality an organic zone and one day a week as organic farming day, and a portion of the Samal public market a wholesale section for organic products.
...........................................................................
Learn How to really go organic - http://www.thebestcontrol2.com
Monday, June 29, 2009
FDA Scrutinizes Acetaminophen's Liver Risk.
FDA Scrutinizes Acetaminophen's Liver Risk
Concerns Over Unintentional Overdose Hazards May Change Drug's Labeling
By DAN CHILDS
June 29, 2009—
Acetaminophen is the most commonly used painkiller in the country and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration will scrutinize its safety record today in the shadow of concerns that people taking too much of it are damaging their livers.
Research has shown that hundreds of Americans each year experience acute liver failure as a result of taking acetaminophen -- widely known under the brand name Tylenol -- and about 100 people die annually from overdosing on the painkiller, either intentionally or unintentionally.
Although researchers have found that the drug is safe if taken at recommended levels, its prevalence in a variety of pain relievers, fever reducers and cough medicines as a somewhat hidden ingredient means patients don't realize they are taking several drugs that all contain acetaminophen.
Moreover, combining the medication with alcoholic beverages increases the risk of liver damage.
These concerns and more will be the subject of discussion today and Tuesday at the Center for Drug Evaluation and Research Joint Meeting of the Drug Safety and Risk Management Advisory Committee, the FDA's Nonprescription Drugs Advisory Committee, and the Anesthetic and Life Support Drugs Advisory Committee.
No matter the outcome of the meeting, however, consumers will still be able to get acetaminophen. Twenty-nine billion extended units (tablets/capsules/milliliters) of prescription and over-the-counter, acetaminophen-containing products were sold through retail and non-retail pharmacies in 2005, according to the FDA.
"It's important to say that they're not considering taking acetaminophen off the shelves," ABC News Medical Contributor Dr. Marie Savard said on "Good Morning America" this morning. "When taken in the proper dosage, this is a safe drug that's been used for more than a half century. The problem is that people often take more than the maximum dosage and that can cause serious liver damage and sometimes even death."
One of the items on the FDA's agenda, Savard said, is looking into eliminating combination drugs that contain acetaminophen to curb the incidence of accidental overdose. The agency will also be exploring the possibility of better labeling of these drugs -- including strong warnings about the risks of liver damage -- and it's considering reducing the maximum daily dosage levels for over-the-counter acetaminophen to no more than 3,250 milligrams from the current max of 4,000 milligrams per day.
Is Acetaminophen Safe?
The FDA has struggled with the issue of acetaminophen's safety since at least 1977, when an agency committee suggested that labels for pain relievers contain a warning that they can damage a patient's liver.
McNeil Consumer Healthcare, a Johnson & Johnson subsidiary and the manufacturer of Tylenol, said in a statement last month that they fear recommendations made by the FDA could have the effect of steering consumers away from an appropriate and safe drug.
"While we share the FDA's mutual goal of preventing and decreasing the misuse and overdose of acetaminophen, we have concerns that some of the FDA recommendations could discourage appropriate use and are not necessary to addressing the root causes of acetaminophen overdose," the statement read.
And the Consumer Healthcare Products Association, a not-for-profit association representing the makers of over-the-counter medicines and nutritional supplements, cited FDA data showing that more than 80 percent of fatalities associated with over-the-counter and prescription acetaminophen products involve intentional overdoses -- in other words, suicide attempts.
Savard agreed that, in most cases, acetaminophen is safe.
"The truth is that acetaminophen is the safest choice for pain and fever," she said. "The alternatives -- inflammation blockers, like aspirin and ibuprofen -- have even more safety concerns. They can cause ulcers and bleeding, high blood pressure, and kidney disease. With acetaminophen, if you stick to the right dose and don't take too much, it's generally very safe."
Still, the hazards of acetaminophen overdose have worried many poeple for years. In 2002, Dr. Peter Lurie of the consumer advocacy group Public Citizen appeared before the FDA's Nonprescription Drugs Advisory Committee to relay concerns about unintentional overdoses associated with acetaminophen. In November 2005, a study in the journal Hepatology found that the majority of acute liver failure cases in the United States were due to acetaminophen poisoning. And more recent research has suggested that these cases may be on the rise.
Keeping Yourself Safe From Acetaminophen Overdose
Fortunately, Savard said, consumers can go a long way in terms of protecting themselves if they simply monitor the drugs they are taking and, especially, if they are aware of the ingredients in the products they take to ease their pain.
"More than 200 products have acetaminophen in them," Savard said. "Everything you put in your mouth counts -- and that includes prescription drugs too, which can also contain acetaminophen."
Savard's advice to consumers? Read every label carefully and keep track of how many doses of acetaminophen you take per day. She added that consumers must also become more savvy to clues on labels that point to acetaminophen.
"When you're checking prescription drugs like these, look for the letters 'APAP,' which designate that the medication contains acetaminophen," she said. "Drugs like codeine and oxycodone often come with acetaminophen but, as I said, it's labeled as 'APAP.'"
Copyright © 2009 ABC News Internet Ventures
Concerns Over Unintentional Overdose Hazards May Change Drug's Labeling
By DAN CHILDS
June 29, 2009—
Acetaminophen is the most commonly used painkiller in the country and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration will scrutinize its safety record today in the shadow of concerns that people taking too much of it are damaging their livers.
Research has shown that hundreds of Americans each year experience acute liver failure as a result of taking acetaminophen -- widely known under the brand name Tylenol -- and about 100 people die annually from overdosing on the painkiller, either intentionally or unintentionally.
Although researchers have found that the drug is safe if taken at recommended levels, its prevalence in a variety of pain relievers, fever reducers and cough medicines as a somewhat hidden ingredient means patients don't realize they are taking several drugs that all contain acetaminophen.
Moreover, combining the medication with alcoholic beverages increases the risk of liver damage.
These concerns and more will be the subject of discussion today and Tuesday at the Center for Drug Evaluation and Research Joint Meeting of the Drug Safety and Risk Management Advisory Committee, the FDA's Nonprescription Drugs Advisory Committee, and the Anesthetic and Life Support Drugs Advisory Committee.
No matter the outcome of the meeting, however, consumers will still be able to get acetaminophen. Twenty-nine billion extended units (tablets/capsules/milliliters) of prescription and over-the-counter, acetaminophen-containing products were sold through retail and non-retail pharmacies in 2005, according to the FDA.
"It's important to say that they're not considering taking acetaminophen off the shelves," ABC News Medical Contributor Dr. Marie Savard said on "Good Morning America" this morning. "When taken in the proper dosage, this is a safe drug that's been used for more than a half century. The problem is that people often take more than the maximum dosage and that can cause serious liver damage and sometimes even death."
One of the items on the FDA's agenda, Savard said, is looking into eliminating combination drugs that contain acetaminophen to curb the incidence of accidental overdose. The agency will also be exploring the possibility of better labeling of these drugs -- including strong warnings about the risks of liver damage -- and it's considering reducing the maximum daily dosage levels for over-the-counter acetaminophen to no more than 3,250 milligrams from the current max of 4,000 milligrams per day.
Is Acetaminophen Safe?
The FDA has struggled with the issue of acetaminophen's safety since at least 1977, when an agency committee suggested that labels for pain relievers contain a warning that they can damage a patient's liver.
McNeil Consumer Healthcare, a Johnson & Johnson subsidiary and the manufacturer of Tylenol, said in a statement last month that they fear recommendations made by the FDA could have the effect of steering consumers away from an appropriate and safe drug.
"While we share the FDA's mutual goal of preventing and decreasing the misuse and overdose of acetaminophen, we have concerns that some of the FDA recommendations could discourage appropriate use and are not necessary to addressing the root causes of acetaminophen overdose," the statement read.
And the Consumer Healthcare Products Association, a not-for-profit association representing the makers of over-the-counter medicines and nutritional supplements, cited FDA data showing that more than 80 percent of fatalities associated with over-the-counter and prescription acetaminophen products involve intentional overdoses -- in other words, suicide attempts.
Savard agreed that, in most cases, acetaminophen is safe.
"The truth is that acetaminophen is the safest choice for pain and fever," she said. "The alternatives -- inflammation blockers, like aspirin and ibuprofen -- have even more safety concerns. They can cause ulcers and bleeding, high blood pressure, and kidney disease. With acetaminophen, if you stick to the right dose and don't take too much, it's generally very safe."
Still, the hazards of acetaminophen overdose have worried many poeple for years. In 2002, Dr. Peter Lurie of the consumer advocacy group Public Citizen appeared before the FDA's Nonprescription Drugs Advisory Committee to relay concerns about unintentional overdoses associated with acetaminophen. In November 2005, a study in the journal Hepatology found that the majority of acute liver failure cases in the United States were due to acetaminophen poisoning. And more recent research has suggested that these cases may be on the rise.
