No longer. There aren't enough boys.

This community, surrounded by dozens of pollution-spewing chemical plants, is an especially extreme example of a puzzling phenomenon playing out across the world, in countries as diverse as the United States, Sweden and Japan.

Though more boys are being born than girls in most places, their numbers are falling. And no one is sure why.

The change is small, but real. In the U.S., the number of baby boys vs. girls has been declining since 1970, translating into 17 fewer males for every 10,000 births or an estimated 135,000 fewer boys born between 1970 and 2002, according to a study last year in Environmental Health Perspectives.

Some experts suggest the shift is part of a naturally occurring, cyclical pattern in population dynamics. But others think a notable change is under way, driven by factors such as environmental contaminants and various types of stress, such as economic hardship.

These issues could affect boys more because they're actually the weaker sex _ more vulnerable than girls to illness and death from conception to grave.

Nature's way of compensating is to produce more males than females, increasing the likelihood that the sexes will survive to reproductive age in equal numbers. But recent decades have eroded the gap between the sexes.

The difference may seem tiny, but "it's important to look at the really big picture here, which is that there are global indications that something unusual is going on," said Devra Davis, director of the Center for Environmental Oncology at the University of Pittsburgh and lead author of last year's report.

The sex ratio is an indicator of population health, and unexpected changes could be an important signal that people are at risk biologically, she said.

Several Latin American nations have reported a similar shift in the sex ratio at birth, as have Finland, Norway, Wales and the Netherlands. Late last year, several Arctic communities documented a startling decline in the number of boys being born. Studies have shown changing sex ratios in Italian cities and among fish-eating women in the Great Lakes region.

None of these countries or areas has a tradition of sex selection, which in any case usually favors boys.

The puzzling phenomenon has inspired a flurry of research on what could be causing the population shifts. Davis' hypothesis is that "there is something happening after conception that is making it harder for boys to exist in the maternal fetal environment."

A growing body of research indicates that could include exposure to pollutants such as pesticides, mercury, lead and dioxin. More controversial is the idea that synthetic chemicals known as endocrine-disrupters may be damaging male fetuses during critical periods of development or affecting men's sperm counts and testosterone levels.

That thesis is "very interesting and provocative" but hasn't been proved, said Dr. Rebecca Sokol, past president of the Society of Male Reproduction and Urology.

The steepest sex ratio declines observed in the world have occurred on the 3,000-acre Aamjiwnaang (AH-jih-nahng) First Nation reservation in Canada.

The number of boys vs. girls there began dropping in the early 1990s, according to data published in 2005 in Environmental Health Perspectives. Between 1999 and 2003, researchers found, only 46 boys were born out of 132 recorded births.

"You get angry and you get worried, thinking what could be causing this," said Ada Lockridge, a member of the tribe who compiled the data and has since become an activist. "And then you want to learn more."

Dozens of petrochemical, polymer and chemical plants surround the reservation on three sides. Mercury and PCBs contaminate the creek that runs through the land, and air-quality studies show the highest toxic releases in all of Canada, said Jim Brophy, executive director of Occupational Health Clinics for Ontario Workers, based in Sarnia, the nearest city.

Several months ago, Brophy and co-worker Margaret Keith did additional calculations, finding that boys made up only 42 percent of the 171 babies born from 2001 to 2005 to Aamjiwnaang living on the reserve or nearby.

"A disruption in the sex ratio of this magnitude has to be taken seriously," Brophy said.

Still, there is no proof that pollution is responsible, and data from surrounding Lambton County don't show a similar impact. The findings represent a "short period of time and a small population" and require further study, said Dean Edwardson, general manager of the Sarnia-Lambton Environmental Association, which represents area industry.

Experts note that other factors might include diet, alcohol use, smoking and occupational exposures.

Indeed, there's strong evidence from other areas that men exposed in the workplace to pesticides, lead and solvents and in industrial accidents to toxic substances such as dioxin end up fathering fewer boys.

When a July 1976 chemical plant explosion in Seveso, Italy sent a cloud of dioxin over the area, researchers discovered that no boys were born for seven years to parents who had the highest levels of the toxin in their blood.

In another study, men exposed to the pesticide dibromochloropropane fathered three times as many daughters as expected.

Some evidence also suggests stress can reduce the motility or viability of Y-bearing sperm, reducing the likelihood that boys will be conceived. This may help explain why fewer boys are born after natural disasters such as earthquakes and floods _ a finding well documented in the scientific literature.

Moms are thought to have a different set of responses to stress, which also could favor girls over boys.

When pregnant women struggle with adverse circumstances _ economic hardship, poor food supply _ a biological mechanism that "culls" weak male fetuses may be inadvertently deployed, said Ralph Catalano, a professor of public health at the University of California, Berkeley.

From an evolutionary standpoint, this would make sense, since boys require more parental effort to raise while also dying at a higher rate, Catalano explained. When times are tough, it's more advantageous to give birth to a girl, he said.

Among Catalano's thought-provoking findings: The number of boys born in New York City relative to girls fell significantly after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

That result, reported in 2006 in the journal Human Reproduction, applied primarily to women in their second trimester at the time of the attacks. In the paper, Catalano suggests that "fetal response to maternal stressors appears strongest in the second half of gestation" and "mothers may use that response as a test of male fetal robustness."

Separately, in 2003 Catalano reported that the proportion of boys born in East Germany dropped sharply in 1991, when that nation's economy collapsed.

The world's leading expert on the science of sex ratios, William H. James, who spent his career at University College in London, offers another possible explanation: Hormones in both parents at the time of conception affect the sex of offspring.

Higher levels of testosterone and estrogen are associated with the birth of sons, James says, while elevated levels of gonadotropins and progesterone are associated with daughters. These hormones are internally regulated but also are subject to external influences such as alcohol, cigarette smoke, radiation, chemicals, and illnesses in parents.

A spinoff of the theory is the notion that the timing of conception can help determine the sex of offspring because hormone levels fluctuate during a woman's fertile period.

James observed that women who conceive early or late in their fertile periods are more likely to have boys. Couples who have lots of sex have a higher probability of bearing sons, he concluded, because they're more likely to conceive early on, he concluded.

This ties in to the stress hypothesis: If adults have less sex when enduring adversity, then they'd be less likely to conceive male children.

Another notable finding conforms to James' research: Women receiving ovary-stimulating drugs (including gonadotropins) during assisted reproduction give birth to more girls.

On the Aamjiwnaang reservation, it took people a while to recognize the trend toward fewer boys. Families were more concerned about how many babies they were losing: The miscarriage rate for women on the reservation is about 40 percent, much higher than Ontario's average.

Even when there were three girls' baseball teams and only one boys' team, "people just thought there were girls running in their families," Lockridge said.

It still isn't a subject that people talk about much, said Stephanie Stone, 37, who lives on the reservation with her husband, Paul, and three young daughters.

Stone has an 18-year-old son from a previous marriage but said "it hurts my heart" that she hasn't been able to have another. "We have tried and tried to have a baby boy," she said.

WASHINGTON, Apr. 15, 2008 (Reuters) — A chemical in some plastic food and drink packaging including baby bottles may be tied to early puberty and prostate and breast cancer, the U.S. government said on Tuesday.

Based on draft findings by the National Toxicology Program, part of the U.S. National Institutes of Health, senior congressional Democrats asked the Food and Drug Administration to reconsider its view that the chemical bisphenol A is safe in products for use by infants and children.

The chemical, also called BPA, is used in many baby bottles and the plastic lining of cans of infant formula.

The National Toxicology Program went further than previous U.S. government statements on possible health risks from BPA.

