The April 2010 issue of Toxicological Sciences reports on a study conducted by Dr. Earl Gray of the EPA on the effect of BPA on rats. He fed the rats up to 4,000 times the highest dose of BPA than the average human might be exposed to and found it had absolutely no adverse effects on the animals.[13] Professor Richard Sharpe of the Medical Research Council’s Centre for Reproductive Biology in Edinburgh stated, “The results [of the study] are unequivocal and robust and are based on a valid and rational scientific foundation,”.[14] (Sharpe is one of Britain’s leading specialists in endocrine-disrupting chemicals in the environment.) It’s time to dig your BPA water bottle back out.
Both phthalates and BPA are very useful substances. They have been thoroughly studied by many regulatory agencies and have been found to be harmless at typical levels of exposure. Yet a massive campaign is being waged against them in the media and more frequently in legislatures across the globe. The impetus for this can be traced to a combination of the media tending toward sensationalism and perpetuating conflict, activist groups perpetuating fear and therefore fundraising, activist scientists trying to make a name for themselves, and politicians wishing to look like they are saving babies from large corporations. This is not so much a conspiracy but rather a case of converging interests. Everyone benefits: more papers get sold, more funds are raised, more research grants handed out, and more politicians wear halos. Only the truth, the public, and the economy lose out in this case of what one of my friends calls a classic clusterfuck.[15]
Brominated Flame Retardants
Another class of chemicals that have borne the brunt of activist wrath are the brominated flame retardants. They are added to a number of consumer items, including mattresses, upholstered furniture, infants’ clothing, and electronics, including computers. In the event of a fire, these items do not ignite as quickly or burn as intensely as those that are not treated with a flame retardant. These retardants have saved many lives in house fires. In one dramatic incident an Air France passenger jet crash landed and burned to the ground. Yet every passenger escaped uninjured due to the fact that the upholstered seats did not catch fire quickly, leaving time for the evacuation. The seats had been treated with brominated flame retardants.
Once again we are dealing with a halogenated substance for which groups like Greenpeace have an automatic banning policy. But there is no evidence that brominated flame retardants cause any harm and there is ample evidence that people are being saved by them. It’s not as if the very presence of bromine will give you cancer. I treat my spa with brominating tablets to keep it antiseptic, so I am essentially swimming in bromine. I know this is a lot better for me than the risk of infection from untreated water. I would suggest whatever risk is associated with the brominated flame retardants in our beds and computers it is worth taking to avoid immolation in our sleep or at our desk. Activists do not accept this common sense approach, rather they emphasize the (unknown) risk and ignore the known benefits of flame retardants. That is no way to interpret the precautionary approach.
Tobacco and Nicotine
It is a shame so much energy is wasted campaigning against substances that cause no harm while there are many chemicals that really do harm us. Tobacco and the nicotine it contains deserve more attention from activists who are concerned with human health. I was a heavy smoker for 15 years and it was a real struggle to quit. I haven’t had a cigarette for more than 30 years and I know quitting was the best thing I ever did for my health. In a perfect world it is obvious tobacco would be banned like so many other harmful addictive substances. But that would just create another black market and the crime that goes with it. Surely there should be even more effort put into campaigns to convince young people not to start smoking and to help addicts kick the habit. If Greenpeace really cared about people’s health, it would adopt an antismoking campaign and put some real effort into it. Greenpeacers say nothing about a substance we know causes 30 percent of all cancer, yet they spend millions on campaigns against substances for which there is no evidence of harm. And they spend millions more campaigning to stop the development of crop varieties that could save millions of lives. In fact the only time they express concern for people’s health is when it furthers one of their misguided efforts to ban something useful.
Thalidomide
Chemicals are not simply good or bad. Take the example of thalidomide. It was prescribed for morning sickness in pregnant women in the U.K. and Canada in the late 1950s and early 1960s. The resulting birth defects were horrific and included missing and misshapen limbs. Up to 20,000 babies were born with serious defects. This was possibly the worst accident in the history of modern medicine and it resulted in many of the safeguards that are in place today to make sure such a thing never happens again. If there were a chemical you would think deserves an absolute ban from the face of the earth, thalidomide would be near the top of the list.
