Chemicals

The cold, remote wilderness of the High Arctic, up near the North Pole, conjures up thoughts of some of the most pristine landscape in the world. Mankind hasn't set foot there much. But birds have and they tell a dirty story. Recently, scientists looked at seabird poop and found a toxic cocktail high in cadmium and mercury, plus lead, manganese, and aluminum. The Arctic is polluted because the world in which we live is polluted. From plankton to polar bears, the Arctic is the recipient of contaminants whose sources travel from thousands of miles away on currents of water and air.[1,2]

Heavy metals such as lead, mercury, cadmium, manganese, aluminum, thallium antimony, and arsenic lodge in human bodies. Heavy metals are natural components of the earth's crust. As trace elements, some metals – copper, selenium, zinc – are essential to human health. However, at higher concentrations, even they can be poisonous.

Heavy metals in water are odorless, tasteless and colorless. As levels rise in our environment, they also rise within our bodies. They enter with our food, water, the air we breathe, and by skin contact. They slowly accumulate in the kidneys, liver, pancreas, bones, central nervous system and brain where they contribute to chronic diseases, learning disorders, cancer, dementia, and premature aging. They are subtle, silent, stalking killers. What makes them particularly dangerous is:

• Their tendency to bioaccumulate – we absorb and store them faster than we can metabolize or excrete them from the body. For example, we have perhaps 1000 times more lead in our bones than people did 500 years ago, thanks to increasing contamination.[3,4]

• Their tendency to act as a catalyst for chronic disease. Heavy metals poison us by disrupting our cellular enzymes which run on nutritional minerals such as magnesium, zinc, and selenium. Toxic metals kick out the nutrients and bind their receptor sites (take their place), causing diffuse symptoms by affecting nerves, hormones, digestion, and immune function. Instead of calcium being present in an enzyme reaction, for example, lead or cadmium may be there in its place. Toxic metals can't fulfill the same role as the nutritional minerals, and so their presence becomes critically disruptive to enzyme activity.

• Their tendency to cause hyperactive, aggressive behavior.[5]

• Their tendency to be more dangerous in combination with each other and with other toxins[6] than singularly. Mercury and lead together have about 1000 fold increase in toxicity as compared with either one separately.[7]

• They participate in the creation of biofilms[8] like those that surround the spirochete Borrelia burgdorferi, the bug that causes Lyme disease. Biofilm makes Lyme invisible to the immune system and able to dodge a barrage of antibiotics.[9]

Mercury exposure is an everyday occurrence for all of us, no matter where we live. And mercury levels are rising. When mercury is on board, the ability to handle infections is significantly impacted. Mercury damages the 20,000 or so enzymes in the human body.[10]

"As long as compartmentalized toxic metals are present in the body, microorganisms have a fortress that cannot be conquered by antibiotics, Enderlein remedies, ozone therapy, UV light therapy and others," says Dr. Dietrich Klinghardt who specializes in persistent chronic disease. Heavy metals make it harder for our body's detoxification system to keep us cleaned out and they feed the bugs within us. This is why so many people today have chronic, low level infections. People go to the doctor to find out what is wrong and can't get an answer because medical schools didn't teach heavy metal toxicity.

The damage done by heavy metals is not limited to just the body. Concentrations can disrupt neural pathways in the brain and deplete neurotransmitters. Disorganization of thoughts, problems with planning, and short-term memory disturbances can be a chronic issue.

Lead comes first to mind when we think of environmental toxins that suppress IQ – dumb down the human brain. In fact, lead may have been responsible in great part for the fall of the Roman Empire. In the late phase of the empire, it was considered a privilege of the reigning aristocracy to drink out of lead cups. Wine and food were sweetened with a honey extract boiled in lead pots. Many of the water lines in the city of Rome were made of lead pipes. Some historians believe the infamous neurological deficiencies of the Roman emperors were due to lead intoxication.

Here is a bigger look at just two heavy metals – where we encounter them, and the havoc concentrations can cause in our bodies:

TOXIC METAL	SOURCES	EFFECTS
ALUMINUM	alum, aluminum foil, animal feed, antacids, aspirin, auto exhaust, baking powder, beer, bleached flour, cans, ceramics, cheese, cigarette filters, color additives, construction materials, cookware, cosmetics, dental amalgams, [anti-perspirants], drinking water, drying agents, dust, insulated wiring, medicinal compounds, milk products, nasal spray, pesticides, pollution, salt, tap water, tobacco smoke, toothpaste, treated water, vanilla powder.	ALS, Alzheimer's, anemia, appetite loss, behavioral problems, cavities, colds, colitis, confusion, constipation, dementia, dry mouth, dry skin, energy loss, excessive perspiration, flatulence, headaches, heartburn, hyperactivity, inhibition of enzyme systems, kidney dysfunction, lowered immune function, learning disabilities, leg twitching, liver dysfunction, memory loss, neuromuscular disorders, numbness, osteoporosis, paralysis, Parkinson's disease, peptic ulcer, psychosis, reduced intestinal activity, senility, skin problems, spleen pain, stomach pain, weak and aching muscles
CADMINUM	airborne industrial contaminants, batteries, candy, ceramics, cigarette smoke, colas, congenital intoxication, copper refineries, copper alloys, dental alloys, drinking water, electroplating, fertilizers, food from contaminated soil, fungicides, incineration of tires / rubber / plastic, instant coffee, iron roofs, kidney, liver, marijuana, processed meat, evaporated milk, motor oil, oysters, paint, pesticides, galvanized pipes, processed foods, refined grains / flour cereals, rubber, rubber carpet backing, seafoods (cod, haddock, oyster, tuna), sewage, silver polish, smelters, soft water, solders (including in food cans), tobacco, vending machine soft drinks, tools, vapor lamps, water (city, softened, well), welding metal	alcoholism, alopecia, anemia, arthritis (osteo and rheumatoid), bone disease, bone pain in middle of bones, cancer, cardiovascular disease, cavities, cerebral hemorrhage, cirrhosis, diabetes, digestive disturbances, emphysema, enlarged heart, flu-like symptoms, growth impairment, headaches, high cholesterol, hyperkinetic behavior, hypertension, hypoglycemia, impotence, inflammation, infertility, kidney disease, learning disorders, liver damage, lung disease, migraines, nerve cell damage, osteoporosis, prostate dysfunction, reproductive disorders, schizophrenia, stroke