It said: "There is some concern for neural and behavioral effects in fetuses, infants and children at current human exposures." The findings expressed concern about exposure in these populations, "based on effects in the prostate gland, mammary gland, and an earlier age for puberty in females."

Rep. John Dingell, a Michigan Democrat and chairman of the House of Representatives Energy and Commerce Committee, said the draft cast doubt on the FDA's position that BPA was safe.

"I hope the FDA is willing to reconsider their position on BPA for the safety of our infants and children," he said.

The National Toxicology Program said laboratory rodents exposed to BPA levels similar to human exposures developed precancerous lesions in the prostate and mammary glands, among other things.

"The possibility that bisphenol A may impact human development cannot be dismissed. More research is needed," the agency said.

Bisphenol A is used in the production of polycarbonate plastics and epoxy resins and can be found in food and drink packaging as well as compact discs and some medical devices. Some dental sealants or composites contain it as well.

The National Toxicology Program expressed "negligible concern" that exposure of pregnant women to BPA causes fetal or neonatal death, birth defects or reduced birth weight and growth in babies. It also had "negligible concern" that exposure causes reproductive problems in adults.

The American Chemistry Council industry group said the conclusions confirmed that human exposure to bisphenol A is extremely low and noted no direct evidence that exposure adversely affects reproduction or development in humans.

In Canada, the Globe and Mail newspaper said the Canadian health ministry was ready to declare BPA a dangerous substance, making it the first regulatory body in the world to reach such a determination. The newspaper said the ministry could announce the decision as soon as Wednesday.

Environmental activists long have warned about health concerns regarding the chemical. They praised the draft findings of the National Toxicology Program, which cited more potential worries about the chemical than did a panel of experts that advised the program last year.

"NTP's decision corrects the scientific record. It reflects a significant body of science showing that BPA may play a larger role than previously thought in a host of common health problems," Anila Jacob of the Environmental Working Group said in a statement.

The number of hyperactive children could be cut by a third by banning suspect food additives, it is claimed today.

The finding by British scientists will put pressure on the Food Standards Agency to force manufacturers to stop using the "E-number" chemicals.

The researchers believe that removing artificial colours from children's foods, including cakes, drinks and sweets, would bring significant health and social benefits.

Thousands of children would avoid the blight on their education caused by hyperactive behaviour, which can mean they are labelled slow and disruptive.

Removing the chemicals could also help reduce anti-social behaviour in teenagers, according to the researchers from the University of Southampton, led by Professor Jim Stevenson.

The scientists believe the harm caused to the IQ of youngsters is equivalent to the damaging impact of lead on developing brains.

They say just as efforts were made to protect children against lead poisoning years ago, there is "justification for action now" on food colours.

They are frustrated at the lack of action to tackle the harm to children posed by food additives and are calling on the board of the Food Standards Agency (FSA), which is meeting today, to take bold measures to ban them.

The Southampton team calculates that some 6.6 per cent of children aged three to 12, a total of 462,000, suffer from Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD). The academics believe this figure could be reduced by 30 per cent - around 140,000 - if the additives were banned.

Professor Stevenson and his team discovered that food chemicals caused "psychological harm" to normal healthy children.

Two groups of children showed changes in behaviour when given the additives during controlled trials. They found it hard to sit still and concentrate, they had problems reading and became loud and impulsive.

Professor Stevenson said: "We now have clear evidence that mixtures of certain food colours can adversely influence the behaviour of children.

"We know that hyperactivity in young child is a risk factor for, for example, later difficulties in school. Certainly it is associated with difficulties in learning to read.

"It is also associated with wider behavioural difficulties in middle childhood, such as conduct disorder.

"I feel that the effects we are seeing here are sufficiently great to represent a threat to health."

The Southampton team has sent a report to the FSA board, which argues that a significant number of children could be prevented from developing ADHD if the additives are removed.

Children who are diagnosed with ADHD can find their entire school careers and lives suffer as a result. The report warns: "Elevated levels of hyperactivity in young children represent a risk for continuing behaviour problems into later childhood.

"It should also be recognised that children with elevated levels of hyperactivity can be disruptive to a family and are sometimes socially isolated because peers find their behaviour unsettling."

Last month the Government announced a task force to concentrate on improving the behaviour of 1,000 particularly disruptive young people.

The Southampton team say: "It is a Government policy priority to reduce the level of disruptive behaviour by young people. We suggest... the removal of food colours might be a small, indirect contribution to such a goal."

The suspect colours are tartrazine (E102); quinoline yellow (E104); sunset yellow (E110); carmoisine (E122); ponceau 4R (E124); and allura red (E129).

The FSA, an independent department of the Government, suggests there should be a voluntary ban by UK manufacturers by the end of 2009. The board is also expected to advise parents concerned by the Southampton study that they "might choose" not to give their children products containing the chemicals.

The Food Commission has set up a website - actiononadditives.com - which lists more than 900 products containing the chemicals.

The Daily Mail launched the "Ban the Additives" campaign to encourage manufacturers and supermarkets to remove the chemicals from their recipes.

This has achieved support from all the major supermarkets and pledges from firms such as Cadburys and Mars UK to remove them.

A ban on the suspect additives will change the look of familiar foods.

The green colour of mushy peas is created by tartrazine, and quinoline yellow produces the green colour in lime cordial and green Tic-Tacs.

The vivid colour of Turkish Delight is largely the result of the suspect dye allura red.

Natural alternatives to these food colours are being produced and some companies, including Sainsbury's and Asda, already have new lines on their shelves.

Sainsbury's has created a natural lime cordial, while Asda has taken tartrazine out of its tinned peas.

BY ROBERT McCLURE
Seattle Post-Intelligencer
April 7, 2008

SEATTLE -- In his backyard in Seattle, Nikos Anton spotted a house sparrow that seemed to be toting a twig in its beak.

But when he looked a little closer, Anton saw the "stick" was actually the grotesquely misshapen and overgrown top half of the bird's beak.

But when he looked a little closer, Anton saw the "stick" was actually the grotesquely misshapen and overgrown top half of the bird's beak.

"It's like an elephant trunk.," he said, pointing to his pictures of the bird. "It's a very odd thing happening here in Seattle."

But it's not just here.

This "long-billed syndrome" has been recorded in about 160 birds, mostly in western Washington and southern British Columbia and mostly since 2000. It's also documented in more than 2,100 birds in Alaska, where the deformity seems to have started affecting lots of birds in the early 1990s.

Researchers say the weird beaks appear to be concentrated in Alaska and the Pacific Northwest, although reports are coming in from farther south -- from Southern California in one recent case.

The cause remains a mystery. A small band of puzzled, poorly funded scientists is scrambling to find answers. Could it be chemicals? Something genetic? A disease? Maybe a combination?

Could it affect humans?

Whatever the cause, researchers are left profoundly unsettled by the mysterious "long-billed syndrome."

"It's really tragic," said Bud Anderson of the Falcon Research Group, based in Skagit County, Wash. "It's grotesque. It's horrible. It makes me want to puke."

BAD BEAKS LEAD TO HUNGER, DEATH

Researchers are asking the public to report sightings of any such birds so they can get a better feel for the extent of the phenomenon.

When affected birds are brought into wildlife-rehabilitation centers, their feathers often are dirty and matted, because a misshapen beak inhibits preening. For the same reason, they often are infested with feather lice.

And sometimes they're starving. Birds need to eat a lot every day, and they use their beaks much as we would use our hands. So what rehab centers are often left with is a dirty, cold, hungry and miserable bird. Many die.

"Who knows how many have died out in the field?" Anderson said. When Anderson first noticed long-billed birds in Western Washington in the late 1990s, the deformities were more pronounced, he said. Now, it looks like more birds are affected, but not quite as badly.