Keeping Yourself Safe From Acetaminophen Overdose
Fortunately, Savard said, consumers can go a long way in terms of protecting themselves if they simply monitor the drugs they are taking and, especially, if they are aware of the ingredients in the products they take to ease their pain.
"More than 200 products have acetaminophen in them," Savard said. "Everything you put in your mouth counts -- and that includes prescription drugs too, which can also contain acetaminophen."
Savard's advice to consumers? Read every label carefully and keep track of how many doses of acetaminophen you take per day. She added that consumers must also become more savvy to clues on labels that point to acetaminophen.
"When you're checking prescription drugs like these, look for the letters 'APAP,' which designate that the medication contains acetaminophen," she said. "Drugs like codeine and oxycodone often come with acetaminophen but, as I said, it's labeled as 'APAP.'"
Copyright © 2009 ABC News Internet Ventures
NEW ARTCHITECTURE IN MODERN MEDICINE
NEW ARTCHITECTURE IN MODERN MEDICINE
Beldeu Singh
Some notable Greeks were the Fathers of modern medicine who developed and documented a system to "diagnose" and treat with herbs. This Unani system reached India through the Arabs a long time ago. Today it is being taught in universities and institutes and Indian researchers are working hard at developing strategies in integrative medicine that incorporates herbal remedies into allopathic medicine but such integration is based on scientific research and methodology and evaluation in rat models and clinical trials. They are making pretty nice strides.
Many conditions may not be properly diagnosed. Doctors may just put labels on conditions with little knowledge of the underlying causes, including the disturbances or alterations in the healthy biochemical pathways associated with mineral depletion or excess hydrogen peroxide that is not converted into water and oxygen fast enough. Excess hydrogen peroxide can alter biochemical reactions in the body. Chronic inflammation is another major factor in the development of disease and aids the progression of disease conditions. Chronic inflammations can be initiated by:-
1. Oxidative stress especially when associated with poor nutrition or the empty calorie syndrome, the symptoms coming from oxidative damage to molecules in the body, cell membranes and to the genetic molecules or production of abnormal proteins and/or
2. Weakening of the body's natural antioxidant defense mechanism that may be accompanied by sharp declines in glutathione levels, keeping in mind that excessive use of drugs in treatments can lead to mineral depletion and/or
3. Decline in the production of ATP and antioxidant enzymes such as coenzyme Q10 that may be associated with a decline in mitochondrial density and/or
4. Toxins produced by pathogens including afflatoxins from fungus and/or
5. Heavy metal accumulation in the body including from cosmetics with lead, aluminum from perfumes and several heavy metals from cigarettes, and mercury from power plants and haze or from excess thimerosal and/or
6. Chemicals from pesticides and chemicals such as benzene used in petrol and its derivatives used in drugs and food preservatives, keeping in mind that excessive use of drugs can lead to production of secondary radicals such as the hydroxyl radical in the mitochondria leading to problems in the mitochondria and/or
7. Allergens from protozoal infections that can be very toxic.
Health problems such as elevated blood pressure can be caused by very very fine (VVF) particles, from cigarette smoke and haze and exhaust fumes, that stick to the surface of red blood cells, surface of epithelial cells in the air passages and to the heart cells where they can cause minerals to leak out. On the surface of heart cells they can cause magnesium to leak out leading to sudden heart failure. Formulations using alpha-lipoic acid and pectins in the nano-form extracted from edible substances is the most effective and fastest way to biochelate toxins, heavy metals and VVF in the bloodstream and in the cells of the body especially the fat cells in which they may bioaccumulate.
Diagnosing a condition is not about putting a label on a condition or health problem. The underlying causes or associated factors must be determined. Psoriasis, for instances can be caused by low production of the natural corticosteroids in the body or by allergens from protozoa or may be due to free-radical chain reactions initiated by heavy metals. The treatments for these are not the same.
Many of the issues in modern medicine now arise simply because of the voluminous and diverse research published in the myriad of scientific and medical journals as well as research in alternative therapies including clinical nutrition, biologics and nano-technologies and nano-biotechnologies.
The sudden explosion in knowledge must now be put to good use to create and develop the architecture of modern health systems and modern medicine, the two not being identical. There must be a legal distinction between drugs for treatment which primarily are toxic or synthetic and contain both the L-form and D-form molecules in contrast to antioxidants and phytochemicals obtained from food and edible substances that must be further segregated from toxic molecules or preparation obtained from plants which are in the L-form. The human body is an L-form biological system that thrives on L-form antioxidants. The metabolism of d-form chemicals yields hydrogen peroxide which must be converted into water and oxygen by the catalase-glutathione enzyme system that requires minerals such as zinc, iron, copper and manganese for it enhanced catalytic function. Spent natural antioxidants, on the other hand are converted into other useful biomolecules in the body. For instance, when L-vitamin C loses its electron to quench a free-radical or by donation to another “spent” natural antioxidant, the ascorbate radical can be converted into elastin or collagen.
Treating a condition must now be distinguished from approaches in healing. To see the difference, consider scurvy. Healing such a condition is by using natural vitamin C or fruits that are rich in vitamin C. Treatment science based on drugs and the healing sciences are not the same but can be part of modern medicine together with modern procedures. They are not the same as they clearly fall into two separate and distinct categories.
Life is about good creativity and productivity that serves people well by giving a benefit or benefits or creates value for them. Perhaps the American Dream was built around that notion. It remains a great and wonderful notion to create wealth. I am not sure if drugs do such a wonder to this notion and the economy. Drugs are a bitter pill for the economy. I do not think there is such a thing as a wonder drug as all drugs have toxic side effects to varying extents. The damage they do depends on their ability to generate free-radicals in the body and promote oxidative stress and in mineral depletion and in their ability to damage adhesion molecules. It also depends on the dose and the length of time they are consumed or administered.
So, there is no such thing as safe drugs, only doses deemed "safe" and their use is based on their benefit/risk profile unlike non-toxic preparations or formulations that are made from edible substances. It is not surprising therefore, that thousands of patients worldwide suffer adverse drug reactions, enough in numbers to create a specialist post-graduate training in this field. Many of such adverse reactions are due to or related to the damage of adhesion molecules and the healing approach lies in a cocktail of natural antioxidants not more drugs. Drugs cannot perform biological repair or cell membranes or promote genetic repair or promote the production of repair proteins or elevate the blood antioxidant levels in the patient.
W. Scott Thompson, someone whose writings I have great regard for, recently wrote about A BITTER PILL TO SWALLOW FOR A BUSY SMALL CITY. In it he wrote that the "American health system is scandalous. True, at its high end, it is by far the best in the world with the latest equipment and highest standards of treatment."
Yes that is correct in its context. That context being equipment and procedures but the treatment, on proper and careful analysis in not within the framework of healing science for treatment and healing are very different. You can treat a cancer patient with toxic chemo and risk losing his wellbeing in many ways and if the treatment succeeds in remission, there is still the need to heal the patient to wellness. Similarly, you can treat so called "HIV-positive" patients with toxic AZT that causes the same symptoms as AIDS, which means if you administer it to healthy people long enough, the treatment can sufficiently suppress the immune system to result in opportunistic infections or initiate the development of cancers through development of very high cell membrane potential which is a measure or severe inflammation through loss of electrons from molecules in the cell membrane, and through oxidative damage to the genetic molecules through loss of hydrogen atoms in the genetic molecules.
Of course, W. Scott Thompson is right in the context of his article and the points he made therein.
There is now a need for creating a new architecture in modern medicine based first on an understanding of the basic need to develop L-form interventions and the need to conceive and nurture the notion that the best healthcare system is the one that focuses on wellness and healing by promoting the production of antibodies and repair proteins and by supporting the natural antioxidant defense mechanism of the body that drives healthy biochemical pathways and helps to boost the body's immune system, not one that suppresses it, there being exceptions in preventing rejection in organ transplants, and in developing non-toxic approaches. Good health and healing is a multi-factorial process and hence the need to understand and teach it as healing approaches. That is where the future lies for health whereas the future for treatment science lies in drugs and chemicals.
So, what shall or should or ought to constitute the foundation of the new architecture? That is the primary question along with the scandalous costs.
Copyright - Beldeu Singh
Beldeu Singh
Some notable Greeks were the Fathers of modern medicine who developed and documented a system to "diagnose" and treat with herbs. This Unani system reached India through the Arabs a long time ago. Today it is being taught in universities and institutes and Indian researchers are working hard at developing strategies in integrative medicine that incorporates herbal remedies into allopathic medicine but such integration is based on scientific research and methodology and evaluation in rat models and clinical trials. They are making pretty nice strides.