Global Economies, Global Air Pollution

The electric power industry is the largest toxic polluter in the United States. Producing electricity from coal and oil releases a wide range of pollutants into the environment. In addition to toxic air pollution from power plant smokestacks, large volumes of toxic chemicals are produced at coal and oil-fired power plants and included in millions of tons of solid and liquid wastes that are typically disposed of at or near the power plants that generate these wastes.[13]

Many of America's coal-fired power plants lack widely available pollution controls for the highly toxic metal mercury, and mercury emissions recently increased at more than half of the country's 50 largest mercury-emitting power plants, according to a 2010 report by the nonpartisan Environmental Integrity Project.[14] Since 1990, the EPA has been required under the Clean Air Act to impose controls on many forms of air pollution, including mercury. To date, however, there is still no national regulation to limit mercury pollution.



In addition to what the U. S. generates, there is "transboundary air pollution." Coal burning in China emits 25 percent of global mercury, for example. High levels of mercury from China and India have been detected on both coasts of the United States. Research found that one-fifth of the mercury entering Oregon's Williamette River comes from abroad, mostly from China. Mercury is especially suited for long distance travel because at the smokestack in China it is in elemental form and insoluble. However, by the time it reaches the U.S. west coast, it has transformed into a reactive gaseous material that dissolves in Oregon's wet climate – falling onto the Williamette River's watershed and slowly building up toxic levels of mercury in the local wildlife. In California, for example, some researchers believe at least one-third of California's fine particulate pollution – known as aerosol – originates from Asia. These pollutants threaten California's progress on meeting stricter Clean Air Act requirements. In May 2006, University of California-Davis researchers claimed that almost all the particulate matter over Lake Tahoe was from China. The great irony is that these pollutants are mainly due to the burgeoning demand of U.S. and EU consumers for cheap Chinese goods – which is driving the Chinese economic development.[15]

Bisphenol A (BPA) is the chemical that makes polycarbonate plastic drinking bottles clear and virtually shatterproof. But it is an endocrine disrupter – it mimics the body’s own hormones. A 2009 review of available studies concluded that "perinatal BPA exposure acts to exert persistent effects on body weight and adiposity.” In other words, if you are exposed to BPA as a fetus, you are predisposed to be a fat person. (Rubin 2009). A National Institutes of Health panel found “some concern" about BPA's effects on fetal and infant brain development. Canada banned BPA in baby bottles.

Air pollution is getting credit for causing heart disease and strokes. According to findings from one of the largest studies ever to examine the issue, women living in the most polluted cities had the highest heart disease and stroke risks, while women living in the cleanest cities like Tucson, had the lowest. Fine particulate air pollution – caused primarily by vehicle exhausts, coal-fired power plants, and other industrial sources – is the problem.[16] Heavy metal toxicity can cause the blood pH to become acidic. The body buffers this acidity by extracting calcium from the bones. The calcium tends to accumulate in the soft tissue of the arteries causing hardening of the arteries.

When a fetus is exposed to urban air pollution in the womb, chemicals in air pollution interfere with brain development, resulting in lowered intelligence. Studies involving more than 400 pregnant women in New York City and Krakow, Poland, found that 5-year-olds exposed in the womb to above-average levels of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, or PAHs, score lower on IQ tests. PAHs, created by the burning of fossil fuels, are ubiquitous in urban environments.[17] The pair of studies "adds to the growing literature implicating exposures to environmental toxicants with stunting of children's intellectual abilities and increased risk for attention deficit hyperactivity disorder and conduct disorders," said Bruce Lanphear, professor of children's environmental health at British Columbia's Simon Fraser University. "At some point, we will cease blaming parents and teachers for children's failure to learn or thrive in academics and focus our attention on reducing their exposure to widespread neurotoxicants."[18]

Man-Made Chemicals

Mankind loves colors. For centuries, people colored their clothing with dyes made of natural substances like mollusks, wood, and indigo plants. The color purple holds a special place in history, however.

In 1856, a young English chemist named William Perkin made the first synthetic dye. A combination of aniline and potassium dichromate (K2Cr2O7) rinsed with alcohol produced a beautiful purple known as mauve. It was a huge hit with the French textile industry. Perkins retired a rich man at age 35, having founded the first industry based on synthetic, man-made chemicals.[19]

In 1895, less than two decades after production of synthetic dyes had begun in Germany, it was reported that one of every ten industrial dye factory workers had bladder cancer. Exposure to carcinogenic aromatic amines were taking their toll.[19a]

By 1930, the high risk of bladder cancer among those who worked regularly with such dyes was clear enough that Germany and Switzerland officially agreed to pay dye workers who developed such cancer, making this one of the first formally compensable occupational illnesses.[19b]

The chemical age that came to transform life as we know it started after World War I when new discoveries and new techniques revolutionized industry and led to an era of explosive production of synthetic chemicals.