In Alaska, the majority of birds affected are black-capped chickadees. But the syndrome has been seen in at least 28 other species there, including starlings, Steller's jays, magpies, robins and sparrows.

Most affected birds in western Washington are red-tailed hawks. Second on the list are crows. Others include the sparrow, black-capped chickadees, Steller jays, northern flickers and a raven. Also involved are a variety of songbirds, including woodpeckers, wrens and seabirds, including gulls and one common murre.

Birds' beaks are made of keratin, similar to human fingernails and hair. Normally, beaks wear down with use, continuing to grow at the same time. There's a balance. But something is causing this super-fast growth -- and it doesn't get turned off.

EXPLORING THE CHEMICAL LINK

In Alaska, where the phenomenon is best studied, birds can go from normal to long-beaked in as little as a month. Sometimes the misshapen beaks break off, but they grow back right away.

Researchers wonder: Why just the beaks? Why not the birds' toenails, which also are made of keratin?

So far, there is no evidence the deformities are caused by disease -- including infections, bacteria and viruses -- or parasites. But researchers are pursuing those ideas, as well as chemicals.

Beak deformities have been seen in individual birds here and there for a long time. In fact, Anderson found an ivory-billed woodpecker shot and stuffed in Cuba in 1843, now residing in an Atlanta museum, that had the longest such beak ever seen -- about 18 inches long, the "first and the worst" case, Anderson said.

And when researchers last year asked bird watchers to keep an eye out across North America, they got a handful of reports.

"We are picking up birds across the rest of the continent, but nothing like the magnitude we've seen here," said Colleen Handel, a U.S. Geological Survey biologist heading up the studies in Alaska. Now, "It looks like the entire (Northwest) Pacific Coast is being affected."

Research has shown scientists that:

• A study of black-capped chickadees in Alaska showed "significantly higher" concentrations of a pesticide breakdown product, heptachlor epoxide, in adults with beak deformities than in normal adults. The same goes for a form of polychlorinated biphenyl, PCB, an industrial chemical.

• Baby birds from deformed parents in Alaska had higher concentrations of two of the most toxic forms of PCBs.

• Beak deformities were a feature of a syndrome that affected birds in the Great Lakes area in the 1970s that was associated with exposure to contaminants, including PCBs, dioxins and dibenzofurans. The same thing happened to birds exposed to high concentrations of selenium in California in the 1980s.

• However, unlike the previous outbreaks, the birds in Alaska, at least, do not seem to be passing the deformity from parents to children. But that hasn't been determined conclusively.

• The Alaska chickadees with the deformity had a "highly significant" amount of damage to their DNA.

NO RECOGNIZABLE PATTERN

Scientists know that a vitamin D deficiency has caused beak overgrowth in domestic parrots. Maybe birds in the Northwest and Alaska don't get enough vitamin D from sunlight? But that's something that's been going on forever.

"Why suddenly now, here?" Handel said.

Likewise, there are reasons to think this isn't a simple case of chemicals causing the defects, said Chuck Henny, a wildlife ecologist with the Geological Survey in Corvallis, Ore.

"In general, these pesticides, their residues have been going down over time," Henny said.

Plus, the fact that pesticides were used everywhere "argues against that being a major factor. (This) seems like it's something that's local or regional," Henny said.

When the defects first came to light in an Anchorage neighborhood where pesticides had been sprayed to kill an outbreak of spruce beetles, scientists focused on the poisons. But these birds have turned up far from any obvious human influence. Even chickadees, which generally live all their lives in a single contained area, have been discovered with the weird beaks way out in the wilderness.

One class of chemicals that researchers know has been accumulating in increasing amounts in humans in North America at the same time the beaks phenomenon appeared is polybrominated diphenyl ethers, PBDEs. But again, what explains the concentration in Alaska and the Northwest? PBDEs are used everywhere.

Researchers are still trying to make sure they understand the extent of the problem. That's why they are asking the public to notify them about any long-billed birds.

"They see it and think, 'Oh, how unusual,' not realizing it's part of a much bigger problem," Anderson said. Invariably, when he gives talks on this, a number of people in the audience tell him they've seen such birds.

"People see this and they say 'How odd,' and they tell a few people and forget about it," Anderson said.

Two veteran U.S. senators said Monday they plan to hold hearings in response to an Associated Press investigation into the presence of trace amounts of pharmaceuticals in the drinking water supplies of at least 41 million Americans.

Also, U.S. Rep. Allyson Schwartz, D-Pa., has asked the EPA to establish a national task force to investigate the issue and make recommendations to Congress on any legislative actions needed.

Sen. Barbara Boxer, who heads the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, and Sen. Frank Lautenberg, chairman of the Transportation, Safety, Infrastructure Security and Water Quality Subcommittee, said the oversight hearings would likely be held in April.

Boxer, D-Calif., said she was "alarmed at the news" that pharmaceuticals are turning up in the nation's drinking water, while Lautenberg, a New Jersey Democrat who said he was "deeply concerned" by the AP findings, both represent states where pharmaceuticals had been detected in drinking water supplies, but not disclosed to the public.

"I call on the EPA to take whatever steps are necessary to keep our communities safe," said Boxer in a statement.

Added Lautenberg, whose subcommittee has jurisdiction over drinking water issues: "Our families deserve water that is clean and safe. Our hearing will examine these problems and help ensure the EPA and Congress take the steps necessary to protect our residents and clean up our water supply."

EPA spokesman Timothy Lyons said the agency is "committed to keeping the nation's water supply clean, safe and the best in the world. We encourage all Americans to be responsible when disposing of prescription drugs."

The Lautenberg-Boxer announcement came just 24 hours after the AP's release of the first installment of its three-part series, titled PharmaWater.

The five-month-long inquiry by the AP National Investigative Team found that while water is screened for drugs by some suppliers, they usually don't tell their customers that they have found medication in it, including antibiotics, anti-convulsants, mood stabilizers and sex hormones.

The series shows how drugs - mostly the residue of medications taken by people, excreted and flushed down the toilet - have gotten into the water supplies of at least 24 major metropolitan areas, from Southern California to northern New Jersey. The stories also detail the growing concerns among scientists that this pollution has adversely affected wildlife, and may threaten human health.

In a letter to EPA administrator Stephen Johnson, Schwartz said, "Like many Pennsylvanians, I was especially taken aback by the finding of 56 different pharmaceuticals discovered in the drinking water for the City of Philadelphia.. . . The Associated Press report raises serious questions about the safety and security of America's water system."

A vast array of pharmaceuticals - including antibiotics, anti-convulsants, mood stabilizers and sex hormones - have been found in the drinking water supplies of at least 41 million Americans, an Associated Press investigation shows.

To be sure, the concentrations of these pharmaceuticals are tiny, measured in quantities of parts per billion or trillion, far below the levels of a medical dose. Also, utilities insist their water is safe.

But the presence of so many prescription drugs - and over-the-counter medicines like acetaminophen and ibuprofen - in so much of our drinking water is heightening worries among scientists of long-term consequences to human health.

In the course of a five-month inquiry, the AP discovered that drugs have been detected in the drinking water supplies of 24 major metropolitan areas - from Southern California to Northern New Jersey, from Detroit to Louisville, Ky.

Water providers rarely disclose results of pharmaceutical screenings, unless pressed, the AP found. For example, the head of a group representing major California suppliers said the public "doesn't know how to interpret the information" and might be unduly alarmed.

How do the drugs get into the water?

People take pills. Their bodies absorb some of the medication, but the rest of it passes through and is flushed down the toilet. The wastewater is treated before it is discharged into reservoirs, rivers or lakes. Then, some of the water is cleansed again at drinking water treatment plants and piped to consumers. But most treatments do not remove all drug residue.

