Rachel's Democracy & Health News #872
Thursday, September 14, 2006

From: Rachel's Democracy & Health News #872 ..........[This story printer-friendly]
September 14, 2006

MR. BUSH'S SECOND CRUSADE

[Rachel's introduction: The President is relentlessly dismantling the scientific capabilities of U.S. Environmental Protection Agency -- a plan with "long-term consequences," says the agency's chief financial officer.]

By Peter Montague

At an airport the other day, every six minutes like clockwork an authoritative voice emanated from on high, reminding us that the global terror threat stands at "orange alert." As we waited like sheep to be searched for hair gel and lanolin, some of us were led away and body-searched behind the screen while the rest of us averted our eyes and packed closer together, trying to blend in.

It was near the anniversary of Sept. 11, so the Commander-in-Chief was making the rounds to lay wreaths and provide reassurances, and the total-immersion airport TV offered up a cavalcade of frightening images suggesting that we may never be safe again until we track down every last enemy of freedom and interrogate them creatively. We particularly marvel at the newest unauthorized U.S. practice of locking suspects in cages measuring four feet by four feet by 20 inches so they can neither sit nor stand for a week at a time, as reported by the New York Times June 17. And we were amazed to learn recently that Guantanamo is now 25% powered by wind energy, so that if we poke electric cables into the eyes of Muslim prisoners, as has been recently alleged, perhaps some of us can at least feel good about ourselves for using alternative energy.

These reported interrogation techniques, if true, seem certain to prolong the Global War on Terror -- which the President some time ago had already declared to be a war without end -- by creating the next generation of implacable foes who will then need to be resisted with mighty swords, restrained, and themselves creatively interrogated far into the future. Perhaps it's best to look at it as a sustained jobs program, not really different from the Cold War but with a creative Texas twist.

From our airport experience you could only conclude that we've got a big job ahead -- the CIA has now identified people who hate freedom in 80 countries, and no doubt some of these will become good candidates for creative interrogation -- so we'd best get to it and stay focused, was the message. Mr. Bush wants to be remembered as a wartime President, and there's little doubt he'll get his wish. Extraordinary renditions of this President's creative innovations will no doubt be recounted forever-after to wide-eyed children in Texas Sunday schools.

Meanwhile all across the country, out of sight of the TV monitors, the Commander-in-Chief has a second crusade under way, striking a blow against godless science. He is working hard to go down in history as the President who finally had the guts to eliminate -- or at least cripple -- science within the federal agency that President Nixon set up to protect God's creation, our U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).

In a series of decisions during his two terms in office, the Commander has steadily diminished and discredited the scientific bona fides of EPA. This can only mean that the agency is growing less able to do its job of protecting us and the rest of Creation from corporate marauders. As anyone knows who has read the two-part series we ran last month, destruction of the natural environment has reached full orange alert -- the loss of species alone has now reached apocalyptic proportions -- so diminishing government's scientific capability can only accelerate us toward ecological collapse. Clearly, many of the President's supporters relish the thought because to them it foretells the Second Coming of Christ. And who knows? They may be right. In some versions of the Good Book it is written that "Blood will flow like mighty rivers" when Jesus returns to Earth to personally exterminate vast hordes of humanity. This would include the 1.6 billion Christians who have not been "born again" and have not taken Jesus as their personal savior; 1.3 billion Muslims; 900 million Hindus; 850 million secularists, atheists and agnostics; 360 million Buddhists; 245 million indigenous people; 225 million believers in various traditional Chinese religions; 23 million Sikhs; 14 million Jews; 6 million Bahais; 5 million Jainists; 4 million Shintos; 3 million followers of Cao Dai; 2.4 million Tenrikyos; 1 million neopagans; 800,000 Unitarian Universalists; 700,000 Rastafarians; 600,000 Scientologists; and 150,000 Zoroastrians.

It is written that, on the day He returns to Earth, the Prince of Peace is planning to personally slaughter every one of these 5.5 billion infidels and then dispatch their souls to hell where they will suffer unspeakable tortures for the rest of eternity -- this according to the President's most faithful followers and ardent supporters who are working hard to impose these religious values on the rest of us. Among some of these plain folk, perhaps, the torture of a few luckless Muslims at Guantanamo or high in the heavens aboard a CIA-chartered jet pales to insignificance when compared to Jesus's glorious final solution for cleansing the Earth. But I digress.

Just a few days ago, the whistle-blower group representing federal scientists, managers and workers, Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER), leaked a memo from Lyons Gray, chief financial officer (CFO) of EPA. The memo tells all EPA higher-ups that the 2008 budget will include substantial new "disinvestments" in EPA's scientific capabilities -- disinvestments that are expected to have "long-term consequences" for the agency, Mr. Gray's memo said. Those consequences will be Mr. Bush's second legacy.

Here are a few of the changes that the agency has undergone while the Global War on Terror has deflected our attention:

** Closure of scientific laboratories and research centers. By 2011, the agency's staff of 2000 scientists will have been cut 20%. During that same 5-year period, 9000 new chemicals will have entered commercial channels,[1] almost entirely untested for health or environmental effects.

** The executive director of PEER, Jeff Ruch, summarized the plan this way: "The Bush administration is trying to spin this lobotomy as a diet plan for a trimmer, shapelier EPA," Ruch added. "In fact, it is a plan to cut and run from historic standards of environmental protection under the guise of deficit management."

PEER is not the only group aware of the destruction of scientific capacity at EPA.