When the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, the United States was in a bind. It had depended on natural rubber from trees in Southeast Asia. Necessity was the mother of invention; American ingenuity created synthetic rubber from petroleum. That accelerated the development of polymer engineering (think plastic materials made from petroleum). Polymers and plastics comprise the majority of the chemicals in our environment. They are used in cars, computers, planes, houses, eyeglasses, paints, bags, appliances, medical devices, carpets, tools, clothing, boats, batteries, pipes, and more. It would be hard to imagine a world without plastics. But they hand us all kinds of environmental problems because plastics never break down, and they deposit chemicals in our bodies that gum up the works.

As the decades went by, synthetic chemical technology gave us fertilizers, oleochemicals (oils, fats, and waxes), explosives, pharmaceuticals, semiconductors, fragrances, and flavors. For example: to use real strawberries to make a fast-food milkshake is inconvenient because berries mold easily. Food manufacturers can use a synthetic chemical that tastes like strawberries and not have to worry about moldy berries. For better or for worse, the chemical industry is central to the modern world economy.

Today, there are some 80,000 synthetic chemicals on the market in the United States; about 10,000 of them are used in food processing, packaging, wrapping, and storage. These chemicals are largely unregulated, and only about 200 have been studied for safety. Many are carcinogenic – able to cause cancer. For example, a 2001 pilot study looking at residential toxin exposure detected the presence of 33 different carcinogens implicated in breast cancer in house dust, and 24 different compounds in air.[20]

American law is reactionary, not precautionary. In other words, chemicals essentially are innocent until someone – usually an environmental activist group – goes to court and proves them guilty of harm. The burden for protecting children and adults falls on families, not industry or government.

The Cancer Connection

In 2010, the President's Cancer Panel issued a surprisingly candid report about our chemical world. The Panel said it was "particularly concerned to find that the true burden of environmentally induced cancer has been grossly underestimated," and that "grievous harm from carcinogens "has not been addressed adequately by the National Cancer Program."[21] Among the pollutants the Panel pointed out as causing cancer:

• Medical imaging – Americans now are estimated to receive nearly half of their total radiation exposure from medical imaging and other medical sources, compared with only 15 percent in the early 1980s.

• Pharmaceuticals – We are drinking each other's drugs. Drugs of all types enter the water supply when they are excreted or improperly disposed of and they have become a considerable source of contamination.

• Pesticides – The entire U.S. population is exposed on a daily basis to numerous agricultural chemicals, some of which also are used in residential and commercial landscaping. Many of these chemicals have known or suspected carcinogenic or endocrine-disrupting properties. Pesticides (insecticides, herbicides, and fungicides) approved for use by the EPA contain nearly 900 active ingredients, many of which are toxic. Many of the solvents, fillers, and other chemicals listed as inert ingredients on pesticide labels also are toxic, but are not required to be tested for their potential to cause chronic diseases such as cancer. Chemicals used for household pest control can become a component of carpet dust, posing a risk to children when they play on the floor.

• Military sources – Nearly 900 Superfund sites are abandoned military facilities or facilities that produced materials and products for or otherwise supported military needs. Some of these sites and the areas surrounding them became heavily contaminated due to improper storage and disposal of known or suspected carcinogens including solvents, machining oils, metalworking fluids, and metals.

• Chlorine by-products – Disinfection of public water supplies has dramatically reduced the incidence of waterborne illnesses and related mortality in the United States, but research indicates that long-term exposure to disinfection by-products such as trihalomethanes may increase cancer risk.

• Manufacturing – Numerous chemicals used in manufacturing remain in or on the product as residues, while others are integral components of the products themselves. (Think lead in purses from China and melamine in baby formula.)

• Lifestyle – Modern conveniences such as dry-cleaning fluid, cell phones, and tanning booths are toxic.

It is predicted now that 1 in 3 women and 1 in 2 men will develop cancer in their lifetime.

"There are far too many known and suspected cancer-causing chemicals in products people, young and old, use every day of their lives," said Kenneth A. Cook, president and co-founder of the advocacy organization Environmental Working Group (EWG). "Many of these chemicals are believed to be time bombs, altering the genetic-level switching mechanisms that lead to cancerous cellular growth in later life."[22]

This CBS News 60 Minutes program speaks to the lack of political will to end the use of mercury in dental fillings.

The Panel pointed out that "The requisite knowledge and technologies exist to develop alternatives to many currently used chemical agents known or believed to cause or promote cancer." The Panel called for a new national strategy that focuses on such threats in the environment and workplaces.

Finding the political will to do that is another matter.

The Obesity Connection

In 2006, scientists at the Harvard School of Public Health reported that the prevalence of obesity in infants under 6 months had risen 73 percent since 1980. Babies aren't eating fast food burgers and fries, so what's up with that? As Sharon Begley explained in Newsweek, the answer lies in early-life exposure to traces of chemicals in the environment.

Estrogen-mimicking chemicals are everywhere: • Vinyl flooring • Detergents • Shampoo • Deodorants • Perfumes • Hair spray • Moisturizers • Garden hoses • Inflatable toys • Pesticides • Fertilizers Processed carbs (bread pasta, cereal) trigger excess insulin, which builds fat and stimulates feminizing estrogen.

"Evidence has been steadily accumulating that certain hormone-mimicking pollutants, ubiquitous in the food chain, have two previously unsuspected effects. They act on genes in the developing fetus and newborn to turn more precursor cells into fat cells, which stay with you for life. And they may alter metabolic rate, so that the body hoards calories rather than burning them, like a physiological Scrooge. 'The evidence now emerging says that being overweight is not just the result of personal choices about what you eat, combined with inactivity,' says Retha Newbold of the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS) in North Carolina, part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH). 'Exposure to environmental chemicals during development may be contributing to the obesity epidemic.' They are not the cause of extra pounds in every person who is overweight – for older adults, who were less likely to be exposed to so many of the compounds before birth, the standard explanations of genetics and lifestyle probably suffice – but environmental chemicals may well account for a good part of the current epidemic, especially in those under 50. And at the individual level, exposure to the compounds during a critical period of development may explain one of the most frustrating aspects of weight gain: you eat no more than your slim friends, and exercise no less, yet are still unable to shed pounds."[23]

For example, bisphenol A (BPA), the chemical found in plastic water bottles, in the lining of cans, and some cash register receipts, prompts some cells to become fat cells.