And while researchers do not yet understand the exact risks from decades of persistent exposure to random combinations of low levels of pharmaceuticals, recent studies - which have gone virtually unnoticed by the general public - have found alarming effects on human cells and wildlife.

"We recognize it is a growing concern and we're taking it very seriously," said Benjamin H. Grumbles, assistant administrator for water at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

Members of the AP National Investigative Team reviewed hundreds of scientific reports, analyzed federal drinking water databases, visited environmental study sites and treatment plants and interviewed more than 230 officials, academics and scientists. They also surveyed the nation's 50 largest cities and a dozen other major water providers, as well as smaller community water providers in all 50 states.

Here are some of the key test results obtained by the AP:

-Officials in Philadelphia said testing there discovered 56 pharmaceuticals or byproducts in treated drinking water, including medicines for pain, infection, high cholesterol, asthma, epilepsy, mental illness and heart problems. Sixty-three pharmaceuticals or byproducts were found in the city's watersheds.

-Anti-epileptic and anti-anxiety medications were detected in a portion of the treated drinking water for 18.5 million people in Southern California.

-Researchers at the U.S. Geological Survey analyzed a Passaic Valley Water Commission drinking water treatment plant, which serves 850,000 people in Northern New Jersey, and found a metabolized angina medicine and the mood-stabilizing carbamazepine in drinking water.

-A sex hormone was detected in San Francisco's drinking water.

-The drinking water for Washington, D.C., and surrounding areas tested positive for six pharmaceuticals.

-Three medications, including an antibiotic, were found in drinking water supplied to Tucson, Ariz.

The situation is undoubtedly worse than suggested by the positive test results in the major population centers documented by the AP.

The federal government doesn't require any testing and hasn't set safety limits for drugs in water. Of the 62 major water providers contacted, the drinking water for only 28 was tested. Among the 34 that haven't: Houston, Chicago, Miami, Baltimore, Phoenix, Boston and New York City's Department of Environmental Protection, which delivers water to 9 million people.

Some providers screen only for one or two pharmaceuticals, leaving open the possibility that others are present.

The AP's investigation also indicates that watersheds, the natural sources of most of the nation's water supply, also are contaminated. Tests were conducted in the watersheds of 35 of the 62 major providers surveyed by the AP, and pharmaceuticals were detected in 28.

Yet officials in six of those 28 metropolitan areas said they did not go on to test their drinking water - Fairfax, Va.; Montgomery County in Maryland; Omaha, Neb.; Oklahoma City; Santa Clara, Calif., and New York City.

The New York state health department and the USGS tested the source of the city's water, upstate. They found trace concentrations of heart medicine, infection fighters, estrogen, anti-convulsants, a mood stabilizer and a tranquilizer.

City water officials declined repeated requests for an interview. In a statement, they insisted that "New York City's drinking water continues to meet all federal and state regulations regarding drinking water quality in the watershed and the distribution system" - regulations that do not address trace pharmaceuticals.

In several cases, officials at municipal or regional water providers told the AP that pharmaceuticals had not been detected, but the AP obtained the results of tests conducted by independent researchers that showed otherwise. For example, water department officials in New Orleans said their water had not been tested for pharmaceuticals, but a Tulane University researcher and his students have published a study that found the pain reliever naproxen, the sex hormone estrone and the anti-cholesterol drug byproduct clofibric acid in treated drinking water.

Of the 28 major metropolitan areas where tests were performed on drinking water supplies, only Albuquerque; Austin, Texas; and Virginia Beach, Va.; said tests were negative. The drinking water in Dallas has been tested, but officials are awaiting results. Arlington, Texas, acknowledged that traces of a pharmaceutical were detected in its drinking water but cited post-9/11 security concerns in refusing to identify the drug.

The AP also contacted 52 small water providers - one in each state, and two each in Missouri and Texas - that serve communities with populations around 25,000. All but one said their drinking water had not been screened for pharmaceuticals; officials in Emporia, Kan., refused to answer AP's questions, also citing post-9/11 issues.

Rural consumers who draw water from their own wells aren't in the clear either, experts say.

The Stroud Water Research Center, in Avondale, Pa., has measured water samples from New York City's upstate watershed for caffeine, a common contaminant that scientists often look for as a possible signal for the presence of other pharmaceuticals. Though more caffeine was detected at suburban sites, researcher Anthony Aufdenkampe was struck by the relatively high levels even in less populated areas.

He suspects it escapes from failed septic tanks, maybe with other drugs. "Septic systems are essentially small treatment plants that are essentially unmanaged and therefore tend to fail," Aufdenkampe said.

Even users of bottled water and home filtration systems don't necessarily avoid exposure. Bottlers, some of which simply repackage tap water, do not typically treat or test for pharmaceuticals, according to the industry's main trade group. The same goes for the makers of home filtration systems.

Contamination is not confined to the United States. More than 100 different pharmaceuticals have been detected in lakes, rivers, reservoirs and streams throughout the world. Studies have detected pharmaceuticals in waters throughout Asia, Australia, Canada and Europe - even in Swiss lakes and the North Sea.

For example, in Canada, a study of 20 Ontario drinking water treatment plants by a national research institute found nine different drugs in water samples. Japanese health officials in December called for human health impact studies after detecting prescription drugs in drinking water at seven different sites.

In the United States, the problem isn't confined to surface waters. Pharmaceuticals also permeate aquifers deep underground, source of 40 percent of the nation's water supply. Federal scientists who drew water in 24 states from aquifers near contaminant sources such as landfills and animal feed lots found minuscule levels of hormones, antibiotics and other drugs.

Perhaps it's because Americans have been taking drugs - and flushing them unmetabolized or unused - in growing amounts. Over the past five years, the number of U.S. prescriptions rose 12 percent to a record 3.7 billion, while nonprescription drug purchases held steady around 3.3 billion, according to IMS Health and The Nielsen Co.

"People think that if they take a medication, their body absorbs it and it disappears, but of course that's not the case," said EPA scientist Christian Daughton, one of the first to draw attention to the issue of pharmaceuticals in water in the United States.

Some drugs, including widely used cholesterol fighters, tranquilizers and anti-epileptic medications, resist modern drinking water and wastewater treatment processes. Plus, the EPA says there are no sewage treatment systems specifically engineered to remove pharmaceuticals.

One technology, reverse osmosis, removes virtually all pharmaceutical contaminants but is very expensive for large-scale use and leaves several gallons of polluted water for every one that is made drinkable.

Another issue: There's evidence that adding chlorine, a common process in conventional drinking water treatment plants, makes some pharmaceuticals more toxic.

Human waste isn't the only source of contamination. Cattle, for example, are given ear implants that provide a slow release of trenbolone, an anabolic steroid used by some bodybuilders, which causes cattle to bulk up. But not all the trenbolone circulating in a steer is metabolized. A German study showed 10 percent of the steroid passed right through the animals.

Water sampled downstream of a Nebraska feedlot had steroid levels four times as high as the water taken upstream. Male fathead minnows living in that downstream area had low testosterone levels and small heads.

Other veterinary drugs also play a role. Pets are now treated for arthritis, cancer, heart disease, diabetes, allergies, dementia, and even obesity - sometimes with the same drugs as humans. The inflation-adjusted value of veterinary drugs rose by 8 percent, to $5.2 billion, over the past five years, according to an analysis of data from the Animal Health Institute.

Ask the pharmaceutical industry whether the contamination of water supplies is a problem, and officials will tell you no. "Based on what we now know, I would say we find there's little or no risk from pharmaceuticals in the environment to human health," said microbiologist Thomas White, a consultant for the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America.