** In April, EPA's own Science Advisory Board -- a panel of outside reviewers of EPA's scientific work -- concluded that EPA is no longer funding a credible public health research program.

** A Government Accountability Office study also released in April concluded that EPA lacks safeguards to "evaluate or manage potential conflicts of interest" in corporate research agreements.

** PEER noted in October, 2005 that the American Chemistry Council (ACC, formerly the Chemical Manufacturer's Association) is now EPA's main research partner. PEER noted that, "A classic example of recent EPA/corporate joint ventures is the 2004 agreement reached with the ACC to fund the now-canceled CHEERS experiment in which parents would have received payments and gifts in return for spraying pesticides and other chemicals in the rooms primarily occupied by their infant children." EPA and ACC were surprised at public opposition to testing pesticides on children, since testing drugs on children without informed consent is a booming business.

PEER also noted that, "In internal agency surveys, EPA scientists maintain that corporations are influencing the agency's research agenda through financial inducements. As one EPA scientist wrote, 'Many of us in the labs feel like we work for contracts.'"

In March of this year PEER executive director Jeff Ruch testified before Congress that, "There appears to be a deliberate policy of marginalizing EPA science on issue after issue, so that the agency is becoming increasingly irrelevant to emerging environmental threats," Ruch testified, pointing to internal surveys showing a growing pessimism by agency scientists about the direction of EPA. "EPA's public health research agenda has been neutered," he testified.

Unfortunately, EPA has placed its own scientists under a gag order, so they cannot tell their own story.

Last month, PEER pointed out that EPA's own Office of Inspector General -- an internal investigative arm within EPA itself -- recently reported that:

** "EPA does not have the data to support its positions on the state of the environment or to measure the success of its programs";

** "EPA's information systems have incomplete and untimely data"; and

** EPA lacks a "clear identification and prioritization of the most important scientific questions to be addressed."

"Right now, EPA is flying blind," concluded PEER Executive Director Jeff Ruch, noting that the agency is spending millions on a public relations campaign to burnish the "corporate image" of its science program even as it cuts research support. "EPA scientists describe a deliberate attempt by its current leaders to 'dumb down' the agency and marginalize research so it cannot be applied to any topic of controversy," he said.

Ruch pointed out that

** Investment in EPA science has steadily decreased to the point where the chair of EPA's Scientific Advisory Board believes that the agency no longer fields a coherent scientific research program;

** Suppression of politically inconvenient scientific findings and rewrites of technical reports for non-scientific reasons have become commonplace.

** EPA is slashing its network of technical research libraries.

This last point is important because it undercuts EPA's ability to enforce the laws Congress has told it to enforce.

Late last month, PEER leaked an internal EPA memo saying,

** Prosecution of polluters by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency "will be compromised" due to the loss of "timely, correct and accessible" information from the agency's closure of its network of technical libraries. EPA enforcement staff currently rely upon the libraries to obtain technical information to support pollution prosecutions and to track the business histories of regulated industries.

The memo, prepared in mid-August by the enforcement arm of EPA, called the Office of Enforcement and Compliance (OECA), agency staff detailed concerns about the effects of EPA's plans to close many of its libraries, box up the collections and eliminate or sharply reduce library services. Each year, EPA's libraries handle more than 134,000 research requests from its own scientific and enforcement staff. The memo states:

"If OECA is involved in a civil or criminal litigation and the judge asks for documentation, we can currently rely upon a library to locate the information and have it produced to a court house in a timely manner. Under the cuts called for in the plan, timeliness for such services is not addressed."

"Cutting $2 million in library services in an EPA budget totaling nearly $8 billion is the epitome of a penny wise-pound foolish economy," stated PEER Executive Director Jeff Ruch. "From research to regulation to enforcement, EPA is an information-dependent operation which needs libraries and librarians to function properly," he said.

But who needs EPA anyway? The states and tribes do.

According to the memo by EPA CFO Lyons Gray, leaked by PEER just a few days ago, the EPA's 2008 budget preparations include reducing the "regulatory burden" on state and tribes and reducing federal oversight of state and tribal regulatory agencies.

The assumption is that state environmental agencies can run their own show better without EPA setting basic standards of performance. But it plainly isn't so.

Take New Jersey. New Jersey is the wealthiest state in the Union. It has a well-educated population who regularly tell pollsters they care about the environment only slightly less than they care about jobs. If any state should be able to field a group of environmental professionals to clamp down on -- or at the very least, keep track of -- the corporate polluters, it would be New Jersey. Yet after 35 years of effort, this remains the most polluted state in the Union and the state Department of Environmental Protection was revealed last month to be near total paralysis, if not complete collapse. More next week.

==============

[1] Marianne Lavelle, "EPA's Amnesty Has Become a Mixed Blessing," The National Law Journal February 24, 1997, pgs. A1, A18. And see David Roe and others, Toxic Ignorance; The Continuing Absence of Basic Health Testing for Top-Selling Chemicals in the United States (New York: Environmental Defense Fund, 1997).

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From: Independent (UK) ...................................[This story printer-friendly]
September 12, 2006

CAN CHEMICALS IN OUR HOMES CAUSE DEFORMITIES?

[Rachel's introduction: Growing numbers of boys are being born with malformed genitals. Are chemicals in our homes to blame?]

By Hannah Duguid

At 16 weeks pregnant, Isobel Lockwood had an ultrasound and was told she was carrying a baby girl. Soon afterwards, DNA taken from the foetus during an amniocentesis showed it was a boy. The doctor, who'd never made such a mistake before, was astonished but thought nothing further of it.