Many conditions may not be properly diagnosed. Doctors may just put labels on conditions with little knowledge of the underlying causes, including the disturbances or alterations in the healthy biochemical pathways associated with mineral depletion or excess hydrogen peroxide that is not converted into water and oxygen fast enough. Excess hydrogen peroxide can alter biochemical reactions in the body. Chronic inflammation is another major factor in the development of disease and aids the progression of disease conditions. Chronic inflammations can be initiated by:-
1. Oxidative stress especially when associated with poor nutrition or the empty calorie syndrome, the symptoms coming from oxidative damage to molecules in the body, cell membranes and to the genetic molecules or production of abnormal proteins and/or
2. Weakening of the body's natural antioxidant defense mechanism that may be accompanied by sharp declines in glutathione levels, keeping in mind that excessive use of drugs in treatments can lead to mineral depletion and/or
3. Decline in the production of ATP and antioxidant enzymes such as coenzyme Q10 that may be associated with a decline in mitochondrial density and/or
4. Toxins produced by pathogens including afflatoxins from fungus and/or
5. Heavy metal accumulation in the body including from cosmetics with lead, aluminum from perfumes and several heavy metals from cigarettes, and mercury from power plants and haze or from excess thimerosal and/or
6. Chemicals from pesticides and chemicals such as benzene used in petrol and its derivatives used in drugs and food preservatives, keeping in mind that excessive use of drugs can lead to production of secondary radicals such as the hydroxyl radical in the mitochondria leading to problems in the mitochondria and/or
7. Allergens from protozoal infections that can be very toxic.
Health problems such as elevated blood pressure can be caused by very very fine (VVF) particles, from cigarette smoke and haze and exhaust fumes, that stick to the surface of red blood cells, surface of epithelial cells in the air passages and to the heart cells where they can cause minerals to leak out. On the surface of heart cells they can cause magnesium to leak out leading to sudden heart failure. Formulations using alpha-lipoic acid and pectins in the nano-form extracted from edible substances is the most effective and fastest way to biochelate toxins, heavy metals and VVF in the bloodstream and in the cells of the body especially the fat cells in which they may bioaccumulate.
Diagnosing a condition is not about putting a label on a condition or health problem. The underlying causes or associated factors must be determined. Psoriasis, for instances can be caused by low production of the natural corticosteroids in the body or by allergens from protozoa or may be due to free-radical chain reactions initiated by heavy metals. The treatments for these are not the same.
Many of the issues in modern medicine now arise simply because of the voluminous and diverse research published in the myriad of scientific and medical journals as well as research in alternative therapies including clinical nutrition, biologics and nano-technologies and nano-biotechnologies.
The sudden explosion in knowledge must now be put to good use to create and develop the architecture of modern health systems and modern medicine, the two not being identical. There must be a legal distinction between drugs for treatment which primarily are toxic or synthetic and contain both the L-form and D-form molecules in contrast to antioxidants and phytochemicals obtained from food and edible substances that must be further segregated from toxic molecules or preparation obtained from plants which are in the L-form. The human body is an L-form biological system that thrives on L-form antioxidants. The metabolism of d-form chemicals yields hydrogen peroxide which must be converted into water and oxygen by the catalase-glutathione enzyme system that requires minerals such as zinc, iron, copper and manganese for it enhanced catalytic function. Spent natural antioxidants, on the other hand are converted into other useful biomolecules in the body. For instance, when L-vitamin C loses its electron to quench a free-radical or by donation to another “spent” natural antioxidant, the ascorbate radical can be converted into elastin or collagen.
Treating a condition must now be distinguished from approaches in healing. To see the difference, consider scurvy. Healing such a condition is by using natural vitamin C or fruits that are rich in vitamin C. Treatment science based on drugs and the healing sciences are not the same but can be part of modern medicine together with modern procedures. They are not the same as they clearly fall into two separate and distinct categories.
Life is about good creativity and productivity that serves people well by giving a benefit or benefits or creates value for them. Perhaps the American Dream was built around that notion. It remains a great and wonderful notion to create wealth. I am not sure if drugs do such a wonder to this notion and the economy. Drugs are a bitter pill for the economy. I do not think there is such a thing as a wonder drug as all drugs have toxic side effects to varying extents. The damage they do depends on their ability to generate free-radicals in the body and promote oxidative stress and in mineral depletion and in their ability to damage adhesion molecules. It also depends on the dose and the length of time they are consumed or administered.
So, there is no such thing as safe drugs, only doses deemed "safe" and their use is based on their benefit/risk profile unlike non-toxic preparations or formulations that are made from edible substances. It is not surprising therefore, that thousands of patients worldwide suffer adverse drug reactions, enough in numbers to create a specialist post-graduate training in this field. Many of such adverse reactions are due to or related to the damage of adhesion molecules and the healing approach lies in a cocktail of natural antioxidants not more drugs. Drugs cannot perform biological repair or cell membranes or promote genetic repair or promote the production of repair proteins or elevate the blood antioxidant levels in the patient.
W. Scott Thompson, someone whose writings I have great regard for, recently wrote about A BITTER PILL TO SWALLOW FOR A BUSY SMALL CITY. In it he wrote that the "American health system is scandalous. True, at its high end, it is by far the best in the world with the latest equipment and highest standards of treatment."
Yes that is correct in its context. That context being equipment and procedures but the treatment, on proper and careful analysis in not within the framework of healing science for treatment and healing are very different. You can treat a cancer patient with toxic chemo and risk losing his wellbeing in many ways and if the treatment succeeds in remission, there is still the need to heal the patient to wellness. Similarly, you can treat so called "HIV-positive" patients with toxic AZT that causes the same symptoms as AIDS, which means if you administer it to healthy people long enough, the treatment can sufficiently suppress the immune system to result in opportunistic infections or initiate the development of cancers through development of very high cell membrane potential which is a measure or severe inflammation through loss of electrons from molecules in the cell membrane, and through oxidative damage to the genetic molecules through loss of hydrogen atoms in the genetic molecules.
Of course, W. Scott Thompson is right in the context of his article and the points he made therein.
There is now a need for creating a new architecture in modern medicine based first on an understanding of the basic need to develop L-form interventions and the need to conceive and nurture the notion that the best healthcare system is the one that focuses on wellness and healing by promoting the production of antibodies and repair proteins and by supporting the natural antioxidant defense mechanism of the body that drives healthy biochemical pathways and helps to boost the body's immune system, not one that suppresses it, there being exceptions in preventing rejection in organ transplants, and in developing non-toxic approaches. Good health and healing is a multi-factorial process and hence the need to understand and teach it as healing approaches. That is where the future lies for health whereas the future for treatment science lies in drugs and chemicals.
So, what shall or should or ought to constitute the foundation of the new architecture? That is the primary question along with the scandalous costs.
Copyright - Beldeu Singh
CHEMICALS AND DISEASE CONDITIONS
CHEMICALS AND DISEASE CONDITIONS - Beldeu Singh
For the environmentally aware, there is no need to describe the environmental problems we face today. Literally thousands of books, articles and films have been produced showing that the biosphere has been dramatically disturbed and chemically changed by human activities (Ecology 30). But the average individual may not know that in 1989 alone, more than 1,000,000,000 pounds of chemicals were released into the ground, contaminating our farmlands and drinking waters. Over 188,000,000 pounds of chemicals were also discharged into surface waters such as lakes and rivers. More than 2,400,000,000 pounds of chemicals were pumped into the air we breathe. A grand total of 5,705,670,380 pounds of chemical pollutants were released into the environment that we eat, breathe, and live in—all in just one year (cf: Nicole MR 2002, ISP, College of Lifelong Learning; Wayne State University). Since WWII, over 80,000 chemicals have been developed and used. Many are pesticides that degrade soils and contaminate water.
All of these chemicals are toxic to some degree and generate free radicals that can induce free radical damage in the body. Some of these chemicals are similar to biomolecules in the body and they are utilized in metabolic reactions resulting in disease conditions because their metabolism in the body produces toxic metabolites or simply because the body cannot differentiate between them. Their metabolism in the human cells can lead to excess hydrogen peroxide that must be converted into water and oxygen by the SOD-catalase-glutathione antioxidant system. When this process is slow, the excess hydrogen peroxide reacts with the oxygen free radicals (OFR) to yield the highly toxic secondary radical called the hydroxyl radical. The hydroxyl radical is highly reactive and can oxidatively damage cell membranes as well as the genetic molecules. Such damage to the genetic molecules impairs health and can cause developmental defects. A large percentage of pesticides sprayed in gardens, plantations and golf courses end up in the ecology and in ponds and lakes. This explains the significantly large number of frogs with deformities and developmental defects compared to forty-fifty years ago.
Free radicals are highly reactive species that can be damaging to the body at the cellular and molecular level, causing oxidative stress to cell membranes, damaging molecules including lipids, hormones, proteins and mitochondrialose reactive chemicals can damage the cell components and disrupt biochemical pathways by inactivating enzymes involved in the Kreb,s cycle and receptors for cellular molecules. Since 1985, there is overwhelming scientific work to show that free radicals actually contribute to or hasten heart disease, cancer, diabetes, arthritis and other age-related diseases.