The fact that chemicals could cause obesity was a radical theory when it was first proposed in 2002 by Paula Baillie-Hamilton, a doctor at Stirling University in Scotland. But now these chemicals that make us fat actually have their own label: obesogens. Obesogens are natural estrogenic-hormones found in soy products, hormones administered to animals, plastics in some food and drink packaging, ingredients added to processed foods, and pesticides sprayed on produce. They act in a variety of ways: by mimicking human hormones such as estrogen, by misprogramming stem cells to become fat cells and, researchers think, by altering the function of genes. Whether you're a man or a woman, too much estrogen makes you fat, slow, tired, and diseased.

Toxins can do great damage, and the body, in its wisdom, looks for a safe place to park them to keep them out of the bloodstream and away from the organs. One of the body's responses to toxins is to encapsulate them in fat cells. Think of putting something dangerous in a safe deposit box. Nature makes these fat cells tough to remove so the body is not endangered. This belly fat –medical books call it adiposity – does further damage because it is more biologically active than other kinds of fat, meaning it produces more hormones and chemical messengers that cause chronic inflammation throughout the body.

So the epidemics of obesity and chronic disease cannot be blamed just on addictive quality of fast food and sodas, or the excess calories and out-of-control insulin levels triggered by processed foods. A good portion of the blame also goes to chemicals, particularly estrogen-mimicking chemicals.

Many diseases, including pervasive and chronic ones such as autism and autoimmune diseases, will respond to treatment that includes helping the body eliminate toxins.

The Law & Order Connection

British Professor Derek Bryce-Smith put forth a thesis in 1974 that violent criminals who commit crimes involving loss of control are hyperactive people with a high heavy metal body burden, particularly lead. He concluded that "… offenders of this type would be better treated with penicillamine [a chelating agent] than prison." His suggestion that society should adopt a more 'humane approach' of tackling the medical issues that predispose a person to criminal behavior went unheeded.

But he kept at it. Twelve years later he wrote:

"Changed brain chemistry can alter behaviour, and changed behaviour can alter brain chemistry: the interaction is two way. It therefore follows that behaviour, cognition, social interactions, and other expressions of brain function are subject not only to the social environment but also to certain aspects of the chemical environment. The relevant chemical factors include (a) neurotoxic pollutants in general, of which lead is evidently now the most serious in its impact, (b) certain common nutrient deficiencies, particularly of zinc, and (c) neurotoxins of voluntary abuse, of which ethanol is still probably producing the most widespread social damage."[26]

By 1995, methods to analyze such things were more precise. Dr. Neil I. Ward got permission to obtain hair and blood samples from a group of incarcerated men, aged 16-19 years, and he compared them with a control group.[27] He was particularly interested in 28 of those young men whose crime involved violence. Hair samples provide a 'diary' of long-term exposure and tend more to show whole-body accumulation of toxins, whereas blood samples tell a more transient story concerning recent absorption of nutrients before they have been stored or excreted. Looking at the 28 violent offenders, Dr. Ward found their hair analyses had about four times as much lead and aluminum, and twice as much cadmium. He also found remarkable deficits in certain essential trace metals – chromium, selenium and zinc. The blood samples told pretty much the same story:[28]




Did the post WWII chemical age spawn several generations of 'toxic metal kids' roaming the streets?

America's crime rates have been falling since the early 1990s. New York and Los Angeles, once the twin capitals of violent crime, have calmed down significantly, as have Phoenix and most other big cities. In 2009, violent crime fell an impressive 5.5 percent nationwide, despite the economic downturn. Criminologists debate why: the crack war petered out, new community policing tactics worked, the economy had improved for a long spell. But many felt that didn't fully explain it and looked beyond the criminal justice system for answers. Professor Bryce-Smith's hypothesis was gaining traction. As reported in The Week:

One intriguing hypothesis about why Americans were so prone to violence in the 1980s was that many young people were suffering the effects of lead poisoning. The link between lead poisoning and aggressive or impulsive behavior is well established. And peaks in children's exposure to the toxic metal, first due to lead paint and then to leaded gasoline, were followed roughly 20 years later by two of the 20th century's worst crime eras. Under this theory, the phasing out of lead paint and leaded gasoline explains the reduction in crime.[29]

Neurotoxic metals, absorbed in the brain due to poor diet and deficiencies in vitamins and minerals, can disturb normal brain development and neurotransmitter function. Some hypothesize that environmental pollution interacts with poverty, poor diet, alcohol or drug use, and social stress to put some individuals at risk for subclinical toxicity, leading to a loss of impulse control and increased violent crime.[30]

Magnesium, for example, protects us from aluminum. Zinc, amino acids, calcium, iron, vitamin C, and vitamin E protect us from lead.

The Autism and ADHD Connection

One out of every six children in the U.S. has been diagnosed with a developmental disability.[31] The bulk of the disorders are autism, ADHD, and bi-polar.