When Isobel eventually gave birth, the reason for the mix-up became clear. Her son's penis was tiny and split down the middle.

The immediate diagnosis was hypospadias -- a birth abnormality where the hole in the penis lies underneath the shaft, or in more severe cases, at the base of the penis or underneath the scrotum. In some cases the penis is very bent and will grow back on itself, in the shape of a doughnut. In severe cases, it is difficult to identify a penis at all.

At best the problem is largely cosmetic and can be rectified in a single operation. At worst (and with modern surgery these cases are rare), boys are left infertile and unable to have sex.

Of every 150 to 200 boys born in this country, one will have hypospadias -- and doctors believe that cases have doubled over the past 25 years. It happens during the first three or four months of pregnancy and is a result of incomplete masculinisation.

Basically, we all begin life in the womb as female, but with hypospadias something disrupts the hormonal changes a foetus goes through to become male. What that "something" might be turns out to be fairly chilling.

Research in Denmark points to a group of chemicals -- phthalates - found in objects and everyday products all around us. They are in plastic, carpets, fabric, make-up, food packaging, perfume, cosmetics, milk, vegetables, pesticides and sun cream. Known as endocrine disrupters, it is believed they upset the delicate balance of hormones during the early stages of pregnancy.

Related to this is the general crisis in male fertility in the West. One in six boys born today will have a low sperm-count. Hypospadias sufferers are part of a much wider problem which has seen male fertility drastically decline over the past 50 years.

Professor Richard Sharpe of the Medical Research Council's Human Reproductive Sciences Unit suggests that there's a link between incidents of hypospadias, undescended testes, low sperm-count and testicular cancers. "We don't yet know the exact cause of these problems, but they are all inter-related. It seems that the increase in these abnormalities is to do with environmental and lifestyle factors. It is something that has only happened recently," Sharpe says.

Aivar Bracka, a consultant genito-urethral plastic surgeon at Russells Hall Hospital in Dudley, operates on hundreds of cases of hypospadias every year. "I would be surprised if there wasn't an environmental cause for it. It is difficult to explain any other way. In particular, it explains cases of identical twins where one is born with hypospadias and the other isn't. This means that genetics doesn't account for everything."

Hereditary factors do, however, play a part in some cases. It is not unusual for more than one male in a family to have hypospadias. If the father and grandfather has it, there is a one in three chance that the next male in line will have it.

But mostly, it happens out of the blue. "I had no idea what hypospadias was," says Sue Phipps, mother of identical twins Henry and Charlie, 11, both born with the condition. "I didn't notice immediately as I had not had boys before. The nurse pointed it out. Both of them had their hole half-way down the underneath of their penis, and both had a hooded foreskin. They had to sit on the toilet to pee, or it went everywhere.

"We were told they would need one operation, but after a series of operations their penises were a mess. The pain was so severe they were on morphine. Going to the loo was dreadful for them; Henry urinated from three holes and Charlie from five."

A traumatic two years culminated in Sue Phipps threatening to sue the surgeon. One of the problems when local plastic surgeons operate on hypospadias patients is that they are not sufficiently experienced in the delicate technique required and end up making the problem worse - one-third of cases operated on by Bracka are repair jobs.

Once referred to Russells Hall Hospital, the boys needed just one "salvage" operation to give them a penis that looked normal and worked. Both were able to get erections.

But Phipps does not yet know whether her boys will be fertile. There is a small but significant chance that they won't be. Studies have shown that boys with hypospadias tend to have a slightly lower sperm- count. The twins' testicles are normal, though. One in 10 boys with hypospadias is also born with undescended testicles. If one testicle descends there is, again, a small but significant increase of infertility. If both fail to descend, that likelihood shoots up to 80 per cent.

The other reason hypospadias sufferers may struggle to have children is if their abnormality makes it difficult to have sex. A penis with a 270-degree bend can be surgically corrected, but if it is not penetration is almost impossible -- as is normal ejaculation if the hole is at the base of the penis. Ham-fisted surgery leaves the urethra "baggy", causing weak ejaculation where sperm dribbles rather than shoots out.

A penis that doesn't look or behave like everybody else's is upsetting for a boy, too. Their penises tends to be smaller than usual and, apart from embarrassment with potential sexual encounters, there is "locker room syndrome", when boys face the rough judgements of their peers.

Peter Cuckow, consultant paediatric urologist at Great Ormond Street Hospital and the Institute of Urology, says: "People are much more critical of their anatomy now, which means operations take place that wouldn't have years ago. I have known families where all the men had hypospadias but the older generations had not had operations because all that was wrong was that their penis looked strange. It still worked, so it wasn't a problem."

Isobel Lockwood says: "I am most worried about how to talk to my son about his penis. I don't want there to be any shame about it, but there's no point pretending nothing's wrong. You want them to be the same. But I do worry about what will happen when he reaches puberty."

Sometimes it is fathers who find it difficult to cope. "I suppose it's because they see it as their manhood," says Dionne Smith, 38. "When my boys went into hospital to have their operation, my ex-partner told his friends that the boys were on holiday. I didn't like that. I told him it wasn't a disease -- or anything to be afraid of."

What is important is that for most boys born with hypospadias, one or two operations when they're very young will correct the condition. It is also true that surgeons expect to see more cases in the future - and unless something changes there is nothing we can really do about it.