But at a conference last summer, Mary Buzby - director of environmental technology for drug maker Merck & Co. Inc. - said: "There's no doubt about it, pharmaceuticals are being detected in the environment and there is genuine concern that these compounds, in the small concentrations that they're at, could be causing impacts to human health or to aquatic organisms."

Recent laboratory research has found that small amounts of medication have affected human embryonic kidney cells, human blood cells and human breast cancer cells. The cancer cells proliferated too quickly; the kidney cells grew too slowly; and the blood cells showed biological activity associated with inflammation.

Also, pharmaceuticals in waterways are damaging wildlife across the nation and around the globe, research shows. Notably, male fish are being feminized, creating egg yolk proteins, a process usually restricted to females. Pharmaceuticals also are affecting sentinel species at the foundation of the pyramid of life - such as earth worms in the wild and zooplankton in the laboratory, studies show.

Some scientists stress that the research is extremely limited, and there are too many unknowns. They say, though, that the documented health problems in wildlife are disconcerting.

"It brings a question to people's minds that if the fish were affected ... might there be a potential problem for humans?" EPA research biologist Vickie Wilson told the AP. "It could be that the fish are just exquisitely sensitive because of their physiology or something. We haven't gotten far enough along."

With limited research funds, said Shane Snyder, research and development project manager at the Southern Nevada Water Authority, a greater emphasis should be put on studying the effects of drugs in water.

"I think it's a shame that so much money is going into monitoring to figure out if these things are out there, and so little is being spent on human health," said Snyder. "They need to just accept that these things are everywhere - every chemical and pharmaceutical could be there. It's time for the EPA to step up to the plate and make a statement about the need to study effects, both human and environmental."

To the degree that the EPA is focused on the issue, it appears to be looking at detection. Grumbles acknowledged that just late last year the agency developed three new methods to "detect and quantify pharmaceuticals" in wastewater. "We realize that we have a limited amount of data on the concentrations," he said. "We're going to be able to learn a lot more."

While Grumbles said the EPA had analyzed 287 pharmaceuticals for possible inclusion on a draft list of candidates for regulation under the Safe Drinking Water Act, he said only one, nitroglycerin, was on the list. Nitroglycerin can be used as a drug for heart problems, but the key reason it's being considered is its widespread use in making explosives.

So much is unknown. Many independent scientists are skeptical that trace concentrations will ultimately prove to be harmful to humans. Confidence about human safety is based largely on studies that poison lab animals with much higher amounts.

There's growing concern in the scientific community, meanwhile, that certain drugs - or combinations of drugs - may harm humans over decades because water, unlike most specific foods, is consumed in sizable amounts every day.

Our bodies may shrug off a relatively big one-time dose, yet suffer from a smaller amount delivered continuously over a half century, perhaps subtly stirring allergies or nerve damage. Pregnant women, the elderly and the very ill might be more sensitive.

Many concerns about chronic low-level exposure focus on certain drug classes: chemotherapy that can act as a powerful poison; hormones that can hamper reproduction or development; medicines for depression and epilepsy that can damage the brain or change behavior; antibiotics that can allow human germs to mutate into more dangerous forms; pain relievers and blood-pressure diuretics.

For several decades, federal environmental officials and nonprofit watchdog environmental groups have focused on regulated contaminants - pesticides, lead, PCBs - which are present in higher concentrations and clearly pose a health risk.

However, some experts say medications may pose a unique danger because, unlike most pollutants, they were crafted to act on the human body.

"These are chemicals that are designed to have very specific effects at very low concentrations. That's what pharmaceuticals do. So when they get out to the environment, it should not be a shock to people that they have effects," says zoologist John Sumpter at Brunel University in London, who has studied trace hormones, heart medicine and other drugs.

And while drugs are tested to be safe for humans, the timeframe is usually over a matter of months, not a lifetime. Pharmaceuticals also can produce side effects and interact with other drugs at normal medical doses. That's why - aside from therapeutic doses of fluoride injected into potable water supplies - pharmaceuticals are prescribed to people who need them, not delivered to everyone in their drinking water.

"We know we are being exposed to other people's drugs through our drinking water, and that can't be good," says Dr. David Carpenter, who directs the Institute for Health and the Environment of the State University of New York at Albany.

----

The AP National Investigative Team can be reached at investigate (at) ap.org
Copyright 2008 The Associated Press.

Below is a link to the Oprah radio network web page where you can hear exerpts from the show. (It was taped a month earlier for release in November.)

http://www2.oprah.com/xm/moz/200711/moz_20071108.jhtml

(More of the web page below)

Dr. Oz
Message Board Talk about today's show!
The Threat of Synthetic Chemicals
Original Air Date: November 8, 2007
Audio Listen in to part of the show!

According to investigative journalist Randall Fitzgerald, thousands of synthetic chemicals deemed safe by the government, regulatory agencies, manufacturers and even medical science are actually quite hazardous—and we're only beginning to glimpse the potential harmful effects they are having on our health and the environment. Dr. Oz talks with Randall, author of The Hundred-Year Lie: How to Protect Yourself from the Chemicals That Are Destroying Your Health, about his theory and how society can begin to eliminate the threat of toxins.

In 1906, the United States Congress enacted the Pure Food and Drug Act, legislation designed to set standards for the quality and safety of foods and medicines. Randall says this legislation marked the beginning of what he calls the "hundred-year lie" because the regulatory agencies that followed, such as the Food and Drug Administration, failed to adequately monitor what was truly safe. "We have all been guinea pigs in a vast chemical experiment, and based on the statistics—the health statistics—over the past 100 years, we can begin to see a correlation with the onslaught of synthetic chemicals in our lives that we've been impacted by those chemicals in the foods and medicines that we consume," he says.

Randall says as consumers, all we can do is try to limit our exposure by avoiding processed foods, eating as clean a diet as possible and monitoring the chemicals in the vaccines, prescription drugs, vitamins, cosmetics and personal care products that we use. He says the government can play an important role through public education, beginning with requiring manufacturers to follow truth in labeling. Initiating safety standards and legislation where products are constantly evaluated as well as increased social activism could also help reduce the threat posed by synthetic chemicals, he says.

Related Resources

* The Hundred-Year Lie: How to Protect Yourself from the Chemicals That Are Destroying Your Health by Randall Fitzgerald
* Randall's list of practical steps you can take to protect yourself from illness

Related Links

* Dr. Oz talks to Dr. Ken Bock about toxins, immunizations and autism.
* How to start living with fewer toxins today
* Everyday items that can be harmful to your health

Today, Dr. Lonsdale has a confession to make. "Oh, how I cringe. How culpably, horribly wrong I have been! As varied as my patients were in size, species, age, sex and breed, the one common uniting feature was their junk food diet. And almost without exception this was why the animals needed my services."

These and other revelations come in the Oct./Nov. 2007 issue of Nexus Magazine, published in Australia.

Junk food marketed to pet owners is laden with synthetic colorants, preservatives, "and a raft of other strange chemical additives, none with any nutritive value and all toxic to varying degrees," says Dr. Lonsdale. These chemicals depress animal immune systems and support toxin-producing bacteria in their bowels. "Pets worn down by the toxic effects of a junk food diet are at greater risk of succumbing to diseases."

Why don't more veterinarians and animal groups speak out about this toxic threat to animal health that masquerades as quality wet and dry food? It's because of the "cozy relationship between the pet food manufacturers and the veterinary profession." It's a relationship similar to that between pharmaceutical companies and the medical profession, in which physicians financially benefit from prescribing drugs to their patients. Deals behind the scenes are made between junk food makers and the veterinary profession, which includes veterinary associations, veterinary schools, research institutes, etc.