In 1964 Jacob Sheskin, a professor at Hadassah University Hospital in Jerusalem, discovered thalidomide could be used to treat leprosy, a disease that still occurs in a number of countries, including Brazil.[16] Thalidomide has been used successfully to fight leprosy in Brazil since 1965. In 1998 the U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved thalidomide for treatment of lesions caused by leprosy. Since then thalidomide has been found to be an effective treatment for multiple myeloma, a cancer of the white blood cells that typically kills two-thirds of the people who contract the disease.[17]
At present thalidomide is being investigated as a possible treatment for amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, aphthous ulcer, behcet’s syndrome, brain cancer, breast cancer, cachexia, colorectal cancer, congestive heart failure, crohn’s disease, diarrhea, fibrodysplasia ossificans progressiva, graft-versus-host disease, hematological malignancies, HIV infections, Hodgkin’s disease, Kaposi’s sarcoma, leprosy, leukemia, macular degeneration, malignant melanoma, mycobacterium avium complex infections, myelodysplastic syndromes, myelofibrosis, myeloid leukemia, non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, non-small cell lung cancer, ovarian cancer, pain, prostate cancer, prurigo nodularis, renal cancer, rheumatoid arthritis, small cell lung cancer, solid tumors, systemic lupus erythematosus, thyroid cancer, and tuberculosis.[18] Thalidomide is already recognized for a number of treatments but the list could grow much longer as a result of these investigations.
This long list stresses the fact that a chemical that has such deleterious effects in some circumstances can save lives in other circumstances. Today the rules that govern whether or not to prescribe thalidomide focus on preventing pregnant women from accessing the drug. And this brings us straight to a hard question: If it can be demonstrated that legalizing thalidomide to treat certain illnesses would save 100,000 lives per year but might also result in unauthorized access to the drug resulting in two children with birth defects, what choice would you make? The precautionary approach would clearly come down on the side of the 100,000 saved lives. But what politician could stand up to the charge that he or she was condemning a few people to lives of extreme disability by supporting a chemical that would save thousands as many from an early death?
The Dirty Dozen
The Stockholm Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants (POPs) came into effect in 2004 when the minimum of 50 countries ratified it. With the notable exceptions of the United States, Russia, and Saudi Arabia, most countries have ratified the convention.
It is a United Nations treaty aimed at eliminating or reducing a number of chemicals that do not biodegrade quickly in the environment and are considered toxic to humans and wildlife. The 12 chemicals in the original list for discussion became known as the “Dirty Dozen.” There are now 17 chemicals in the list, including DDT. Most of them are chlorinated or brominated pesticides that are used to control insects in the field of agriculture and to control termites in order to protect wooden structures. Some of them are chemicals used in industry and still others are unintentional by-products of chemical manufacturing.
Most environmental groups, including Greenpeace and
the Word Wildlife Fund, initially took the position that all POPs should be eliminated. But as the meetings progressed, it became clear that even some of the most toxic chemicals had uses that were considered sufficiently beneficial to adopt exemptions for certain purposes. Of the 17 POPs listed for elimination, 7 have been registered for exemptions. These include chlordane, which is used to control termites, dieldrin, which is used in agriculture as an insecticide, and DDT, which is used in the production of dicofol, used to control mites on fruit and vegetable crops. These exemptions were made because no other suitable chemical could be found to replace the ones in use. This highlights the fact that when one applies the precautionary approach in a balanced fashion, reasonable people will sometimes decide a toxic chemical is worth keeping in our arsenal for limited or restricted use.
In addition, DDT has a special exemption for use in controlling mosquitoes that carry malaria. Seventeen countries, mostly in Africa but also including China and India, have filed notice they intend to continue using DDT for this purpose.