Evidence was accumulating over the past three decades that most of the degenerative diseases that afflict humanity have their origin in deleterious free radical reactions. These diseases include atherosclerosis, cancer, inflammatory joint disease, asthma, diabetes, senile dementia and degenerative eye disease (Florence TM, Centre for Environmental and Health Science Pty Ltd, Sydney, NSW, Aust N Z J Ophthalmol 1995; 23(1) Feb: 3–7).
Since free radicals are involved in carcinogenesis and since some epidemiological studies have suggested that certain antioxidants may reduce cancer risk, some survivors and clinicians might conclude that antioxidants are effective in preventing cancer recurrence (Jean et al, Nutrition During and After Cancer Treatment: A Guide* for Informed Choices by Cancer Survivors, CA Cancer J Clin 2001; 51:153-181© 2001 American Cancer Society) while many oncologists believe that antioxidants interfere with chemo-drugs and radiotherapy. The interference is primarily on account of the fact that chemo-drugs and radiation generate large amounts of hydroxyl free radicals that kill cancer cells (as well as normal and healthy cells) and antioxidants scavenge these free radicals. So, while research has shown that free radicals and involved in carcinogenesis, oncologists attempt to treat cancer patients with free radical generating agents as in chemotherapy and radiotherapy.
In fact a study of the relevant literature on cancer risks, whether associated with alcohol, smoking, pollutants, chemicals, toxins or sun exposure (ultraviolet radiation) all point to free radicals produced by these agents and/or a poor diet that is low in antioxidants. Put together, it means poor free radical scavenging activity in the body as the primary initiating factor for the risk and the cause of the disease condition and its progress. One way to appreciate the harmful effects of chemicals when introduced into the human body indirectly through the ecology is to understand their effects when they are introduced directly into the human body.
Would medical science prescribe a cancer causing drug to cancer patients? Last March, the U.S. federal government issued an unusually detailed alert to the nation’s 5.5 million health care workers: The powerful drugs used in chemotherapy can themselves cause cancer and pose a risk to nurses, pharmacists and others who handle them (The Washington Post, Tuesday, February 15, 2005; Page HE01, Jim Morris). Chemotherapy drugs in human and animal studies have shown they have the potential to cause cancer or reproductive problems, said Thomas Connor, a research biologist with the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH).
Chemo-drugs, like radiation, generate huge amounts of the highly reactive hydroxyl radical that damages cell membranes and disrupts the electron transport system in cells as well as protein synthesis. Natural enzyme and micronutrient levels drop rapidly and that accelerates cell death. Such a new surge of free radicals is generated by chemo-drugs which are cytotoxic to cancer cells as well as normal cells. Thus many young normal cells die due to the treatment. Most of the known carcinogens, including benzene and at least 40 other toxic chemicals in cigarette smoke and pesticides generate free radicals that create oxidative stress in cells, impairing their aerobic respiration or damaging DNA and mitochondrial DNA, turning them into cancer cells. It is this very same toxicity that is common to carcinogens and chemotherapy-drugs. Hence the NOISH alert really comes as no surprise (see: Dangerous Philosophy of treatment in Medical Science).
Fortunately some of the regulatory bodies are recognizing the dangers of chemicals. The European Chemicals Agency (ECHA) has issued its first recommendation for harmful chemicals that should undergo Europe’s new strict ‘authorisation’ process. The EU countries in the ECHA Member States Committee have adopted an opinion supporting the recommendation. ECHA recommend that seven substances of very high concern (SVHC) should be subject to use and market access only with explicit authorisation under the EU’s REACH law (ref: Chemicals Health Monitor, 5th June, 2009).
Over the last 100 years, sperm count in males is declining while breast cancers in females have been rising. This phenomenon coincides with the increasing use of chemicals in industry and in medical science. Interestingly, three of the seven chemicals proposed by ECHA are officially classified in Europe as toxic to reproduction. One is officially classified as carcinogenic and three are recognized as being persistent, bioaccumulative and toxic (PBT) or very persistent and very bioaccumulative (vPvB). The flame retardant HBCCD has also been identified as a persistent, bioaccumulative and toxic substance by an EU working group, with potential effects on the liver, brain, nervous and hormone system.
Three chemicals DEHP, DBP and BBP, phthalates or plastic softeners, are already banned in toys and childcare articles in the EU. Medical devices containing DEHP must also be labeled according to the revised European Medical Devices Directive. These phthalates (which become more powerful when present simultaneously), are examined in a recent report on male reproductive health disorders. The existing knowledge about the contribution of phthalates to human testicular disorders points to the need to reduce people’s exposure to phthalates, especially pregnant women (ref: Chemicals Health Monitor, 5th June, 2009) .
Polls show that the public is concerned that the environment may be playing a role, and many respondents consider that the EU is not doing enough to address this aspect in prevention, education and policy. The real concern is rooted in the fact that “over the last 50 years, the incidence of cancer has increased rapidly. The officially recognized risk factors for cancer, including age, genetics, smoking, lack of exercise and so on, are unable to account for the rise in incidence for other cancers” (see: Chemicals Health Monitor, 22nd June, 2009). This concern is well founded and can be better understood in the way chemicals create problems in the mammalian biological systems.
Wherever there are cells that are rapidly dividing as in the testicles for production of sperm and where there is fatty tissue the relative risk increases sufficiently to result in health concerns and higher risk to the development of disease states. Toxic chemicals tend to interfere with cell division while on the other hand they tend to bioaccumulate in fatty tissue. They can also generate free radicals that rob electrons from hormones leading to problems like diabetes in people with excess visceral fat and breast cancers in women as female breasts have fatty tissue.
Another reason is attributable to the fact that metabolism of chemicals leads to depletion of minerals in the body, especially iron, managanese, zinc and copper. The metabolism of these D-form substances yields a lot of hydrogen peroxide that must be converted into water and oxygen failing which its reaction with the oxygen free radicals (OFR), the secondary radical called the hydroxyl is formed that is highly reactive and very deleterious to health. These minerals, in the organic and bioavailable form, work in the body’s natural antioxidant system to catalytically enhance the role of the natural antioxidant system to convert hydrogen peroxide into water and oxygen.
It is therefore not surprising at all that a report, commissioned by Health and Environment Alliance’s (HEAL) partner organization CHEM Trust titled Male Reproductive Health Disorders and the Potential Role of Exposure to Environmental Chemicals. written by one of the world’s leading experts in reproductive biology, Professor Richard Sharpe of the Medical Research Council (MRC) in Edinburgh, UK, reveals that many everyday chemicals in the environment or in consumer products have the potential to block the action of testosterone, and a baby’s exposure to this mixture of chemicals may undermine this process and harm future male reproductive health. Birth defects in male genitals, low sperm counts and testicular cancer, collectively called Testicular Dysgenesis Syndrome (TDS), may all have their origins during development in the womb. The link is convincingly proven in the report as it highlights animal studies that have clearly established that certain hormone disrupting chemicals, in particular testosterone disrupting chemicals, can cause TDS-like disorders (see: Chemicals Health Monitor, 13th May, 2009).
Bisphenol A (BPA) is employed in the manufacture of a wide range of consumer products. It is an endocrine disruptor at amounts to which we are exposed, alters the reproductive organs of developing rodents has caused concern. At present, no information exists concerning the exposure of human pregnant women and their fetuses to BPA. The suggestion that BPA, at amounts to which we are exposed, alters the reproductive organs of developing rodents has caused concern, if not an alarm. At present, no information exists concerning the exposure of human pregnant women and their fetuses to BPA. There is broad human exposure to this chemical.
In a study, blood samples were obtained from healthy premenopausal women, women with early and full-term pregnancy, and umbilical cord at full-term delivery. Ovarian follicular fluids obtained during IVF procedures and amniotic fluids obtained at mid-term and full-term pregnancy were also subject to BPA measurements. The results showed that BPA was present in serum and follicular fluid at 1–2 ng/ml, as well as in fetal serum and full-term amniotic fluid, confirming passage through the placenta. These results suggest accumulation of BPA in early fetuses and significant exposure during the prenatal period, which must be considered in evaluating the potential for human exposure to endocrine-disrupting chemicals (Yumiko et al, Human Reproduction, Determination of bisphenol A concentrations in human biological fluids reveals significant early prenatal, Vol. 17, No. 11, 2839-2841, November 2002 ).
Regulation is now moving in the direction to ensure that chemicals which act in combination to disrupt hormones are regulated according to their total combined effects (cumulative risk assessment). European Council is likely to adopt the next critical step to establish a definition of ‘endocrine disrupting’ pesticides which will determine which pesticides will be banned.
This is important to properly move towards setting targets to reduce pesticides use and eliminating or restricting pesticides use in public places. Member State targets therefore can and should include significant reductions in the use of hormone disrupting pesticides; and eliminate their use in public places as soon as possible. However, the problem remains with regard to facilitating their biodegradation upon entering the eco-systems as they can still enter the human body through water and food chains and will come back to create health problems.