Two international chocolate manufacturers --Mars and Nestle-- dominate the pet junk food market. Other conglomerates such as Colgate Palmolive and Procter & Gamble, Heinz and Del Monte also hold huge shares of the pet food market.

An analysis in the Archives of Internal Medicine journal found that 467,809 serious complications from legal drug use were reported during that period, while the number of deaths tripled. More prescriptions are being written than ever before and the interactions between all of these various drugs are taking a devastating toll. Women were victims more often than men. Among the 15 drugs most often linked with serious side effects and deaths were the antidepressant Paxil, the arthritis drug Remicade, and the painkiller Oxycontin.

(2) Fumes from microwave popcorn are harming consumers. The first reports of a fatal lung disease occurring as a result of contact with diacetyl, a chemical used in artificial butter flavorings added to microwave popcorn, came from food factories where hundreds of workers have reported lung damage from exposure to diacetyl.

Now reports are emerging of consumers who microwave a lot of artificial buttered popcorn coming down with the same lung symptoms. A case in Denver illustrates the problem. A man who consumed several bags of microwaved popcorn a day developed progressively worsening respiratory symptoms, a condition that stopped only when he stopped eating the popcorn. A team of medical researchers measured airborne levels of diacetyl in the patient's home after the popcorn was microwaved, and found levels "similar to those reported in the microwave oven exhaust area at the quality assurance unit of the popcorn plant where the affected employees work."

While the Flavor and Extract Manufacturers Association has warned its members to reduce diacetyl levels in butter flavorings, no such warning has been given to consumers. So consider yourself warned by reading these words!

(3) A study in the Journal of Environmental Quality has raised an alarm about vegetables absorbing antibiotics as a result of irrigation water being contaminated by cattle manure from cattle injected with antibiotics.

Three food crops were analyzed --corn, lettuce and potatoes-- and all three were found to have the antibiotic sulfamethazine in the plant leaves and concentrated in plant tissue. Other root crops such as carrots and radishes may be even more susceptible to contamination.

The result of this antibiotic absorption into vegetables is an accelerated fostering of antimicrobial resistance in vegetable eaters, which is fast rendering antibiotics ineffective for treatment in humans.

There is another angle here which I want to point out. Remember the scare over spinach contamination with e.coli last year? The theory was that the e.coli bacteria had been absorbed by the spinach as a result of irrigation water having been contaminated by animals.

This principle that vegetables absorb antibiotics and bacteria from irrigation water may also apply to pesticides. Even if we wash the produce thoroughly, pesticides still probably can be found in the plant tissues and leaves, which means the level of pesticides being absorbed by consumers of non-organic produce is much higher than previously thought.

(4) Pharmaceutical companies want to 'treat' precocious puberty. From Britain come news reports indicating that more boys and girls are entering puberty at the ages of six or seven than ever before, a trend identified in The Hundred Year Lie as evidence of a mutant species emergence resulting from chemical exposures.

The American Academy of Pediatrics wants to lower the age of 'normal' puberty to as young as seven years old from twelve to make the problem go away, while drug companies are wanting public health institutions to declare the desirability of treating precocious puberty with drugs that block the hormonal changes from taking place. The hormone-blocking drugs Gonapeptyl and Decapeptyl have already been licensed in Britain for use in children, targeting girls who reach puberty before their ninth birthday and boys who reach it before the age of ten.

Sociologists and psychologists worry about the social repercussions of young children being able to produce children, in addition to the effects of mass doping children in an attempt to prevent these hormonal changes. We all need to be equally concerned about WHY precocious puberty is happening-- stress has been mentioned as a factor, even obesity, but so have the synthetic chemicals in diet.

FROM THE DAILY MAIL

Parents will be alerted this week to ensure children avoid artificial additives
in drinks, sweets and processed foods because of explosive evidence about the effects on behaviour.

A plausible connection to tantrums, poor concentration and slow progress at school is understood to have been found in a study to be published by the Government's Food Standards Agency.

Food industry leaders have been summoned to a meeting with the FSA today for a briefing on the research and its implications.

The findings, from Southampton University, raise the possibility of parents suing
food manufacturers in the same way tobacco firms have been pursued by cancer victims in the U.S.

The study could also mean the industry will have to reformulate a vast array of
children's products.

Some supermarkets and manufacturers have pre- empted the study by announcing bans on suspect additives in sweets, cakes and soft drinks.

The FSA has cloaked the findings in secrecy but its experts are expected to tell
parents the only way to avoid any risk is to cut the additives from their children's diet.

Health campaigners, however, believe a more stringent legal ban is necessary.

The risk of allergic reactions, such as breathing problems and asthma, from certain additives was established more than 20 years ago.

There have been similar concerns-about the impact on brain development but nothing strong enough to convince Whitehall's public health experts.

The Southampton research is expected to support the fears of Sally Bunday of the Hyperactive Children's Support Group.

She said the reaction to the artificial chemicals could be "horrendous in terms
of mood swings with crying, screaming, inability to sleep".

She added: "There can also be physical reactions such as difficulty in breathing
and skin rashes".

The additives may help explain the rise in Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder in children.

Some 359,000 prescriptions for ADHD prevention drugs are issued each year, up 90-fold since the early 1990s.

Critics of food additives believe this disruptive behaviour can be cured by a return to natural food, rather than drugs.

Vyvyan Howard, professor of bioimaging at Ulster University and an adviser to the FSA, called for the additives to be removed on a precautionary basis.

He said: "They have no nutritional value, so why put them in?

"There are very tight restrictions banning these additives from foods designed
for children under the age of one. But why stop there?

"Children's brains and nervous systems are developing beyond the age of
one."

Some companies have already acted.

Marks & Spencer is removing all artificial colours and flavours from 99 per
cent of products by the end of the year.

Asda is doing the same with 9,000 own-label items, while Sainsbury's, Tesco
and the Co- op have announced similar action.

Nestle Rowntree, which makes Smarties, has dropped artificial colours with the result the blue variety has been axed.

The colours, tested on groups of three-year-olds and eight-to-nine year olds by
the Southampton researchers, were tartrazine (E102), ponceau 4R (E124), sunset yellow
(E110), carmoisine (E122), quinoline yellow (E104) and allura red AC (E129).

The team also looked at the effect of the preservative sodium benzoate (E211), which is commonly used in soft drinks.

The Food & Drink Federation, which speaks for manufacturers, said the colours
and chemicals used by the industry were proven to be safe.

"The use of food additives is strictly regulated under European law,"
it said.

"They must be approved as safe by the appropriate European scientific committee before they can be used."

This is a positive step in public disclosure and in creating a public dialogue about the relative safety of tap water vesus bottled water, if indeed the revelations and the inquiry will be taken far enough.

Let's start with deceptive marketing. Yosemite water, for example, comes not from the Yosemite Valley, but from tap water taken from a street named Yosemite in the Highland Park neighborhood of Los Angeles. Crystal Geyer water comes from a well in Owens Valley, California, but the L.A. Department of Water also draws some of its tap water from this same source, only the municipality adds chlorine and fluoride to its supply.

By contrast, Calistoga Mineral Water comes direct from a capped geyser in Napa Valley and is accurately labeled "bottled at the source." We could go on and on identifying what water is and isn't from the actual source of a spring or glacier. But rigorous disclosure and truth in labeling will at least enable us to start making distinctions about the source of the water we consume.

My concerns with tap water go far beyond the fluoride and chlorine typically added by municipal water authorities. What never comes up in the news media is the extent to which many groundwater sources for municipal water supplies are contaminated by synthetic chemical pollutants that municipalities cannot test for, if only because they don't have the technology to do so even if they possessed the technology to remove the chemicals, which they don't.