I would certainly not argue in favor of toxic chemicals if there is no use for them or if suitable, less toxic, substitutes were available. But even then we should not just forget about them. As the cases of DDT and thalidomide demonstrate, certain uses of the chemicals may prove so valuable they should not be subjected to an outright ban.
A few generalities follow from the above discussion:
• All material things are made of elements and chemicals (molecules, compounds).
• No chemical is inherently evil.
• Some chemicals are extremely dangerous under certain circumstances.
• Many chemicals have both negative and positive attributes.
• In general, bans should be placed on the way a chemical is used, rather than on the chemical itself.
• If an otherwise toxic chemical has uses where the benefits far outweigh negative impacts, it should be used.
• There is no end to learning—continual advances in knowledge must be the goal of science and technology.
It is not possible to provide an exhaustive review of chemicals in a single chapter. But I hope these examples and principles have provided some new perspectives on the vast array of substances, both natural and synthetic, that make up ourselves and our world.
[1]. “PVC Alternatives Database,” Greenpeace Int., http://archive.greenpeace.org/toxics/pvcdatabase/bad.html
[2]. “Periodic Table (large version),” Wikipedia, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Periodic_table_(large_version)
[3]. “Estimated Deaths and DALYs [Disability Adjusted Life Years]Attributable to Selected Environmental Risk Factors.” World Health Organization, January 2007, http://www.who.int/quantifying_ehimpacts/countryprofilesebd.xls
[4]. “The Inventory of Sources and Environmental Releases of Dioxin-Like Compounds in the United States: The Year 2000 Update,” U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, March 2005, http://www.epa.gov/ncea/pdfs/dioxin/2k-update/pdfs/Dioxin_Frontmatter.pdf
[5]. Rick Smith and Bruce Laurie, Slow Death by Rubber Duck: How the Toxic Chemistry of Everyday Life Affects Our Health, (Berkeley, Counterpoint, 2009).
[6]. “Go PVC-Free,” Greenpeace International, http://www.greenpeace.org/usa/campaigns/toxics/go-pvc-free
[7]. “Polyvinyl Chloride,” Greenpeace International, http://www.greenpeace.org/international/campaigns/toxics/polyvinyl-chloride
[8]. “EU Risk Assessment,” DINP Information Centre, http://www.dinp-facts.com/RA
[9]. Kara Altshuler et al., “Assessment of a Technical Basis for a PVC-Related Materials Credit in LEED,” TSAC PVC Task Group, US Green Building Council, December 17, 2004, p. 10, https://www.usgbc.org/ShowFile.aspx?DocumentID=1287
[10]. “Hospital Infection Control Saves Lives, Cuts Costs,” Medical News Today, March 11, 2007, http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/64886.php
[11]. Margaret Wente, “Does BPA Give You the Willies? It Shouldn’t,” Globe and Mail, November 9, 2009, http://www.beattystreetpublishing.com/confessions/references/does-bpa-give-you-the-willies
[12]. “Plastics Industry Reassures on the Safety of Bisphenol-A (BPA),” British Plastics Federation, December 1, 2009, http://www.bpf.co.uk/Article/Detail.aspx?ArticleUid=97b49741-856b-4e4e-82c7-62f27ef2eb65
[13]. Steve Conner, “Scientists Declare War Over BPA,” Independent, April 13, 2010, http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/scientists-declare-war-over-bpa-1943087.html
[14]. Ibid.
[15]. “Clusterfuck,” Wikipedia, http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/clusterfuck
[16]. “Thalidomide,” Wikipedia, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thalidomide
[17]. “Multiple Myeloma,” Wikipedia, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiple_myeloma
[18]. “Thalidomide” http://bi.adisinsight.com/rdi/viewdocument.aspx?render=view&mode=remote&adnm=800004827&PushValidation=121745
Chapter 19 -
Population Is Us
Population is a very tricky subject. Many people believe we have a right, even a moral obligation, to go forth and multiply. Others complain there are far too many of us already and it would be a good thing if some calamity befell us, thinning the human herd. These opposing views are strongly linked to religious convictions on the one hand, and extreme antihuman sentiments on the other. It is a somewhat typical right versus left dichotomy. What can a sensible environmentalist make of this chasm in philosophical outlook?