Many of the toxic chemicals are used in combination or as a mixture. In mixtures, toxic chemicals will produce cumulative and dose-additive effects.
Scientists have already conducted studies with mixtures to provide a framework for assessing the cumulative effects of "antiandrogenic" chemicals. Rats were dosed during pregnancy with antiandrogens singly or in pairs at dosage levels equivalent to about one half of the ED50 for hypospadias or epididymal agenesis. The pairs include: AR antagonists (vinclozolin plus procymidone), phthalate esters (DBP plus BBP and DEHP plus DBP), a phthalate ester plus an AR antagonist (DBP plus procymidone), and linuron plus BBP. This study proved the expected effects. All binary combinations produced cumulative, dose-additive effects on the androgen-dependent tissues. We also conducted a mixture study combining seven "antiandrogens" together. These chemicals elicit antiandrogenic effects at two different sites in the androgen signaling pathway (i.e., AR antagonist or inhibition of androgen synthesis). In this study, the complex mixture behaved in a dose-additive manner. The results indicate that compounds that act by disparate mechanisms of toxicity display cumulative, dose-additive effects when present in combination (Rider et al, Cumulative effects of in utero administration of mixtures of "antiandrogens" on male rat reproductive development, Toxicol Path, 2009;37(1):100-13. Epub 2009 Jan 15).
Chemicals used in pesticides also have antiandrogenic properties and endocrine toxicity. Antiandrogenic chemicals alter sexual differentiation by a variety of mechanisms, and as a consequence, they induce different profiles of effects. For example, in utero treatment with the androgen receptor (AR) antagonist, flutamide, produces ventral prostate agenesis and testicular nondescent, while in contrast, finasteride, an inhibitor of 5 alpha-dihydrotestosterone (DHT) synthesis, rarely, if ever, induces such malformations. In this regard, it was recently proposed that dibutyl phthalate (DBP) alters reproductive development by a different mechanism of action than flutamide or vinclozolin (V), which are AR antagonists, because the male offsprings display an unusually high incidence of testicular and epididymal alterations--effects rarely seen after in utero flutamide or V treatment. In one recent study, we present original data describing the reproductive effects of 10 known or suspected anti-androgens, including a Leydig cell toxicant ethane dimethane sulphonate (EDS, 50 mg kg-1 day-1), linuron (L, 100 mg kg-1 day-1), p,p'-DDE (100 mg kg-1 day-1), ketoconazole (12-50 mg kg-1 day-1), procymidone (P, 100 mg kg-1 day-1), chlozolinate (100 mg kg-1 day-1), iprodione (100 mg kg-1 day-1), DBP (500 mg kg-1 day-1), diethylhexyl phthalate (DEHP, 750 mg kg-1 day-1), and polychlorinated biphenyl (PCB) congener no. 169 (single dose of 1.8 mg kg-1). Male offsprings display a higher incidence of epididymal and testicular lesions than generally seen with flutamide, P, or V even at high dosage levels. Overall these toxic chemicals display several mechanisms of endocrine toxicity. Ketoconazole did not demasculinize or feminize males but rather displayed anti-hormonal activities, apparently by inhibiting ovarian hormone synthesis, which resulted in delayed delivery and whole litter loss. This study shows the effects of chemicals in pesticides in developmental toxicity (Gray et al, Administration of potentially antiandrogenic pesticides (procymidone, linuron, iprodione, chlozolinate, p,p'-DDE, and ketoconazole) and toxic substances (dibutyl- and diethylhexyl phthalate, PCB 169, and ethane dimethane sulphonate) during sexual differentiation produces diverse profiles of reproductive malformations in the male rat, Toxicol Ind Health, 1999 Jan-Mar;15(1-2):94-118).
Bioaccumulation and severe or prolonged exposure to chemicals leads to health problems whose symptoms mimic disease conditions from other causes. When such exposure to chemicals is not understood and taken into account, its treatment is impossible and the patient keeps coming back for more drugs. Unfortunately, conventional allopathic treatments are not geared towards the break-up of chemicals in the body and to remove them with non-toxic approaches. Hence, headaches, backpains and symptoms related to or caused by chronic inflammations initiated by free radicals generated by chemicals in the body tend to persist. These health problems can be compounded when there are also populations of protozoa in the body as their allergens also cause chronic inflammation. These protozoa feed on vitamin 12 at night. Symptoms may therefore become more severe at night. In psoriasis patients, the itch increases at night. Such persons may also become deficient in B vitamins especially vitamin B12. Protozoal infections are more common that currently thought and that explains the relatively high incidence of 25% in the US for vitamin B deficiency. Such deficiency in people with protozoal infections can also lead to numbness in hands and neuropathies, chronic hypertension as well as borderline elevations in glucose and LDL levels. Vitamin B12 supplementation only results in a short-lived improvement and the problems can become more aggravated over time as the protozoa feed on the increased supply of vitamin B12 and multiply.
The exposure of people with protozoal infections to chemicals and toxic dust clouds is a problem that needs serious attention and funding for research. The dangers of exposing people and especially pregnant women to hormone disrupting chemicals in consumer products are now well documented and more members of the public know about it. The focus is on the risks these pose to baby boys and to healthy reproductive biology but compounding factors such as protozoal infections must be also considered. Chemicals can also cause problems in other tissues and organs such as in the dermis and the respiratory tract.
In recent years, cleaning has been identified as an occupational risk because of an increased incidence of reported respiratory effects, such as asthma and asthma-like symptoms among cleaning workers. Due to the lack of systematic occupational hygiene analyses and workplace exposure data, it is not clear which cleaning-related exposures induce or aggravate asthma and other respiratory effects. Currently, there is a need for systematic evaluation of cleaning products ingredients and their exposures in the workplace. Ingredients of concern in cleaning agents include quaternary ammonium compounds, 2-butoxyethanol, and ethanolamines. Cleaning workers are at risk of acute and chronic inhalation exposures to volatile organic compounds (VOC) vapors and aerosols generated from product spraying, and dermal exposures mostly through hands (Bello et al, Characterization of occupational exposures to cleaning products used for common cleaning tasks--a pilot study of hospital cleaners, Environ Health, 2009 Mar 27;8:11.). An often overlooked problem with regard to chemicals that affect respiratory health is their impact on the endothelium in the major arteries over time that can lead to disruption in the production of nitric oxide (NO) and the formation of the peroxynitrite oxidant that is also highly reactive specie that very often oxidatively damages cell membranes causing joint-pains. Such disruption in the NO yields also leads to hypertension and erectile dysfunction.
Other chemicals found in the environment and in our homes such as formaldehyde can also lead to health problems depending on exposure and period of exposure. Formaldehyde is an economically important chemical, to which more than 2 million U.S. workers are occupationally exposed. Substantially more people are exposed to formaldehyde environmentally, as it is generated by automobile engines, is a component of tobacco smoke and is released from household products, including furniture, particleboard, plywood, and carpeting. The International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) recently classified formaldehyde as a human carcinogen that causes nasopharyngeal cancer and also concluded that there is "strong but not sufficient evidence for a causal association between leukemia and occupational exposure to formaldehyde." In a new meta-analysis of these studies, focusing on occupations known to have high formaldehyde exposure, we show that summary relative risks (RRs) were elevated in 15 studies of leukemia (RR=1.54; confidence interval (CI), 1.18-2.00) with the highest relative risks seen in the six studies of myeloid leukemia (RR=1.90; 95% CI, 1.31-2.76). The biological plausibility of this observed association lead the researchers to hypothesize that formaldehyde may act on bone marrow directly or, alternatively, may cause leukemia by damaging the hematopoietic stem or early progenitor cells that are located in the circulating blood or nasal passages, which then travel to the bone marrow and become leukemic stem cells (Zhang et al, Formaldehyde exposure and leukemia: a new meta-analysis and potential mechanisms, Mutat Res, 2009 Mar-Jun;681(2-3):150-68, Epub 2008 Jul 15). Unfortunately traces of formaldehyde are also found in haze from burning vegetative matter and forest fires.
Although risk assessments are typically conducted on a chemical-by-chemical basis, the 1996 Food Quality Protection Act (FQPA) required the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to consider cumulative risk of chemicals that act via a common mechanism of toxicity. The common underlying toxicity of chemicals lies in their ability to generate excess hydrogen peroxide in the body leading to the formation of secondary radicals such as the hydroxyl and the oxidant called the peroxynitrite.
The key issues being the role of chemicals in inducing and accelerating free radical damage and their bioaccumulation in human tissue, it is only proper that we note the interest in exposure assessment that has shifted from pollutant monitoring in air, soil, and water toward personal exposure measurements and biomonitoring. That process is important to assess the level of contamination together with the levels of natural antioxidants in the blood and to monitor both levels as against symptoms and health problems. Biochelation procedures and interventions will therefore become the more important and the more critical part of a modern healthcare system as a large variety of chemicals are already in our environment and more are entering the human body directly through “medications” and indirectly through the ecosystems and through wars that use chemicals to defoliate and weapons that use depleted uranium 235. The lingering health problems of chemical warfare will therefore be astounding if they are surmountable.