As the U.S. Geological Survey has repeatedly reported, (discussed elsewhere on this blog page) every body of water in the U.S. --and in Europe-- that has been tested shows increasing levels of a wide range of chemicals from pharmaceutical drugs to endocrine disrupters and industrial agents. The Environmental Working Group organization has also begun to identify other synthetic chemicals in the wastewater that ends up being recycled as tap water. (see previous blog post.)

Reverse osmosis used by most municipalities on drinking water supplies may remove all or most organic contaminants, but these processes do not even begin to address the challenges posed by removal of synthetic chemicals that were designed to be virtually indestructible. (Reverse osmosis involves a separation process using pressure to force water through a membrane layer of polymers, which is the same process used to separate salt from sea water. Usually an activated carbon filter is used to trap organic chemicals.)

Aquafina, Dasani, and the other tap water brands claim to purify their supplies using this same reverse osmosis process. They then charge consumers much higher prices than if consumers simply filled their bottles up directly from the faucet. The Los Angeles Times calculated that a consumer can get 450 gallons of L.A. tap water for the price that same consumer would pay for 20 ounces of identical tap water being sold in plastic bottles.

According to the International Bottled Water Association, the average American drinks 27.6 gallons of bottled water a year. That means for every $5 spent on a container of bottled tap water, the same quantity can be drawn from the faucet for about half a penny. You do the math. It amounts to a huge ripoff, unless you believe convenience alone is worth the price. After all, who has a spigot on the dashboard of their car?

At least with bottled water that comes from glaciers or snow melt, and is accurately identified as such, we are paying for the fighting chance that the levels of synthetic chemical contaminants will be much lower than with municipal supplies.

95 Percent of Wastewater Samples Show Widespread Use of Chemicals

Advances in technology allow an unprecedented look at chemical contaminants in water bodies throughout the United States. In 2002, the first nationwide study of man-made chemicals and hormones in 139 streams revealed that 80 percent of streams tested were contaminated (Kolpin 2002). Several of the chemicals examined are known or suspected of disrupting the hormone systems of animals and people. Of these, only a small fraction have been regulated at all, much less tested for toxicity, persistence in the environment, or other harmful characteristics, such as hormone disruption. Some of the same unregulated, widely-used, hormone-disrupting chemicals have been detected at trace levels in the San Francisco Bay (Oros 2002).

Fish and other aquatic life inhabiting waters containing man-made hormone-disrupting chemicals may develop reproductive and other health disorders. For example, male fish with immature eggs in their testes have been documented with increasing frequency throughout the U.S. (Pait 2002; Goodbred 2007). Damage to the reproductive health of vulnerable fish populations may result in detrimental consequences to local fisheries and aquatic ecosystems; in addition, there is concern that people could become further exposed to hormone-disrupting chemicals by eating contaminated fish (Houghton 2007).

To identify some of the sources of these hormone-disrupting chemicals, Environmental Working Group (EWG) and East Bay Municipal Utility District (EBMUD) researchers analyzed samples of wastewater from residential, commercial, and industrial sites in the San Francisco Bay Area. 18 of 19 wastewater samples examined contained at least 1 of 3 unregulated, widely-used hormone disruptors – phthalates, bisphenol A, and triclosan; 2 samples contained all 3 substances. Despite sophisticated wastewater treatment, these chemicals were detected in treated waters discharged into the Bay.

Analysis of 19 wastewater samples for 3 hormone-disrupting substances reveals widespread contamination.

While wastewater treatment is extremely effective in removing biodegradable food and human waste, it was never designed to address this broad spectrum of unregulated chemical pollution. Advances in wastewater treatment may reduce some types of pollution, but new chemicals are introduced continuously into the marketplace. Expensive potential improvements to wastewater treatment facilities would result in higher consumer water rates, while only removing a fraction of these contaminants of concern. Instead, it is critical to look at more cost-effective ways to protect our waterways through reducing chemical pollution at the source – before it ever reaches the treatment plant or the Bay.

This study represents a first look at specific sources of hormone-disrupting chemical contamination from residential, commercial, and industrial sources that can enter San Francisco Bay. By tracing these chemicals to particular sites – including residential areas, a nail salon, laundries, a pet wash, medical centers, and industrial facilities – we can identify simple pollution prevention strategies.

Choices you make at home and on the job to reduce your exposure to hormone disruptors can reduce the impact of these chemicals on wildlife in San Francisco Bay. For example, by making informed choices when you buy everyday products, from shampoo and toothpaste to laundry detergent and even canned food, you can help protect the environment, without breaking the bank. This report provides detailed findings from our study, and presents tips to help you reduce your use of hormone-disrupting chemicals and better protect the Bay.

Of course, ultimately, we need to fix our system of chemical regulations. The law establishing U.S. regulation of chemicals was created over three decades ago, and has not been revised since, despite significant advances in our understanding of the impacts of a variety of chemicals to ecological and human health. Of particular relevance, U.S. chemical regulations were created before the body of scientific evidence on hormone-disrupting chemicals was established and, therefore, are not designed to identify and act against substances with these properties. In the absence of federal action, local and state leaders have brought special attention to the critical ecological and public health problem of hormone disruption caused by man-made chemicals. EWG and EBMUD are participating in national stakeholder initiatives to advance chemical policy in the U.S.

Hormone Disruptors and Human Health

Hormone-disrupting chemicals are not just an ecological concern. Studies of ordinary people show that our own bodies typically are contaminated with low levels of phthalates, bisphenol A, and triclosan (Calafat 2005; CDC 2005; Wolff 2007). The sources of this pollution in people include many ordinary consumer products, such as cosmetics, canned foods, and "antibacterial" soaps and cleaning agents. Recent research indicates that chemicals that interfere with the hormone system can cause adverse health effects in laboratory animals at levels as low as 1 part per trillion (Wozniak 2005).

Already, epidemiological evidence suggests that people may be experiencing health effects caused by exposures to hormone-disrupting chemicals. Adult men with higher levels of phthalates in their bodies are more likely to show signs of hormonal disturbance, including reduced sperm concentration and motility, increased damage to sperm DNA, and altered hormone levels (Duty 2003, 2004, 2005; Hauser 2007). Baby boys exposed to higher levels of phthalates in the womb or in breast milk are more likely to display reproductive system abnormalities (Swan 2005). And women with polycystic ovarian disorder, a leading cause of female infertility, or those who suffer recurrent miscarriages, are more likely to have higher levels of bisphenol A in their blood (Sugiura-Ogasawara 2005; Takeuchi 2006). Though no epidemiological studies of triclosan are available, a recent animal study suggests that this substance may be a potent disruptor of the thyroid system (Veldhoen 2006).

These studies indicate that taking action now to reduce your exposures to hormone-disrupting chemicals may benefit the health of you and your family, as well as the health of the surrounding environment.

Hormone-disrupting chemicals are found in many consumer products and contaminate wastewater from a variety of residential, commercial, and industrial sites.