On the World Day of Peace in December 2008, Pope Benedict XVI pointed out poverty has been reduced as a percentage of the human population in recent years. “In other words, population is proving to be an asset, not a factor that contributes to poverty,” the pope affirmed.[1] The only form of birth control tolerated by the Catholic Church is the very unreliable rhythm method. Modern contrivances such as condoms and birth control pills need not apply. Yet many Catholics, especially in the industrialized countries, choose to defy this edict and actively limit the size of their families, using modern birth control techniques.
On the other extreme, Paul Watson, the early Greenpeace activist who is now head of the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society, believes, “We need to radically and intelligently reduce human populations to fewer than one billion.” He warns, “Curing a body of cancer requires radical and invasive therapy, and therefore, curing the biosphere of the human virus will also require a radical and invasive approach.”[2] A little genocide anyone? It’s only a virus. The pope looks pretty good by comparison.
In December 2009, the prominent Canadian journalist Diane Francis wrote an editorial in the National Post calling on the world to adopt China’s “one-child policy.” This policy punishes parents and their children if a mother has more than one child. It is credited for reducing population by 250 million during the past 30 years, but this is questioned, and can’t be proven either way. The editorial received almost universal condemnation, clearly indicating that people in Canada and the U.S. do not believe in such intrusive state policies in matters of family planning.
By 2020 there will be 30 million more men than women in China. That’s 30 million men with no chance of finding a partner of the opposite sex. This is largely due to the fact the Chinese prefer boys to girls, resulting in forced abortions and girl infanticide. In addition, many girl babies are adopted out illegally so that couples can avoid punishment for going over the one-child limit.[3] The United States government has stated this policy contravenes the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and Amnesty International has also condemned the one-child policy.[4]
Too often, discussions about human population degenerate into political debates about race, class, gender, and left-right dogma. Fortunately there is a middle ground between unbridled procreation and a collective death wish. The trick is to get beyond knee-jerk discrimination and to objectively analyze what is going on in the real world. Let’s forget about whether humans are good or bad for a moment and take a look at the current trends.
The Population Division of the United Nations Department
of Economic and Social Affairs projects a global population of between 8 billion and 10.5 billion by 2050, up from the present population of nearly 7 billion.[5] Without exception, all the growth will occur in the developing countries while the developed countries will experience negative internal growth rates, only growing in population due to immigration from the developing countries. It is clear from this that wealth results in reduced population growth. Why is this the case when wealthier people can afford more children?
It turns out that one of the most important factors in determining average family size is the number of people employed in agriculture. In 1870 between 70 to 80 percent of the workforce in the United States was employed in agriculture. Today, due entirely to mechanization and intensive farming practices, only 2 to 3 percent of workers are required to grow food. And even with so few people involved, the United States has a surplus of food exports over imports of nearly $35 billion annually. Today, 70 percent of the workforce in India and 65 percent in China are engaged in food production. Imagine how many millions of people would be able to pursue productive careers in other sectors if only 2 to 3 percent were required for agriculture. The implications for population growth are also staggering.
People who live by subsistence farming tend to have large families because children are an asset when unskilled labor is required to work the land. When agriculture becomes mechanized, far fewer people are required to work on farms. In China alone, 300 million people will move from the country into cities in the next 10 years, largely due to mechanization. This will represent the largest migration of humans in history. And it will result in a dramatic decline in birth rates because families that move into urban areas tend to have fewer children. Children are a liability in cities, and their mothers become better educated, politically empowered, and more in control of their reproductive future, unlike their counterparts in subsistence farming, who are barefoot and pregnant most of their lives.
Confessions of a Greenpeace Dropout: The Making of a Sensible Environmentalist Page 46