Evidence strongly suggests that thimerosal (the mercury-based preservative used in multi-dose vials of vaccines) may be responsible in some part for the exponential growth of autism, attention deficit disorder, speech delays, and other childhood neurological disorders now epidemic in the United States. In the early 1990s, public health officials dramatically increased the number of thimerosal-containing vaccinations. In a 1991 memo, Dr. Maurice Hilleman, one of the fathers of Merck's vaccination programs, warned that 6-month-old children administered the shots on schedule would suffer mercury exposures 87 times the government safety standards. He recommended that thimerosal be discontinued. Merck ignored Hilleman's warning. Autism rates began rising dramatically in children who were administered the new vaccine regimens.[32]

Also, thimerosal tends to settle in the vial. If it was not shaken up before being drawn, whoever got the tenth and final dose got an enormously high concentration of mercury.[33]

The key issue has turned out to be whether or not you were dealt the genes to be a "good excreter" of mercury. Can your body get it out? One of the first hair-sample studies was done by Amy Holmes, MD. She found strikingly lower levels of mercury in the hair of children with autism than in the hair of neurotypical children. That means children with autism cannot excrete mercury from their systems; the mercury builds to toxic levels.[34]

Mercury is still included in a few vaccines including the seasonal flu shot and the swine flu shot. Although mercury got all the media attention, some vaccines contain aluminum and MSG, and they are also neurotoxins. Vaccines containing high concentrations of aluminum were added to the child immunization schedule when several vaccines containing mercury were removed. Two-month old babies now receive 1,225 mcg of aluminum from their vaccines – 50 times higher than safety levels.[35]

"Aluminum is not perceived, I believe, by the public as a dangerous metal. Therefore, we are in a much more comfortable wicket in terms of defending its presence in vaccines."

— Dr. John Clements, World Health Organization vaccine advisor, May 2000[36]

People ask if vaccines cause autism. The answer: yes and no. No, because there are children who have never been vaccinated who have become autistic. Yes, because the neurotoxins in the vaccines add to an already heavy load of environmental pollution. The Environmental Working Group has tested umbilical cord blood and found more than 200 chemicals in newborns' blood – mercury, lead, fire retardants, pesticides, plastics, Teflon – a virtual toxic stew of modern day life. Vaccines appear to have been the proverbial straw that breaks the camel's back for some children.

Heavy metal toxicities such as lead and cadmium have also been associated with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder.[37] Autism and ADHD differ in how the children react to their world – one mostly withdrawn, the other mostly hyperactive. But both manifestations share much of the same origins and both require heavy metal detoxification as a fundamental element of treatment.

Autistic children commonly suffer from yeast overgrowth which, according to the National Autism Association, may be eliminated in the long-term only by removing the heavy metal burden from the body.[38]

Author Dr. Mary Ann Block says what we call "diseases" are actually symptoms, rather than psychiatric disorders requiring medication. "If you've got heavy metal toxicity, then you don't have autism, you have the symptoms caused by heavy metal toxicity."

Dr. Fred Baughman, an author and outspoken critic of the use of drugs for children with hyperactive disorders, points out that the ADHD diagnosis does not exist in other countries and didn't exist anywhere two generations ago. "They have taken entirely normal children and made patients out of them by diagnosing them with fictional chemical imbalances of the brain. It's a total fraud."[40] In other words, there is more profit in prescribing drugs than performing a heavy metal detox.

Chemicals In the Bathroom

Stacy Malkan exposes the toxic secrets of the industry and goes behind the scenes with the breast cancer activists pressuring the cosmetics companies to stop using chemicals linked to cancer and birth defects

The U.S. government doesn't regulate cosmetics and body care products for safety, long-term health impacts, or environmental damage. There are many harmful synthetic chemicals and petroleum-based ingredients including lead in lipstick, arsenic in eye shadow, mercury in mascara, coal tar in shampoos, and mineral oil in lotions.

Many cosmetics are made from petroleum. They are toxic. As Ronnie Cummins, founder and director of the Organic Consumers Association (OCA) put it in June, 2010:

"There's an oil spill leaking from U.S. bathrooms that's roughly the same size as the BP disaster in the Gulf of Mexico. It's coming from the petrochemical-based cosmetics we're rubbing into our hair and skin and rinsing down the drain … All of these products can be replaced with petrochemical-free, certified organic alternatives that work just as well."[41]

Ingredients that use petroleum have no business being in products labeled "organic" but, as Cummins lists, it is a fairly common practice. He listed a few such ingredients he found in products labeled organic:
• Ceteareth-20
• Cocamidopropyl Betaine
• Phenoxyethanol
• Polyethylene Glycol (PEG)
• Olefin Sulfonate
• Sodium Myreth Sulfate

Brands that carry the USDA certified Organic Body Care and Cosmetics should be free of toxic elements made from or with petroleum, but there is a lot of cheating going on in the marketplace. Efforts are underway for better self-regulation of the industry. OCA is one of the leaders. It launched a "Coming Clean Campaign" to encourage retailers to take action to address widespread organic labeling fraud in their health and beauty care aisles. In June 2010, Whole Foods Market became the first retail chain to adopt an organic integrity policy for health & beauty products sold in their stores. By June, 2011, all organic claims on personal care products sold at Whole Foods are to be backed up by third-party certification to USDA organic standards.

Who is cheating and who is not? The OCA website tells you and constantly updates their database.

You'll find that many brand name cosmetic companies that donate to breast cancer awareness use toxic chemicals. It happens so much, it has been given the term "pink washing."

Check out this great video, The Story of Cosmetics. Teenagers will enjoy this one too. You will never look at the word "natural" on the label again and think it means "safe."