Hormone-disrupting Chemical Wastewater Samples Contaminated Consumer Products Health Effects
Phthalates ·Homes
·Nail salon
·Laundries
·Pet wash
·Medical centers
·Manufacturing
·Treated
wastewater ·Perfumes & personal care products containing "fragrance"
·Nail polish
·Flexible & PVC/vinyl plastic, including food wrap, building materials, toys, IV tubing, blood & fluid storage bags
·Adhesives, inks, pill coatings, detergents
·Many others Phthalate exposure is linked to male reproductive system problems including feminization of baby boys (Swan 2005), altered hormone levels in baby boys and men (Duty 2005; Main 2006), reduced sperm concentration and motility and increased sperm DNA damage in men (Duty 2003, 2004; Hauser 2007).
Bisphenol A
(BPA) ·Industrial laundry
·Pharmaceutical & Paper products manufacturing
·Treated wastewater ·Polycarbonate plastic including hard plastic water & water cooler bottles, hard plastic baby bottles, plastic silverware, Lexan products, and many items labeled plastic #7 or "PC"
·Linings of food and beverage cans
·Dental sealants BPA exposure is linked to polycystic ovarian syndrome, the most common form of infertility in the U.S. (Takeuchi 2006), as well as to recurrent miscarriage and reduced levels of an essential sex hormone in men (Hanaoka 2002; Sugiura-Ogasawara 2005). Over 100 animal studies reveal a wide array of adverse health effects caused by low dose exposures in utero (Myers 2006).
Triclosan ·Laundries
·Veterinary & Medical centers
·Plastic bag manufacturing
·Treated wastewater ·"Antibacterial" hand soap, toothpaste, personal care products
·"Antibacterial" detergents & cleaning products
·"Antibacterial" plastic & foam items including shoe insoles, plastic cutting boards Triclosan causes thyroid disruption in frogs at low levels found in many streams (Veldhoen 2006); human and frog thyroid signaling systems are nearly identical. In tap water and in lakes and streams, triclosan forms chemicals linked to cancer and other health problems, and known to accumulate in animals (Adolfsson-Erici 2002, Lindstrom 2002; Balmer 2004; Lores 2005; Fiss 2007).

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Copyright 2007, Environmental Working Group. All Rights Reserved.

Many psychiatrists, according to news reports, hailed this statistic as A GOOD SIGN and GOOD NEWS because, in the words of one shrink, "Americans finally feel comfortable asking for help with psychiatric problems." Needless to say, pharmaceutical companies that manufacture Prozac, Paxil, Lexapro and the other anti-depressants were also excited by the news that 25 percent of all adults in the U.S. will "have a major depressive episode at some point in their lives" and will resort to anti-depressant drugs to treat the symptoms.

There is a major flaw in this reasoning and an insidiously dark undercurrent to the statistic that the news media overlooked, an oversight which reveals how ill-served we are by their short attention spans and fuzzy thinking.

In 1998, two psychologists writing in a well-respected medical journal stumbled across a revelation that should have undermined the credibility of the entire anti-depressant industry. These researchers analyzed the results of 39 studies on the effectiveness of anti-depressant drugs and found that 50 percent of the therapeutic benefits could be attributed to the placebo effect. That is to say, people's expectations that the drugs would be effective triggered their own body's natural healing mechanism and accounted for half of the benefits they felt from taking the drug.

When these same two researchers subsequently evaluated 19 more recent double-blind studies on depression, the placebo effect shot up to account for 75 percent of the effectiveness of each drug therapy. (Kirsch, Irving, and Sapirstein, Guy. "Listening to Prozac but hearing placebo: A meta-analysis of antidepressant medication." Prevention & Treatment, 1998, June; 1(1).

So here we have a situation where the most profitable drugs known to humankind are being directly marketed to doctors and consumers, who are being sold on the idea that these anti-depressants are a panacea. Individual consumers spend hundreds and sometimes thousands of dollars each on these drugs. Doctors over-prescribe them, patients over-use them, and Big Pharma gets rich. And yet 75 percent of the beneficial effects are nothing more than the patient's own power of suggestion at work!

Antidepressants are now right up there with bottled water and synthetic vitamins as my top ranking scams on consumers.

In the latest study, published this month in the medical science journal, Environmental Health Perspectives, 4,000 rats ingested aspartame their entire lives until death, when autopsies revealed a higher than normal rate of leukemia, lymphoma and breast cancer cells. This study replicated previous findings by the same research team.

What made the latest Italian study unique, in contrast to studies that had found aspartame to be harmless, is that it tracked the lab animals throughout a natural life cycle, as opposed to the previous studies in the U.S. and elsewhere that failed to detect cancer because their rats were killed at just two years of age. Allowing the rats to live longer is a better gauge of cancer risk than to arbitrarily kill them.

Cumulative impacts of aspartame collecting in body tissues over a lifetime seem a much more reasonable way to assess the health risks in humans, but the problem in doing human trial studies is that it is virtually impossible to find a comparison group of people who haven't been exposed to the synthetic sweetener. So far the U.S. studies of humans and aspartame have been nothing more than food questionnaires that people filled out and that National Cancer Institute researchers used in an attempt to calculate how much aspartame they consume and whether their risk for cancer increased.

As for why U.S. scientists have been so lenient toward aspartame use, Dr. Morando Soffritti, who led the Bologna-based study group, called it an example of how "some researchers are ready to put themselves at the disposal of that industry that produces sweeteners." This was a polite way of saying that too many scientists in the U.S. are either prostitutes to manufacturers, or they are too lazy to conduct proper longterm studies.

The Center for Science in the Public Interest organization issued an appeal to the FDA to review its stance on aspartame based on these new study results.
"This review is particularly urgent with regard to aspartame-containing beverages, heavily consumed by children," said the group's executive director.

You can probably guess how the FDA responded. "The FDA finds no reason to alter its previous conclusion that aspartame is safe as a general purpose sweetener in food," declared FDA spokesman Michael Herndon.

So if you are going to protect yourself from the longterm effects of aspartame, it will be up to you to make lifestyle changes, since the FDA refuses to even acknowledge any problem might exist.

Malignant melanoma ranks as the fastest growing cancer on the planet, its incidence doubling in recent years with nearly all of these cases of skin cancer due to exposure to the sun.

Dermatologists strongly advise applying sunscreen to your body every day if you are in the sunshine, especially during the summer months.

But, and this is a really big BUT, most sunscreens contain ingredients that are hormone disrupters once absorbed by the human body. Known as endocrine disrupters, these chemicals accumulate in the body, as evidenced by their frequent detection in human breast milk, and have been documented as being capable of initiating a range of harmful effects including reproductive disorders and the feminizing of male offspring.

Now an even more disturbing twist has been added to the sunscreen dilemma. Consumer Reports magazine describes in its July issue how tests of 19 common sunscreen products found that eight of them now contain nanoparticles that are NOT identified on the labels. In sunscreens, nanoparticles are used as 'penetration enhancers' to drive chemicals deeper into the skin and ultimately, into our blood and body tissues. Many cosmetics products, particularly skin moisturizers, now contain nanoparticle ingredients.

The risks of nanoparticles to the human body are largely unexplored. Because these particles are so small, 100,000 times smaller than the width of a human hair, it has been assumed they would pose no risk.But the limited laboratory and animal research so far has produced very worrisome findings. Here is a list:

--some chemicals when nanosized become toxic and react much more readily with human tissues.

--nanoparticles enter vital body organs, such as the brain, much easier than previous chemical particles, and application to the skin enables them to bypass the detoxifying enzymes of the liver.

--a class of nanoparticles known as fullerenes have been revealed to damage cells in fish and harm human liver cells and DNA.

--some nanoparticles persist in water supplies and can damage the ecosystem.

Products containing nanoparticles are being developed far faster than toxicologists can test them or even begin to describe all of their potential effects on life.

So what do we do to protect ourselves from skin cancer while avoiding hormone disrupting ingredients and nanoparticles in sunscreens?

First, wear protective clothing or stay out of the sun as much as possible. One popular clothing brand called Solumbra offers swim suits and everyday sun protective clothing with 97 percent ultraviolet protection ( call 800-882-7860 for more information or look up their website.)

Second, use zinc oxide or titanium dioxide sunblocks as an alternative to sunscreens. These products can produce some skin-whitening effects, which may cause consternation for sun worshippers intent on browning their bodies. But look at it this way -- is tanning and vanity more important than your health and your life? It is your choice.