Support group: www.hypospadias.co.uk Some names have been changed

Phthalates: what you need to know

What are phthalates?

Phthalates (pronounced "thal-ates") are a group of chemical liquids used as "plasticisers" -- substances that modify the physical properties of materials. Resembling vegetable oil, odourless, they belong to a family of workhorse chemicals that have been in use for 50 years. They are created by the simple reaction of alcohols with phthalic anhydride and the elimination of water.

How do they work?

They are most commonly used to soften polyvinyl chloride (PVC), thus creating a soft and flexible texture.

What are they used for?

Items such as footwear, electrical cables and stationery, as well as medical devices such as tubing and blood bags. The larger-molecule variety is what gives flexibility to some vinyl flooring and children's toys. The smaller-molecule type serves as a fixative for perfumes to slow evaporation and help the scent to linger. Nail varnishes, adhesives and safety glass gain more supple textures thanks to phthalates.

The European Parliament will be finalising legislation this autumn on the use of toxic chemicals in household products. Greenpeace, which is locking horns with the chemical industry lobby over this issue, is working to ensure that the legislation is strong enough to make a difference.

The environmental campaign group wants to see the use of phthalates, a group of chemicals that may be responsible for disrupting hormones during pregnancy, restricted and safer ones used. It also wants the chemical content of products to be clearly stated on labels so that consumers know what to avoid.

Sarah Shoaka of Greenpeace says: "These chemicals are so widespread. We're using ourselves as an experiment and by the time we know the results, it will be too late."

Whether Greenpeace can succeed against the might of the chemicals industry remains to be seen -- and no one knows for certain that, even if they do, the rise in conditions such as hypospadias can be reversed. But it does seem clear that some lifestyle and environmental factors must be addressed.

For a list of products to avoid, see www.greenpeace.org.uk/products/toxics

At 16 weeks pregnant, Isobel Lockwood had an ultrasound and was told she was carrying a baby girl. Soon afterwards, DNA taken from the foetus during an amniocentesis showed it was a boy. The doctor, who'd never made such a mistake before, was astonished but thought nothing further of it.

When Isobel eventually gave birth, the reason for the mix-up became clear. Her son's penis was tiny and split down the middle.

The immediate diagnosis was hypospadias -- a birth abnormality where the hole in the penis lies underneath the shaft, or in more severe cases, at the base of the penis or underneath the scrotum. In some cases the penis is very bent and will grow back on itself, in the shape of a doughnut. In severe cases, it is difficult to identify a penis at all.

At best the problem is largely cosmetic and can be rectified in a single operation. At worst (and with modern surgery these cases are rare), boys are left infertile and unable to have sex.

Of every 150 to 200 boys born in this country, one will have hypospadias -- and doctors believe that cases have doubled over the past 25 years. It happens during the first three or four months of pregnancy and is a result of incomplete masculinisation.

Basically, we all begin life in the womb as female, but with hypospadias something disrupts the hormonal changes a foetus goes through to become male. What that "something" might be turns out to be fairly chilling.

Research in Denmark points to a group of chemicals -- phthalates - found in objects and everyday products all around us. They are in plastic, carpets, fabric, make-up, food packaging, perfume, cosmetics, milk, vegetables, pesticides and sun cream. Known as endocrine disrupters, it is believed they upset the delicate balance of hormones during the early stages of pregnancy.

Related to this is the general crisis in male fertility in the West. One in six boys born today will have a low sperm-count. Hypospadias sufferers are part of a much wider problem which has seen male fertility drastically decline over the past 50 years.

Professor Richard Sharpe of the Medical Research Council's Human Reproductive Sciences Unit suggests that there's a link between incidents of hypospadias, undescended testes, low sperm-count and testicular cancers. "We don't yet know the exact cause of these problems, but they are all inter-related. It seems that the increase in these abnormalities is to do with environmental and lifestyle factors. It is something that has only happened recently," Sharpe says.

Aivar Bracka, a consultant genito-urethral plastic surgeon at Russells Hall Hospital in Dudley, operates on hundreds of cases of hypospadias every year. "I would be surprised if there wasn't an environmental cause for it. It is difficult to explain any other way. In particular, it explains cases of identical twins where one is born with hypospadias and the other isn't. This means that genetics doesn't account for everything."

Hereditary factors do, however, play a part in some cases. It is not unusual for more than one male in a family to have hypospadias. If the father and grandfather has it, there is a one in three chance that the next male in line will have it.

But mostly, it happens out of the blue. "I had no idea what hypospadias was," says Sue Phipps, mother of identical twins Henry and Charlie, 11, both born with the condition. "I didn't notice immediately as I had not had boys before. The nurse pointed it out. Both of them had their hole half-way down the underneath of their penis, and both had a hooded foreskin. They had to sit on the toilet to pee, or it went everywhere.

"We were told they would need one operation, but after a series of operations their penises were a mess. The pain was so severe they were on morphine. Going to the loo was dreadful for them; Henry urinated from three holes and Charlie from five."

A traumatic two years culminated in Sue Phipps threatening to sue the surgeon. One of the problems when local plastic surgeons operate on hypospadias patients is that they are not sufficiently experienced in the delicate technique required and end up making the problem worse - one-third of cases operated on by Bracka are repair jobs.

Once referred to Russells Hall Hospital, the boys needed just one "salvage" operation to give them a penis that looked normal and worked. Both were able to get erections.