By some estimates, women use 12 cosmetic products each day and absorb 5 pounds of cosmetic chemicals a year. The evidence of damage to human health is mounting:

• More and more girls are experiencing "early onset puberty" meaning they reach puberty earlier, growing breasts by ages 7 and 8.[42] Researchers are beginning to examine the link between cosmetics ingredients that mimic the effect of estrogen and premature puberty. Young bodies interpret the extra estrogen as the call to develop breasts and sexual traits, despite the fact they are still children.

• Girls younger than 10 with early onset puberty show a high rate of exposure to endocrine disruptors found in nail polishes and other cosmetics.[43] Phthalates, triclosan, musks and parabens are also known to alter the hormone system.[44]

• Exposure to phthalates, endocrine disrupting chemicals found in perfumes, nail polish and other cosmetics, is linked to childhood obesity.[45]

• Fragrances can be particularly nasty synthetic chemical concoctions and what goes into a fragrance need not be listed on labels because the law considers them trade secrets. Many fragrances contain hormone-disrupting chemicals which have been linked to increased risk of cancer, especially breast and prostate cancers; reproductive toxicity and effects on the developing fetus; and predisposition to metabolic disease such as thyroid problems or obesity. Fragrance is now considered among the top five allergens.[46]

• The polishes, acrylics and other products used in nail salons contain some twenty chemicals flagged as having "potential symptoms and health effects" by the EPA. Nail salon workers exposed to solvents without proper ventilation face an increased risk for miscarriages and birth defects similar to fetal alcohol syndrome. "Most kinds of house paint are less toxic than what you find in nail polish," says Cora Roelofs, ScD, an assistant professor at the University of Massachusetts.[47]

Environmental Working Group (EWG) has a wonderful resource called "Skin Deep," an online cosmetics safety database in 2004. It provides safety ratings for more than 62,000 products on the market and receives about one million hits per month. You find it at www.cosmeticsdatabase.com. Jane Houlihan, vice president for research at EWG:

"When you get online and use it, you'll find more than 500 products that contain ingredients that are banned in other countries. You'll find a hundred products that contain ingredients that the industry itself has said are unsafe in cosmetics. And you'll find that 99 percent of the products you find in our database contain at least one ingredient, and many times dozens of ingredients, that haven't been assessed for safety by the FDA, by the cosmetics industry itself, or any other publicly accountable institution."[48]

Other very handy sources of information including:

• Not So Sexy (2010) – the perfume industry's 3,100 stock chemical ingredients are used to concoct a complex cocktail of natural essences and synthetic chemicals, often toxic petrochemicals.

• A Little Prettier (2008) – cosmetic companies deny health problems related to phthalates, but are they secretly reformulating? A follow up to the prior Not Too Pretty report. www.safecosmetics.org

• Teen Cosmetic Study (2008) - Laboratory tests reveal adolescent girls across America are contaminated with chemicals commonly used in cosmetics and body care products.

• Beauty Secrets (2000) – Nail polish contains the plasticizer dibutyl phthalate (DBP) and CDC found the compound in everyone they sampled. DBP causes a number of birth defects in lab animals, primarily to male offspring. An environmental release of just 10 pounds of DBP must be reported to environmental authorities under the Superfund law. The cosmetics industry, in contrast, puts hundreds of thousands of pounds of DBP into nail polish each year, with no requirements for safety testing or reporting.

Chemicals in the House

In May, 2009, Canadian activists Rick Smith and Bruce Lourie published the book, Slow Death by Rubber Duck: The Secret Danger of Everyday Things. It got noticed, if for nothing else, because the cover attacks one of the American icons of children's fun in the bath tub – the rubber ducky. But alas, the duck perfectly symbolizes the new and surprising kind of pollution that threatens our health and environment. Most rubber ducks aren't rubber; they are vinyl and full of toxic phthalates.

Smith and Lourie voluntarily ate, drank, breathed, and absorbed commonly encountered toxins, then measured samples of their blood and urine for intake levels. Experiments involved such seemingly benign activities as sitting on upholstery (flame retardants) and using microwave popcorn bags (Teflon), soft plastic (bisphenol A), shampoo (phthalates), and anti-bacterial soap (triclosan). In most cases, with even brief exposure, their levels of toxicity rose significantly.

The Wall Street Journal gave their book a negative review. The authors wrote back:

"The Wall St. Journal insults the intelligence of concerned parents and scientists who know it is dangerous for children's health to use products such as baby bottles and sippy cups made from plastic containing BPA … The Wall St. Journal is putting powerful vested interests above children's safety on toxic chemical issues. Its editorial rejects the basic purpose of scientific research saying 'Environmentalists hope that if researchers run more tests, they'll come up with more links...Thus, they ask for tests unto eternity.' In fact, it was the lack of studies that prompted us to use ourselves as lab rats. Our families would have certainly preferred it if studies had been conducted in modern laboratories, instead of us pioneering them in our homes."[49]

The take-home message is that we don't have the luxury to wait for governments to impose limits on chemicals.

The political environment in the United States has been the hold up. Some creative folks at an advocacy group called "Citizens for Health" put animation to that reality:


And mainstream environmental groups may not be what you think. Christine MacDonald's 2008 book, Green Inc., exposed cozy relationships many groups have with corporate donors who, as she sees it, turn green groups into the handmaidens of corporate benefactors.

A couple years later, journalist Johann Hari picked up where MacDonald left off. His 2010 article in The Nation magazine says addiction to corporate cash has changed these groups at their core.

"[As Christine MacDonald reported] many of the green organizations meant to be leading the fight are busy shoveling up hard cash from the world's worst polluters – and burying science-based environmentalism in return. Sometimes the corruption is subtle; sometimes it is blatant.