The cancer rate in the USA in 1900 was three out of one hundred. Today, one in three people will get cancer and one in four will die from it. This amounts to over one million people yearly, killing some 520,000 of us annually. That is one grave problem related to becoming industrialized wherein society is led to use more and more chemicals in industry and at home. One recent report commissioned by the California EPA done by University of Calif. researchers estimate that in 2004, 200,000 California workers suffered from chronic diseases linked to workplace exposure to industrial chemicals and 4,400 people died of these diseases including cancer, emphysema and Parkinson's disease. New research is beginning to show that low-level synthetic chemical exposure over time can disrupt the natural development of infants and children.
The Collaborative on Health and the Environment (CHE) database report shows links between chemical contaminants and 180 diseases or conditions in humans ranging from skin conditions to fertility to cancers. Chemicals that bioaccumulate in the brain can lead to Alzheimers and Parkinson’s disease as they cause chronic inflammations in brain cells. The World Health Organization (WHO) has released a report stating that one-quarter of the world's disease burden -- and one-third of the disease burden among children -- is due to environmental factors that could be modified. Today the human biological system among urban populations is contaminated and so is human breast milk. The chemical origin of diseases must be recognized and included in the medical school program. The problem is paradoxically aggravated by trying to treat symptoms caused by chemicals by other toxic chemicals called drugs that are prescribed as “medications.” There is now the need to go for non-toxic treatments and to apply non-toxic pesticides to modify the environment and our ecosystems in order to modify the world’s disease burden that is a drag on every economy. In many developed nations it has become a burden on the household.
Business interest sometimes seems to override health concerns. One of the criteria used to lobby in favor of businesses is that the sole basis of hazards based on the toxic properties of a chemical should not prompt its inclusion in Europe’s new strict ‘authorization’ process. But the paradox in medical science still stands which is the use of toxic chemicals to treat health problems. For instance the chemical called AZT which is “toxic by inhalation” and can cause the same symptoms as AIDS is used to treat AIDS patients. Quite naturally, six national representatives raised concerns about the inclusion of the flame retardant HBCDD, arguing inclusion on the list could harm small businesses. This goes against REACH which mandates that harmful chemicals be lined up for the authorization procedure solely on the basis of the hazards posed by their toxic properties.
Before toxic chemicals are banned, substance producers or users will have to show that the risks of a particular use can be adequately controlled, or for certain chemicals, that there are overwhelming socioeconomic benefits to the substance’s use (that outweigh the health and environment risks) and that no alternatives exist. The real problem is that most of the controls exist only at the production stage and there is little or no control once they are released into the markets and into the ecology.
Health science is beginning to recognize the significance of bioaccumulation of chemicals and chemicals used in pesticides as a cause of persistent pain and chronic disease conditions. Drugs are not a solution to this chemically induced problem that may be associated with heavy metal bioaccumulation in tissues. The most effective and fast way is to use alpha-lipoic acid and pectins obtained from edible substances in the nano-form to biochelate for safe removal from the human biological system through the urine.
copyright/IP:beldeusingh
For the environmentally aware, there is no need to describe the environmental problems we face today. Literally thousands of books, articles and films have been produced showing that the biosphere has been dramatically disturbed and chemically changed by human activities (Ecology 30). But the average individual may not know that in 1989 alone, more than 1,000,000,000 pounds of chemicals were released into the ground, contaminating our farmlands and drinking waters. Over 188,000,000 pounds of chemicals were also discharged into surface waters such as lakes and rivers. More than 2,400,000,000 pounds of chemicals were pumped into the air we breathe. A grand total of 5,705,670,380 pounds of chemical pollutants were released into the environment that we eat, breathe, and live in—all in just one year (cf: Nicole MR 2002, ISP, College of Lifelong Learning; Wayne State University). Since WWII, over 80,000 chemicals have been developed and used. Many are pesticides that degrade soils and contaminate water.
All of these chemicals are toxic to some degree and generate free radicals that can induce free radical damage in the body. Some of these chemicals are similar to biomolecules in the body and they are utilized in metabolic reactions resulting in disease conditions because their metabolism in the body produces toxic metabolites or simply because the body cannot differentiate between them. Their metabolism in the human cells can lead to excess hydrogen peroxide that must be converted into water and oxygen by the SOD-catalase-glutathione antioxidant system. When this process is slow, the excess hydrogen peroxide reacts with the oxygen free radicals (OFR) to yield the highly toxic secondary radical called the hydroxyl radical. The hydroxyl radical is highly reactive and can oxidatively damage cell membranes as well as the genetic molecules. Such damage to the genetic molecules impairs health and can cause developmental defects. A large percentage of pesticides sprayed in gardens, plantations and golf courses end up in the ecology and in ponds and lakes. This explains the significantly large number of frogs with deformities and developmental defects compared to forty-fifty years ago.
Free radicals are highly reactive species that can be damaging to the body at the cellular and molecular level, causing oxidative stress to cell membranes, damaging molecules including lipids, hormones, proteins and mitochondrialose reactive chemicals can damage the cell components and disrupt biochemical pathways by inactivating enzymes involved in the Kreb,s cycle and receptors for cellular molecules. Since 1985, there is overwhelming scientific work to show that free radicals actually contribute to or hasten heart disease, cancer, diabetes, arthritis and other age-related diseases.
Evidence was accumulating over the past three decades that most of the degenerative diseases that afflict humanity have their origin in deleterious free radical reactions. These diseases include atherosclerosis, cancer, inflammatory joint disease, asthma, diabetes, senile dementia and degenerative eye disease (Florence TM, Centre for Environmental and Health Science Pty Ltd, Sydney, NSW, Aust N Z J Ophthalmol 1995; 23(1) Feb: 3–7).
Since free radicals are involved in carcinogenesis and since some epidemiological studies have suggested that certain antioxidants may reduce cancer risk, some survivors and clinicians might conclude that antioxidants are effective in preventing cancer recurrence (Jean et al, Nutrition During and After Cancer Treatment: A Guide* for Informed Choices by Cancer Survivors, CA Cancer J Clin 2001; 51:153-181© 2001 American Cancer Society) while many oncologists believe that antioxidants interfere with chemo-drugs and radiotherapy. The interference is primarily on account of the fact that chemo-drugs and radiation generate large amounts of hydroxyl free radicals that kill cancer cells (as well as normal and healthy cells) and antioxidants scavenge these free radicals. So, while research has shown that free radicals and involved in carcinogenesis, oncologists attempt to treat cancer patients with free radical generating agents as in chemotherapy and radiotherapy.
In fact a study of the relevant literature on cancer risks, whether associated with alcohol, smoking, pollutants, chemicals, toxins or sun exposure (ultraviolet radiation) all point to free radicals produced by these agents and/or a poor diet that is low in antioxidants. Put together, it means poor free radical scavenging activity in the body as the primary initiating factor for the risk and the cause of the disease condition and its progress. One way to appreciate the harmful effects of chemicals when introduced into the human body indirectly through the ecology is to understand their effects when they are introduced directly into the human body.
Would medical science prescribe a cancer causing drug to cancer patients? Last March, the U.S. federal government issued an unusually detailed alert to the nation’s 5.5 million health care workers: The powerful drugs used in chemotherapy can themselves cause cancer and pose a risk to nurses, pharmacists and others who handle them (The Washington Post, Tuesday, February 15, 2005; Page HE01, Jim Morris). Chemotherapy drugs in human and animal studies have shown they have the potential to cause cancer or reproductive problems, said Thomas Connor, a research biologist with the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH).
Chemo-drugs, like radiation, generate huge amounts of the highly reactive hydroxyl radical that damages cell membranes and disrupts the electron transport system in cells as well as protein synthesis. Natural enzyme and micronutrient levels drop rapidly and that accelerates cell death. Such a new surge of free radicals is generated by chemo-drugs which are cytotoxic to cancer cells as well as normal cells. Thus many young normal cells die due to the treatment. Most of the known carcinogens, including benzene and at least 40 other toxic chemicals in cigarette smoke and pesticides generate free radicals that create oxidative stress in cells, impairing their aerobic respiration or damaging DNA and mitochondrial DNA, turning them into cancer cells. It is this very same toxicity that is common to carcinogens and chemotherapy-drugs. Hence the NOISH alert really comes as no surprise (see: Dangerous Philosophy of treatment in Medical Science).