But Phipps does not yet know whether her boys will be fertile. There is a small but significant chance that they won't be. Studies have shown that boys with hypospadias tend to have a slightly lower sperm- count. The twins' testicles are normal, though. One in 10 boys with hypospadias is also born with undescended testicles. If one testicle descends there is, again, a small but significant increase of infertility. If both fail to descend, that likelihood shoots up to 80 per cent. The other reason hypospadias sufferers may struggle to have children is if their abnormality makes it difficult to have sex. A penis with a 270-degree bend can be surgically corrected, but if it is not penetration is almost impossible -- as is normal ejaculation if the hole is at the base of the penis. Ham-fisted surgery leaves the urethra "baggy", causing weak ejaculation where sperm dribbles rather than shoots out.

A penis that doesn't look or behave like everybody else's is upsetting for a boy, too. Their penises tends to be smaller than usual and, apart from embarrassment with potential sexual encounters, there is "locker room syndrome", when boys face the rough judgements of their peers.

Peter Cuckow, consultant paediatric urologist at Great Ormond Street Hospital and the Institute of Urology, says: "People are much more critical of their anatomy now, which means operations take place that wouldn't have years ago. I have known families where all the men had hypospadias but the older generations had not had operations because all that was wrong was that their penis looked strange. It still worked, so it wasn't a problem."

Isobel Lockwood says: "I am most worried about how to talk to my son about his penis. I don't want there to be any shame about it, but there's no point pretending nothing's wrong. You want them to be the same. But I do worry about what will happen when he reaches puberty."

Sometimes it is fathers who find it difficult to cope. "I suppose it's because they see it as their manhood," says Dionne Smith, 38. "When my boys went into hospital to have their operation, my ex-partner told his friends that the boys were on holiday. I didn't like that. I told him it wasn't a disease -- or anything to be afraid of."

What is important is that for most boys born with hypospadias, one or two operations when they're very young will correct the condition. It is also true that surgeons expect to see more cases in the future - and unless something changes there is nothing we can really do about it.

Support group: www.hypospadias.co.uk Some names have been changed

Phthalates: what you need to know

What are phthalates?

Phthalates (pronounced "thal-ates") are a group of chemical liquids used as "plasticisers" -- substances that modify the physical properties of materials. Resembling vegetable oil, odourless, they belong to a family of workhorse chemicals that have been in use for 50 years. They are created by the simple reaction of alcohols with phthalic anhydride and the elimination of water.

How do they work?

They are most commonly used to soften polyvinyl chloride (PVC), thus creating a soft and flexible texture.

What are they used for?

Items such as footwear, electrical cables and stationery, as well as medical devices such as tubing and blood bags. The larger-molecule variety is what gives flexibility to some vinyl flooring and children's toys. The smaller-molecule type serves as a fixative for perfumes to slow evaporation and help the scent to linger. Nail varnishes, adhesives and safety glass gain more supple textures thanks to phthalates.

The European Parliament will be finalising legislation this autumn on the use of toxic chemicals in household products. Greenpeace, which is locking horns with the chemical industry lobby over this issue, is working to ensure that the legislation is strong enough to make a difference.

The environmental campaign group wants to see the use of phthalates, a group of chemicals that may be responsible for disrupting hormones during pregnancy, restricted and safer ones used. It also wants the chemical content of products to be clearly stated on labels so that consumers know what to avoid.

Sarah Shoaka of Greenpeace says: "These chemicals are so widespread. We're using ourselves as an experiment and by the time we know the results, it will be too late."

Whether Greenpeace can succeed against the might of the chemicals industry remains to be seen -- and no one knows for certain that, even if they do, the rise in conditions such as hypospadias can be reversed. But it does seem clear that some lifestyle and environmental factors must be addressed.

For a list of products to avoid, see www.greenpeace.org.uk/products/toxics

Copyright 2006 Independent News and Media Limited

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From: Healthy Building Network ............................[This story printer-friendly]
September 13, 2006

OUR GENERATION'S URBAN RENEWAL?

[Rachel's introduction: The same forces that corrupted the urban renewal process in the 1970s -- big-money developers -- are now trying to corrupt the "green building" movement. They are pouring millions of dollars in cash and staff time into controlling -- and changing -- the very definition of "green building."]

By Bill Walsh

Four months after the death of New York's urban visionary Jane Jacobs (May 4, 1916 -- April 25, 2006)[1], I found myself jockeying for position on the Cross Bronx Expressway stretch of Interstate 95.[2] By the time of her death, Jacobs was revered; and the philosophy of urban renewal she opposed was reviled. But I-95's monotonous lacerations through cities from Boston to Washington, DC remain monuments to the limits of Jacobs' contemporary influence. I wondered: how will history judge the structures that will define our generation's green building legacy?

Urban Renewal, like the Green Building movement, was inspired and catalyzed by some of the best and brightest design professionals of its generation. Their persuasive vision promised to link financial success and social well-being within a pleasing aesthetic.

But something went wrong.

A big part of what went wrong is that those with the most to gain or lose financially had the greatest incentives and resources to wrest control of the movement from the merely civic-minded. Even though most projects were subject to public scrutiny and debate, the big moneyed interests routinely prevailed over the protests and counterproposals of architects, planners, community organizations and advocates working in the public interest.

Similar forces threaten the Green Building movement today. Deep pocketed product manufacturers understand the promise of a "green" marketing advantage conferred upon their product by a LEED credit, and the peril of not having a "green" product in today's market. Consequently they are pouring millions of dollars in cash and paid staff hours into controlling -- and changing -- the very definition of "green building."