"The Sierra Club was approached in 2008 by the makers of Clorox bleach, who said that if the Club endorsed their new range of 'green' household cleaners, they would give it a percentage of the sales. The Club's Corporate Accountability Committee said the deal created a blatant conflict of interest – but took it anyway. Executive director Carl Pope defended the move in an e-mail to members, in which he claimed that the organization had carried out a serious analysis of the cleaners to see if they were 'truly superior.' But it hadn't."[50]

The argument for taking corporate dollars is basically that such alliances are the way to steer environmental policies within the business community.[51]

Groups who have not taken corporate money, like Greenpeace, say that is a lot of baloney from those who are not willing to do the hard work:

"Greenpeace has maintained our financial independence, refusing money from corporations. A few years ago, Greenpeace and our allies decided to stop deforestation in the Amazon by 'convincing' the major industries driving the problem to cease and desist … Greenpeace activists throughout the United States and Europe nudged Nike and Timberland to cancel their contracts with leather [companies] causing deforestation. A few cancelled contracts later; the major ranching companies agreed with Greenpeace Brazil to a moratorium on any ranching that causes deforestation."[52]

Our Top 10 List for Cleaning Up Our Own Corner of the World

Here are 10 things we have found possible to do in our lives to mitigate the impact environmental chemicals have on our health:

1. You can't do much directly about China's air pollution, but you can remove mercury fillings and get fluoride-free toothpaste. Removing amalgam fillings is usually an out-of-pocket expense because the powers-that-be do not want the enormous liability that would come from acknowledging the harm of having put this neurotoxin in the mouth. In addition to poisoning enzyme reactions and potentiating the effects of pesticides and aluminum, mercury negatively affects the heart. Heart disease is the number one killer – we need to do all we can to reduce the incidence of heart attacks, strokes, and hypertension. Fluoride has never been proven to prevent cavities; there is no reason to put a poison in our mouths that attacks our bones and thyroid. Much of the fluoride added to municipal water supplies across the United States is imported from China, and is contaminated with heavy metals.[53] A great resource on the subject is the Fluoride Action Network (fluoridealert.org).

2. Invest in a water filtration system. Claims and counterclaims abound with different systems, but anything you can do is a big help. Our bodies are about 70 percent water, so get it as clean as you can. The closer you are to the water treatment plant, the more chlorine you will have in the household water you use for drinking and showering. You want to remove chlorine and its by-products. The first step is to use a carbon filter. Getting the fluoride out takes a different filter because it is a smaller molecule; there are multi-part filtration systems that include a fluoride filter. Reverse Osmosis water is "clean," but it is often an acid pH and all the minerals have been removed from it – not to mention it takes about 9 gallons of water to make one gallon of RO. Alkalinized water systems have some merit.

Invest in a re-usable BPA-free water bottle so you can carry your own water. That way you don't toss plastic bottles into the trash, and you are not at the mercy of the bottled water companies who often charge a lot for a natural resource.

3. Eat nutrient-dense, organic food. Get less pesticides; get more nutrition. And we don't mean go buy organic pretzels and cookies. Buy organic vegetables, and organic meats and dairy – grass fed if you can afford it. If you're eating non-organic celery today, you may be ingesting 67 pesticides with it (EWG). Fruits and vegetables are one of your biggest exposure risks to chemicals and pesticides.

"To the extent you can afford to do so, [parents] should simply buy organic, because there have been some very good studies that shows people who eat mostly organic food reduce 95 percent of pesticides [in their body] in two weeks," said Dr. Philip Landrigan, chairman of the department of preventive medicine at Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York. "A kid's brain goes through extraordinary development, and if pesticides get into the brain, it can cause damage."[54]

Vegetarians argue that eating fish, meat, and dairy increases the risk of heavy metal contamination. But that argument overlooks that fruits, vegetables, legumes, nuts and seeds are easily contaminated by heavy metals in top soil and air. Meat contains amino acids, natural chelators, and vitamin B12 (after about seven years of B12 deficiency, irreversible brain damage can result.) Eat butter, olive oil, and coconut oil – not man-made, processed vegetable oils which are inflammatory.

While you are at it, ditch the soda, the "energy" drinks, the flavored waters, the mocha lattes. There's lots of money in this for the multi-national companies, but there is no redeeming value in this stuff for you. You don't need the caffeine, the sugar, the high fructose corn syrup, the aspartame, the Splenda, the benzene, the phosphoric acid, etc. Your bones will thank you, your liver will thank you, your brain will thank you – what more could you ask? Oh, wait, there is one more. You'll love the money you save.

4. Clean up the cosmetics and household products. You will spend a little more buying organic cosmetics, but you can save big on the household products. One of the best germ killers and degreasers is distilled white vinegar. It's cheap, and it doesn't create superbugs as triclosan can. Its natural acidity kills germs. We recommend the Heinz brand – it is made from corn; other brands of distilled white vinegar are made from petroleum products. (And it doesn't matter if it is genetically modified corn; you're not eating it.)

Butyl cellosolve is the principal ingredient in many household cleaners; the Material Safety Data Sheet says acute conditions include irritation of eyes, skin, lungs, headaches, dizziness, nausea, diarrhea; chronic conditions include damage to liver, kidney, and skin. You can avoid this toxic chemical and many others by reading labels.

You can get cleaning products without ammonia (poisonous), pine oil (irritant), glycol ethers (used in countertop cleaners; can cause liver and kidney damage, as well as nervous disorders), formaldehyde (used as a preservative; a suspected carcinogen, inhalation extremely destructive to mucous membrane tissue), paradichlorobenzene (used in toilet bowl cleaners, causes cancer in laboratory animals), parabens (an inexpensive preservative used in liquid soaps and cosmetics; found in breast cancer tissue), and mineral acids (such as muriatic acid used in pools or phosphoric or hydrochloric acids which clean well but are toxic).