Fortunately some of the regulatory bodies are recognizing the dangers of chemicals. The European Chemicals Agency (ECHA) has issued its first recommendation for harmful chemicals that should undergo Europe’s new strict ‘authorisation’ process. The EU countries in the ECHA Member States Committee have adopted an opinion supporting the recommendation. ECHA recommend that seven substances of very high concern (SVHC) should be subject to use and market access only with explicit authorisation under the EU’s REACH law (ref: Chemicals Health Monitor, 5th June, 2009).
Over the last 100 years, sperm count in males is declining while breast cancers in females have been rising. This phenomenon coincides with the increasing use of chemicals in industry and in medical science. Interestingly, three of the seven chemicals proposed by ECHA are officially classified in Europe as toxic to reproduction. One is officially classified as carcinogenic and three are recognized as being persistent, bioaccumulative and toxic (PBT) or very persistent and very bioaccumulative (vPvB). The flame retardant HBCCD has also been identified as a persistent, bioaccumulative and toxic substance by an EU working group, with potential effects on the liver, brain, nervous and hormone system.
Three chemicals DEHP, DBP and BBP, phthalates or plastic softeners, are already banned in toys and childcare articles in the EU. Medical devices containing DEHP must also be labeled according to the revised European Medical Devices Directive. These phthalates (which become more powerful when present simultaneously), are examined in a recent report on male reproductive health disorders. The existing knowledge about the contribution of phthalates to human testicular disorders points to the need to reduce people’s exposure to phthalates, especially pregnant women (ref: Chemicals Health Monitor, 5th June, 2009) .
Polls show that the public is concerned that the environment may be playing a role, and many respondents consider that the EU is not doing enough to address this aspect in prevention, education and policy. The real concern is rooted in the fact that “over the last 50 years, the incidence of cancer has increased rapidly. The officially recognized risk factors for cancer, including age, genetics, smoking, lack of exercise and so on, are unable to account for the rise in incidence for other cancers” (see: Chemicals Health Monitor, 22nd June, 2009). This concern is well founded and can be better understood in the way chemicals create problems in the mammalian biological systems.
Wherever there are cells that are rapidly dividing as in the testicles for production of sperm and where there is fatty tissue the relative risk increases sufficiently to result in health concerns and higher risk to the development of disease states. Toxic chemicals tend to interfere with cell division while on the other hand they tend to bioaccumulate in fatty tissue. They can also generate free radicals that rob electrons from hormones leading to problems like diabetes in people with excess visceral fat and breast cancers in women as female breasts have fatty tissue.
Another reason is attributable to the fact that metabolism of chemicals leads to depletion of minerals in the body, especially iron, managanese, zinc and copper. The metabolism of these D-form substances yields a lot of hydrogen peroxide that must be converted into water and oxygen failing which its reaction with the oxygen free radicals (OFR), the secondary radical called the hydroxyl is formed that is highly reactive and very deleterious to health. These minerals, in the organic and bioavailable form, work in the body’s natural antioxidant system to catalytically enhance the role of the natural antioxidant system to convert hydrogen peroxide into water and oxygen.
It is therefore not surprising at all that a report, commissioned by Health and Environment Alliance’s (HEAL) partner organization CHEM Trust titled Male Reproductive Health Disorders and the Potential Role of Exposure to Environmental Chemicals. written by one of the world’s leading experts in reproductive biology, Professor Richard Sharpe of the Medical Research Council (MRC) in Edinburgh, UK, reveals that many everyday chemicals in the environment or in consumer products have the potential to block the action of testosterone, and a baby’s exposure to this mixture of chemicals may undermine this process and harm future male reproductive health. Birth defects in male genitals, low sperm counts and testicular cancer, collectively called Testicular Dysgenesis Syndrome (TDS), may all have their origins during development in the womb. The link is convincingly proven in the report as it highlights animal studies that have clearly established that certain hormone disrupting chemicals, in particular testosterone disrupting chemicals, can cause TDS-like disorders (see: Chemicals Health Monitor, 13th May, 2009).
Bisphenol A (BPA) is employed in the manufacture of a wide range of consumer products. It is an endocrine disruptor at amounts to which we are exposed, alters the reproductive organs of developing rodents has caused concern. At present, no information exists concerning the exposure of human pregnant women and their fetuses to BPA. The suggestion that BPA, at amounts to which we are exposed, alters the reproductive organs of developing rodents has caused concern, if not an alarm. At present, no information exists concerning the exposure of human pregnant women and their fetuses to BPA. There is broad human exposure to this chemical.
In a study, blood samples were obtained from healthy premenopausal women, women with early and full-term pregnancy, and umbilical cord at full-term delivery. Ovarian follicular fluids obtained during IVF procedures and amniotic fluids obtained at mid-term and full-term pregnancy were also subject to BPA measurements. The results showed that BPA was present in serum and follicular fluid at 1–2 ng/ml, as well as in fetal serum and full-term amniotic fluid, confirming passage through the placenta. These results suggest accumulation of BPA in early fetuses and significant exposure during the prenatal period, which must be considered in evaluating the potential for human exposure to endocrine-disrupting chemicals (Yumiko et al, Human Reproduction, Determination of bisphenol A concentrations in human biological fluids reveals significant early prenatal, Vol. 17, No. 11, 2839-2841, November 2002 ).
Regulation is now moving in the direction to ensure that chemicals which act in combination to disrupt hormones are regulated according to their total combined effects (cumulative risk assessment). European Council is likely to adopt the next critical step to establish a definition of ‘endocrine disrupting’ pesticides which will determine which pesticides will be banned.
This is important to properly move towards setting targets to reduce pesticides use and eliminating or restricting pesticides use in public places. Member State targets therefore can and should include significant reductions in the use of hormone disrupting pesticides; and eliminate their use in public places as soon as possible. However, the problem remains with regard to facilitating their biodegradation upon entering the eco-systems as they can still enter the human body through water and food chains and will come back to create health problems.
Many of the toxic chemicals are used in combination or as a mixture. In mixtures, toxic chemicals will produce cumulative and dose-additive effects.
Scientists have already conducted studies with mixtures to provide a framework for assessing the cumulative effects of "antiandrogenic" chemicals. Rats were dosed during pregnancy with antiandrogens singly or in pairs at dosage levels equivalent to about one half of the ED50 for hypospadias or epididymal agenesis. The pairs include: AR antagonists (vinclozolin plus procymidone), phthalate esters (DBP plus BBP and DEHP plus DBP), a phthalate ester plus an AR antagonist (DBP plus procymidone), and linuron plus BBP. This study proved the expected effects. All binary combinations produced cumulative, dose-additive effects on the androgen-dependent tissues. We also conducted a mixture study combining seven "antiandrogens" together. These chemicals elicit antiandrogenic effects at two different sites in the androgen signaling pathway (i.e., AR antagonist or inhibition of androgen synthesis). In this study, the complex mixture behaved in a dose-additive manner. The results indicate that compounds that act by disparate mechanisms of toxicity display cumulative, dose-additive effects when present in combination (Rider et al, Cumulative effects of in utero administration of mixtures of "antiandrogens" on male rat reproductive development, Toxicol Path, 2009;37(1):100-13. Epub 2009 Jan 15).
Chemicals used in pesticides also have antiandrogenic properties and endocrine toxicity. Antiandrogenic chemicals alter sexual differentiation by a variety of mechanisms, and as a consequence, they induce different profiles of effects. For example, in utero treatment with the androgen receptor (AR) antagonist, flutamide, produces ventral prostate agenesis and testicular nondescent, while in contrast, finasteride, an inhibitor of 5 alpha-dihydrotestosterone (DHT) synthesis, rarely, if ever, induces such malformations. In this regard, it was recently proposed that dibutyl phthalate (DBP) alters reproductive development by a different mechanism of action than flutamide or vinclozolin (V), which are AR antagonists, because the male offsprings display an unusually high incidence of testicular and epididymal alterations--effects rarely seen after in utero flutamide or V treatment. In one recent study, we present original data describing the reproductive effects of 10 known or suspected anti-androgens, including a Leydig cell toxicant ethane dimethane sulphonate (EDS, 50 mg kg-1 day-1), linuron (L, 100 mg kg-1 day-1), p,p'-DDE (100 mg kg-1 day-1), ketoconazole (12-50 mg kg-1 day-1), procymidone (P, 100 mg kg-1 day-1), chlozolinate (100 mg kg-1 day-1), iprodione (100 mg kg-1 day-1), DBP (500 mg kg-1 day-1), diethylhexyl phthalate (DEHP, 750 mg kg-1 day-1), and polychlorinated biphenyl (PCB) congener no. 169 (single dose of 1.8 mg kg-1). Male offsprings display a higher incidence of epididymal and testicular lesions than generally seen with flutamide, P, or V even at high dosage levels. Overall these toxic chemicals display several mechanisms of endocrine toxicity. Ketoconazole did not demasculinize or feminize males but rather displayed anti-hormonal activities, apparently by inhibiting ovarian hormone synthesis, which resulted in delayed delivery and whole litter loss. This study shows the effects of chemicals in pesticides in developmental toxicity (Gray et al, Administration of potentially antiandrogenic pesticides (procymidone, linuron, iprodione, chlozolinate, p,p'-DDE, and ketoconazole) and toxic substances (dibutyl- and diethylhexyl phthalate, PCB 169, and ethane dimethane sulphonate) during sexual differentiation produces diverse profiles of reproductive malformations in the male rat, Toxicol Ind Health, 1999 Jan-Mar;15(1-2):94-118).