According to the plastics and chemical industries, there is no plastic that is not a green building product. According to the timber industry, all wood is "good wood." Last year trade associations representing the two industries unleashed an unrelenting attack on LEED at both the state and federal level. They continue to threaten LEED's assimilation into governmental green building standards unless and until their products receive favorable treatment within the Materials and Resources section.

It is in this context that the USGBC Board has directed the membership to consider a proposal this fall that would meet timber industry demands and award a LEED credit to the greenwash wood certification label known as the Sustainable Forestry Initiative (SFI). The Board's move is opposed not only by virtually all public interest groups dedicated to forest protection, but also by wood product manufacturers who have dedicated themselves to the consensus- based Forest Stewardship Council (FSC).

Hundreds of environmental and health advocacy groups also urge reductions in the use of PVC building materials due to the plastic's unique association with human carcinogens, heavy metals and phthalate plasticizers. Most leading green building tools and experts[3] -- our era's Jane Jacobs -- encourage reduced PVC use, contradicting the USGBC leadership's decision to remove a proposed PVC reduction credit from an early draft of LEED-CI (Commercial Interiors). The USGBC created a task force to study the issue. Their final report is also due this fall.

One doesn't need 20-20 hindsight to see the connection. Will the next generation see in our buildings the early expression of green building ideals and ideas? Or will they see in the vinyl and endangered (by then extinct?) hardwoods another monument to big money's desecration of big ideas? The response of the active membership of the USGBC to the course being set by its elected board and professional staff will mark a turning point in the history of this movement.

HEALTHY BUILDING NEWS SOURCES

[1] Renowned author of arguably the most influential book on American urban planning, The Death and Life of Great American Cities, see htt p://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Jacobs

[2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cross-Bronx_Expressway

[3] See, e.g. (not a comprehensive list): Michael Braungart, McDdonough Braungart Design Chemistry; Che Wall, Australian Green Building Council; Jason McLennan, AIA, CEO Cascadia Region Green Building Council; Robin Guenther, FAIA; and the Green Guide for Health Care.

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From: Baltimore Sun .......................................[This story printer-friendly]
September 12, 2006

CITY COMES UP SHORT ON LONGEVITY

[Rachel's introduction: A Harvard study has found "longevity gaps" as big as 30 years. Asian women in Bergen County, N.J., a suburb of New York City, have a life expectancy of 91 years, while Native Americans on or near reservations in South Dakota live an average of 58 years.]

By Frank D. Roylance and Chris Emery

Baltimoreans face the lowest life expectancy of almost any jurisdiction in America, according to a new study by the Harvard School of Public Health.

City residents can expect to live 68.6 years on average, the study found. That is worse than in all but a handful of counties in South Dakota that include impoverished Indian reservations, and there has been little improvement since a study published in 1997.

Longevity in Baltimore is much lower than in affluent Montgomery County, where it was 81.3 years, eighth-highest in the nation and trailing seven Colorado counties only fractionally.

Similar disparities persist in many of the nation's high-risk urban settings even when the effects of high rates of homicide and HIV/AIDS are removed, the study found. And the problem does not appear to lie among the very young or the very old.

Instead, the researchers say, the disparities are best explained by chronic health problems among those ages 15 to 59, including cardiovascular and lung disease, diabetes, the effects of smoking and alcohol use, and injuries, all of which are well-understood and preventable.

That would not come as news to John Adams, 57, a longtime security guard at Johns Hopkins Bayview Medical Center who was forced to retire three years ago because of arthritis.

"City life is tough," he said during lunch yesterday at Northeast Market. "Here in the city, truth be told, black men don't live very long."

His eldest brother, 61, recently had a stroke. Drugs, violence and AIDS, he said, threaten black men from their teens into their 30s. "If you can make it past then," he said, "you can live to be real old."

Norma Jackson, who said only that she was in her 70s, observed that older people seemed to be living longer but that young people seem to die more often.

"It's the times," she said. "They don't take care of themselves. They drink too much. They're doing drugs. There are gangs."

Joshua M. Sharfstein, Baltimore's health commissioner, said the city "is not where we want it to be." Despite recent gains against HIV, venereal disease and homicides, he said, the city has "very serious health needs."

"The intermediate ages face special risk in Baltimore, and the safety net systems to care for them need to be strengthened," he said. "It's an age group that traditionally gets less support from both government and the nonprofit world, which is naturally inclined to look at kids and the elderly."

The Harvard study "does sharpen the focus on the need to look at the great number of people in the middle," Sharfstein said. "It's a pretty interesting finding."

When the first Harvard study appeared in 1997, Dr. Peter Beilenson, then the city health commissioner, acknowledged serious public health problems. He also said the city was being compared unfairly with cities such as Detroit, Cleveland, Atlanta and Newark, N.J., that, unlike Baltimore, are part of larger counties with more affluent suburbs.

The new peer-reviewed study was published today in the online journal PLoS Medicine. (PloS stands for Public Library of Science.)

The lead author is Christopher J.L. Murray of the Harvard School of Public Health. Others are from Harvard and the University of California, San Francisco. Their work was sponsored by the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Association of Schools of Public Health and the National Institute on Aging.

The researchers gathered and derived population, age, race and gender data from the 1980 and 1990 censuses. More recent data through 2001 were acquired from the National Center for Health Statistics. The reports' longevity averages are from 1999, the most recent available. Other data came from surveys by the CDC and the World Health Organization.