5. Read up on formaldehyde. It is classified as a known carcinogen and has been linked to cancers of the throat, blood, and lymphatic system. It irritates the nasal and respiratory passages. Formaldehyde is a common chemical found in everything from plywood to nail polish, car exhaust and cigarette smoke. It's part of the "new car" smell. It is in room air fresheners to deaden your sense of smell. It bestows permanent-press qualities to clothing and draperies. It is put into glues and adhesives, and used as a preservative in some paints and coating products. And yes, it's the same stuff morticians use to embalm people and the toxin that made those Katrina trailers infamous. The Campaign for Safe Cosmetics found formaldehyde in bath products. When you buy particle board furniture, you can block the offgassing of formaldehyde by brushing the exposed ends with a sealer (easy to use).

Need a handout on triclosan to take to your children’s school so they switch to something better? Beyond Pesticides has one.

6. Read labels. If you can't pronounce the ingredients, question if you should buy the item. For example: a popular sales tool is to play on the fear of germs. Thus antimicrobials are popular in hand soaps, dish soaps, etc., but we overuse them, just as we did antibiotics, and we are breeding resistant super-bugs. Look for the small print on a variety of everyday products: Colgate Total toothpastes, Clearasil Pimple Treatment Cream, and Right Guard Sport Deodorant all contain triclosan, according to EWG.

EWG surveyed 3,300 parents in 2007 asking what products they use and compared the ingredients to lists of chemicals know to cause allergies, hormone disruption, damage to the nervous system, and cancer. The study found 89% of products labeled "recommended by a doctor" actually contain what EWG considers dangerous chemicals.[55]

EWG's top 7 chemicals of concern for kids:

1. 2-Bromo-2-Nitropropane-1,3 Diol (creates allergy and skin irritation and in certain products it can break down to form cancer causing agents)
2. BHA (a food preservative)
3. Boric acid and sodium borate
4. Dibutyl phthalate & toluene
5. DMDM Hydantoin (can break down into formaldehyde)
6. Oxybenzone (suntan lotions)
7. Triclosan (antimicrobial)

Phthalates most commonly show up on labels as DEP (diethyl phthalate) and MEP (monoethyl phthalate).



7. Wise up to electrosmog. Two years ago when we walked into the cell phone store and asked about the SARs rating (Specific Absorption Rate), the sales staff pretended not to know what we were talking about – talking about radiation emissions implied liability. But now the city of San Francisco requires the SARs rating to be displayed on each cell phone sold. The SARs rating is far from perfect, but it's a great start on building awareness that cell phones expose us to dangerous radiation. We have encased ourselves in a net of electronic signals 24/7 and those pulsating signals don't vibrate on at the same frequency as the energy signals our cells use to repair and regenerate our bodies.

8. Avoid medical and security imaging – PET scans, CT scans, annual mammograms, airport x-ray scanners. Radiation causes cancer. We Americans get the most medical radiation in the world. The average American's dose has grown sixfold over the last couple of decades. The risk of cancer is growing because people in everyday situations are getting imaging tests far too often. The use of CT scans – "super X-rays" that give fast, extremely detailed images – have soared in use over the last decade, often replacing tests that don't require radiation, such as ultrasound and MRI, or magnetic resonance imaging.[56] Doctors don't keep track of radiation given their patients – they order a test, not a dose. Now airports are installing x-ray scanners at security checkpoints. You don't feel the radiation, so you don't think about it. But do think about it. Ask the doctor if there is another option. Choose thermography over mammography (it's a better screening test anyway). And choose the manual pat-down at the airport.

9. Beware of too much medicine. Legal medications like painkillers and sedatives send as many Americans to emergency rooms each year as hardcore street drugs. Vioxx killed some 60,000 people. Drugs to treat mental disorders, and statins, are the largest selling drugs in America, but they are notoriously ineffective long term and come with some very nasty side effects. Pharmacies filled almost 4 billion prescriptions in 2009. Drugs don't solve biological dysfunction; they generally poison a system so the body cannot produce certain symptoms of dysfunction.

In 2003, Gary Null and Dr. Carolyn Dean looked at all the peer-reviewed statistics available at the time and found that the American medical system is the leading cause of death and injury in the United States. Their landmark paper "Death by Medicine" documented unnecessary procedures and drugs used in hospitals.

In 2006, the Institute of Medicine concluded that at least 1.5 million Americans are sickened, injured or killed each year by errors in prescribing, dispensing and taking medications. Mistakes in giving drugs are so prevalent in hospitals that, on average, a patient will be subjected to a medication error each day he or she occupies a hospital bed. "Everyone in the health-care system knows this is a major problem, but there's been very little action, and it's generally remained on the back burner," panel member Charles B. Inlander said.[57]

Did we mention that hospital-acquired infections, MRSA, killed 48,000 Americans in 2006?[58]

10. Ditch the perfume, scented candles, scented laundry soaps and softeners, air fresheners, car fresheners, and fake fire place logs. They are loaded with synthetic chemicals that add greatly to indoor air pollution.

Education and Choices

The next time you are in a public place, look around. Notice how many people are overweight, not walking easily. Notice how the kids have changed – more allergies and asthma, more developmental disabilities, more overweight, and growing up faster biologically. Notice the news stories about the rising rates of infertility, diabetes, and cancers. Along with poor nutrition, too many chemicals in our environment – especially estrogen mimickers and heavy metals – have changed our society.

We all have the ability to lessen our body burden of chemical toxicity. We can learn how to reduce our intake of pesticides, hormone-mimicking chemicals, and the like. We can lessen the have metals already stowed in our bodies by doing a heavy metal detox.

Most of all, we can see that we have some control over our lives, and our health. We can be proactive.

---