Bioaccumulation and severe or prolonged exposure to chemicals leads to health problems whose symptoms mimic disease conditions from other causes. When such exposure to chemicals is not understood and taken into account, its treatment is impossible and the patient keeps coming back for more drugs. Unfortunately, conventional allopathic treatments are not geared towards the break-up of chemicals in the body and to remove them with non-toxic approaches. Hence, headaches, backpains and symptoms related to or caused by chronic inflammations initiated by free radicals generated by chemicals in the body tend to persist. These health problems can be compounded when there are also populations of protozoa in the body as their allergens also cause chronic inflammation. These protozoa feed on vitamin 12 at night. Symptoms may therefore become more severe at night. In psoriasis patients, the itch increases at night. Such persons may also become deficient in B vitamins especially vitamin B12. Protozoal infections are more common that currently thought and that explains the relatively high incidence of 25% in the US for vitamin B deficiency. Such deficiency in people with protozoal infections can also lead to numbness in hands and neuropathies, chronic hypertension as well as borderline elevations in glucose and LDL levels. Vitamin B12 supplementation only results in a short-lived improvement and the problems can become more aggravated over time as the protozoa feed on the increased supply of vitamin B12 and multiply.
The exposure of people with protozoal infections to chemicals and toxic dust clouds is a problem that needs serious attention and funding for research. The dangers of exposing people and especially pregnant women to hormone disrupting chemicals in consumer products are now well documented and more members of the public know about it. The focus is on the risks these pose to baby boys and to healthy reproductive biology but compounding factors such as protozoal infections must be also considered. Chemicals can also cause problems in other tissues and organs such as in the dermis and the respiratory tract.
In recent years, cleaning has been identified as an occupational risk because of an increased incidence of reported respiratory effects, such as asthma and asthma-like symptoms among cleaning workers. Due to the lack of systematic occupational hygiene analyses and workplace exposure data, it is not clear which cleaning-related exposures induce or aggravate asthma and other respiratory effects. Currently, there is a need for systematic evaluation of cleaning products ingredients and their exposures in the workplace. Ingredients of concern in cleaning agents include quaternary ammonium compounds, 2-butoxyethanol, and ethanolamines. Cleaning workers are at risk of acute and chronic inhalation exposures to volatile organic compounds (VOC) vapors and aerosols generated from product spraying, and dermal exposures mostly through hands (Bello et al, Characterization of occupational exposures to cleaning products used for common cleaning tasks--a pilot study of hospital cleaners, Environ Health, 2009 Mar 27;8:11.). An often overlooked problem with regard to chemicals that affect respiratory health is their impact on the endothelium in the major arteries over time that can lead to disruption in the production of nitric oxide (NO) and the formation of the peroxynitrite oxidant that is also highly reactive specie that very often oxidatively damages cell membranes causing joint-pains. Such disruption in the NO yields also leads to hypertension and erectile dysfunction.
Other chemicals found in the environment and in our homes such as formaldehyde can also lead to health problems depending on exposure and period of exposure. Formaldehyde is an economically important chemical, to which more than 2 million U.S. workers are occupationally exposed. Substantially more people are exposed to formaldehyde environmentally, as it is generated by automobile engines, is a component of tobacco smoke and is released from household products, including furniture, particleboard, plywood, and carpeting. The International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) recently classified formaldehyde as a human carcinogen that causes nasopharyngeal cancer and also concluded that there is "strong but not sufficient evidence for a causal association between leukemia and occupational exposure to formaldehyde." In a new meta-analysis of these studies, focusing on occupations known to have high formaldehyde exposure, we show that summary relative risks (RRs) were elevated in 15 studies of leukemia (RR=1.54; confidence interval (CI), 1.18-2.00) with the highest relative risks seen in the six studies of myeloid leukemia (RR=1.90; 95% CI, 1.31-2.76). The biological plausibility of this observed association lead the researchers to hypothesize that formaldehyde may act on bone marrow directly or, alternatively, may cause leukemia by damaging the hematopoietic stem or early progenitor cells that are located in the circulating blood or nasal passages, which then travel to the bone marrow and become leukemic stem cells (Zhang et al, Formaldehyde exposure and leukemia: a new meta-analysis and potential mechanisms, Mutat Res, 2009 Mar-Jun;681(2-3):150-68, Epub 2008 Jul 15). Unfortunately traces of formaldehyde are also found in haze from burning vegetative matter and forest fires.
Although risk assessments are typically conducted on a chemical-by-chemical basis, the 1996 Food Quality Protection Act (FQPA) required the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to consider cumulative risk of chemicals that act via a common mechanism of toxicity. The common underlying toxicity of chemicals lies in their ability to generate excess hydrogen peroxide in the body leading to the formation of secondary radicals such as the hydroxyl and the oxidant called the peroxynitrite.
The key issues being the role of chemicals in inducing and accelerating free radical damage and their bioaccumulation in human tissue, it is only proper that we note the interest in exposure assessment that has shifted from pollutant monitoring in air, soil, and water toward personal exposure measurements and biomonitoring. That process is important to assess the level of contamination together with the levels of natural antioxidants in the blood and to monitor both levels as against symptoms and health problems. Biochelation procedures and interventions will therefore become the more important and the more critical part of a modern healthcare system as a large variety of chemicals are already in our environment and more are entering the human body directly through “medications” and indirectly through the ecosystems and through wars that use chemicals to defoliate and weapons that use depleted uranium 235. The lingering health problems of chemical warfare will therefore be astounding if they are surmountable.
The cancer rate in the USA in 1900 was three out of one hundred. Today, one in three people will get cancer and one in four will die from it. This amounts to over one million people yearly, killing some 520,000 of us annually. That is one grave problem related to becoming industrialized wherein society is led to use more and more chemicals in industry and at home. One recent report commissioned by the California EPA done by University of Calif. researchers estimate that in 2004, 200,000 California workers suffered from chronic diseases linked to workplace exposure to industrial chemicals and 4,400 people died of these diseases including cancer, emphysema and Parkinson's disease. New research is beginning to show that low-level synthetic chemical exposure over time can disrupt the natural development of infants and children.
The Collaborative on Health and the Environment (CHE) database report shows links between chemical contaminants and 180 diseases or conditions in humans ranging from skin conditions to fertility to cancers. Chemicals that bioaccumulate in the brain can lead to Alzheimers and Parkinson’s disease as they cause chronic inflammations in brain cells. The World Health Organization (WHO) has released a report stating that one-quarter of the world's disease burden -- and one-third of the disease burden among children -- is due to environmental factors that could be modified. Today the human biological system among urban populations is contaminated and so is human breast milk. The chemical origin of diseases must be recognized and included in the medical school program. The problem is paradoxically aggravated by trying to treat symptoms caused by chemicals by other toxic chemicals called drugs that are prescribed as “medications.” There is now the need to go for non-toxic treatments and to apply non-toxic pesticides to modify the environment and our ecosystems in order to modify the world’s disease burden that is a drag on every economy. In many developed nations it has become a burden on the household.
Business interest sometimes seems to override health concerns. One of the criteria used to lobby in favor of businesses is that the sole basis of hazards based on the toxic properties of a chemical should not prompt its inclusion in Europe’s new strict ‘authorization’ process. But the paradox in medical science still stands which is the use of toxic chemicals to treat health problems. For instance the chemical called AZT which is “toxic by inhalation” and can cause the same symptoms as AIDS is used to treat AIDS patients. Quite naturally, six national representatives raised concerns about the inclusion of the flame retardant HBCDD, arguing inclusion on the list could harm small businesses. This goes against REACH which mandates that harmful chemicals be lined up for the authorization procedure solely on the basis of the hazards posed by their toxic properties.
Before toxic chemicals are banned, substance producers or users will have to show that the risks of a particular use can be adequately controlled, or for certain chemicals, that there are overwhelming socioeconomic benefits to the substance’s use (that outweigh the health and environment risks) and that no alternatives exist. The real problem is that most of the controls exist only at the production stage and there is little or no control once they are released into the markets and into the ecology.
Health science is beginning to recognize the significance of bioaccumulation of chemicals and chemicals used in pesticides as a cause of persistent pain and chronic disease conditions. Drugs are not a solution to this chemically induced problem that may be associated with heavy metal bioaccumulation in tissues. The most effective and fast way is to use alpha-lipoic acid and pectins obtained from edible substances in the nano-form to biochelate for safe removal from the human biological system through the urine.
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