The study is a follow-up to a similar one in 1997, and the Baltimore statistics show few gains. Life expectancy for Baltimore men, which fell from 64.6 years to 63.2 years between 1980 and 1990, recovered only part of that loss by 1999, rising to 63.8 years.

For women in the city, life expectancy was essentially unchanged at 73.4 years.

In Montgomery County, women live an average of 83 years, almost four years longer than men.

"I think it's lifestyle," said Fred Shapiro, 74, a resident of Leisure World retirement community in Rockville. Shapiro ate breakfast at the Panera restaurant in nearby Aspen Hill Shopping Center yesterday with several of his tennis partners after rain washed out their usual Monday matches.

He credits the county's greater longevity to better education, economic status and community resources.

"There is an availability of a lot of different facilities, both intellectual and physical," he said.

Richard Helfrich, the county's deputy health officer, said in a statement that "despite the good news, we remain committed to improving the long-term health of our residents."

"This includes addressing disparities that still exist among different ethnic groups in such areas such as infant mortality, cancer and access to health care services," he said.

Nationally, Baltimore ranked seventh from the bottom, behind the South Dakota counties. In the 1997 report, the city was third from the bottom.

Washington, D.C., finished 49th from the bottom (out of 2,072 counties or county equivalents), with an average life expectancy of 72 years. Montgomery County was eighth from the top, behind seven affluent counties in Colorado ski country.

The methodology that Beilenson complained about nine years ago hasn't changed, Murray said. It's the way the localities report their data to the states.

That puts Baltimore at a disadvantage in the rankings, he said, but also illuminates the disparities in life expectancy.

"It's just remarkable how bad levels of mortality are in these counties at the bottom," he said.

The Harvard study found "longevity gaps" as big as 30 years. Asian women in Bergen County, N.J., a suburb of New York City, have a life expectancy of 91 years, while Native Americans on or near reservations in South Dakota live an average of 58 years.

Among the striking disparities are that the longest-lived Americans can expect to live at least as long as the longevity champions in places such as Iceland and Japan. But other places rank closer to Third World countries.

The 15.4-year gap in life expectancy between Asian men and urban black men in America parallels the gulf between long-lived Icelandic men and those in Belarus and Uzbekistan.

The 12.8-year difference in longevity between Asian women and black women living in the rural South compares with the gap between women in Japan and those in Fiji, Nicaragua and Lebanon.

Among other findings:

** The longevity gap between black men in high-risk urban areas and other groups widened significantly during the late 1980s and early 1990s, mostly because of high HIV and homicide rates.

** Life expectancies for blacks in high-risk urban environments are comparable to those in Russia and sub-Saharan Africa. In 2001, a black 15-year-old was more than three times more likely to die before age 60 than an Asian-American was.

** One of the largest gains in life expectancy has been among the group the researchers called "Black Middle America" -- African- Americans who live outside high-risk urban communities or the Mississippi Valley and the Deep South.

** Men have been closing the longevity gap with women in almost all of the groups.

Murray said one explanation might be tobacco consumption, which is falling faster among men than among women.

"In any given place, higher income groups have better health," Murray said.

But not always. Low-income whites living in the Northern Plains lived four years longer, on average, than low-income whites in the Mississippi Valley.

Sharfstein noted a "huge gap" in Baltimore, both in providing health insurance and in supporting community health centers that offer primary health care.

"In Massachusetts or in D.C., there are funding streams to help care for the uninsured. In Maryland there just aren't. It has the effect of reducing access to health care," he said.

He said the city is preparing to start programs that can improve primary care for people with cardiovascular disease.

"Our goal is to identify the programs that can be implemented in Baltimore and then develop a consensus that they need to be funded" at the city, state and private level, he said.

Narrowing the longevity gap is "a simple, pragmatic issue," Murray said. In addition to shortening lives, chronic illnesses increase health care costs for employers and taxpayers.

"It's both the right thing to do for our fellow citizens and the right thing to do from a straightforward economic perspective," he said.

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From: Contra Costa Times (California) ....................[This story printer-friendly]
September 11, 2006

STUDY: MAN RESPONSIBLE FOR ROUGHER HURRICANES

[Rachel's introduction: "The human induced build-up of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere appears to be the primary force behind increased hurricane activity," said oceanographer Robert Correll of the American Meteorological Society.]

By Betsy Mason

Livermore, Calif. -- The results are in -- mankind is largely responsible for the rise in hurricane intensity in recent years.

A new study being released today, and led by Lawrence Livermore Laboratory, found man's unmistakable fingerprint on the pattern of increasingly powerful hurricanes in both the Atlantic and Pacific oceans.

"The human induced build-up of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere appears to be the primary force behind increased hurricane activity," said oceanographer Robert Correll of the American Meteorological Society.

A growing number of studies during the last year has convincingly shown that hurricanes have become more destructive during the last three decades, and that this is due to rising sea-surface temperatures.

And now, a team of 19 climate scientists from 10 different institutions led by Livermore Lab's Benjamin Santer, has closed the loop. The study used computer-generated climate models to reveal that natural climate fluctuations, also known as climate noise, cannot account for the upswing in ocean temperature.

"This clearly shows that the observed increases in ocean temperatures in these Atlantic and Pacific hurricane breeding grounds simply can't be explained without positing a large human affect," Santer said. "Climate noise alone just won't cut it."

Most climate scientists agree that man has contributed to global warming through emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases. But the specific nature and causes of the warming varies in different parts of the globe. Some spots may have heated up naturally without help from carbon emissions while others may have gotten a bigger boost from man.

Previous studies have looked at the average warming over large parts of the globe, such as entire oceans. But Santer's team used virtually every climate model developed so far in the world, 22 in all, to analyze all of the possible causes behind the heating up of the sea surface in the specific parts of the oceans where hurricanes are born.

Livermore Lab keeps an archive of the results from the world's climate models, so the raw materials for the study were already at Santer's fingertips.

"We're sitting on top of a wealth of information," he said. "It's like a scientific gold mine."

The team compared results from models that tried to recreate the actual sea-surface temperatures using only natural forces such as the sun and volcanic eruptions, with results from the same models when human greenhouse gas emissions were included.

The results from the experiments that used only natural forces didn't come close to reality. But when human, or anthropogenic, influence was included, the results closely matched the actual temperatures recorded over the last century.

"We found that the dominant cause for the modeled sea-surface temperature changes in these (hurricane formation) regions was anthropogenic increases in the concentration of greenhouse gases," said co-author Tom Wigley of the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colo.

The team estimated there is a very good chance that as much as two- thirds of the temperature increase can be attributed to man. The research appears today in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

While it is impossible to pin Hurricane Katrina, or any other single event, on carbon emissions and the warming oceans, it is clear that boosting the temperature makes powerful hurricanes more likely, Santer said.

The ocean temperature in the hurricane nurseries has gone up less than one degree over the last century, but the number of category 4 and 5 hurricanes has nearly doubled over the last three decades.

This doesn't bode well for the future, said team member Michael Wehner, an atmospheric scientist at Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory. He is using the same models to project ocean temperatures into the future.

Wehner looked at several possible scenarios including continued unabated carbon emissions as well as drastically curbed emissions.

Even if we had stopped emitting greenhouse gases yesterday, it will still get warmer in the future because it takes time for the carbon to affect temperatures, he said.

"It's safe to say that even the conservative estimates of the 21st century will see significantly larger increases in the temperature in this region that we examined than we've already seen," he said. "You ain't seen nothing yet."

The worst-case scenario of undiminished future carbon emissions, which predict ocean temperatures will rise as much as nine degrees by the end of the century, could be catastrophic, Wehner said.

"The results give me cause for concern," Santer said. " We can't stick our heads in the sand here."

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From: Planet Ark .........................................[This story printer-friendly]
September 4, 2006

HARVARD PROFESSOR E.O. WILSON REACHES OUT TO FAITH-BASED GROUPS

[Rachel's introduction: The Harvard professor sees science and religion as allies for averting the mass extinction of species now under way.]

By Daniel Trotta

NEW YORK -- Scientist and Pulitzer Prize-winning author E.O. Wilson is out to save life on Earth -- literally -- and as a secular humanist has decided to enlist people of religious faith in his mission.

The Harvard professor sees science and religion as potential allies for averting the mass extinction of the species being caused by man, as he argues in his latest book, "The Creation: An Appeal to Save Life on Earth" (W.W. Norton), due out on Tuesday.

Asked whether he could unite two groups with clashing world views, Wilson immediately responded, "I know I can."

Among people of religious faith, "There is a potentially powerful commitment to conservation -- saving the creation -- once the connection is made and once the scientists are willing to form an alliance," Wilson told Reuters in a telephone interview on Thursday.

"There are two world views in conflict -- religious and secular -- but yet they can meet in friendship on one of the most important issues of this century," he said.

Wilson, 77, wrote "The Creation" in the form of a series of letters to an imaginary South Baptist minister -- just the opposite of preaching to the converted.

While the scientist believes in evolution, the evangelical Christian interprets the Bible as the literal word of God.

"I may be wrong, you may be wrong. We may both be partly right," Wilson writes.

"Does this difference in worldview separate us in all things? It does not," he goes on, drawing on his former experience as a Southern Baptist to find common ground.

Wilson, who won Pulitzers for general non-fiction in 1979 and 1991, documents how human activity has accelerated the mass extinction of species and says habitat preservation is most urgent. He writes that the world's 25 most endangered hotspots could be saved with a one-time payment of US$30 billion, a relative pittance compared to the wealth that nature generates for man.

In the Reuters interview, Wilson called the religious community in the United States a "powerful majority." The Southern Baptist Convention says on its Web site it has 16 million members in 42,000 churches.

Wilson is no longer one, having drifted away from religion in his youth. Wilson considers himself neither atheist nor agnostic but a "provisional deist."

"I'm willing to accept the possibility that there is some kind of intelligent force beyond our current understanding," he said.

As such he said he gets a "uniformly warm response" from Southern Baptists ministers, and sees mainstream public opinion as getting greener.

"The public opinion in the United States has become pastel green, and the green seems to be deepening," he said. "This could be just foolish optimism, but we could be approaching the turning point."

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Rachel's Democracy & Health News (formerly Rachel's Environment & Health News) highlights the connections between issues that are often considered separately or not at all.

The natural world is deteriorating and human health is declining because those who make the important decisions aren't the ones who bear the brunt. Our purpose is to connect the dots between human health, the destruction of nature, the decline of community, the rise of economic insecurity and inequalities, growing stress among workers and families, and the crippling legacies of patriarchy, intolerance, and racial injustice that allow us to be divided and therefore ruled by the few.

In a democracy, there are no more fundamental questions than, "Who gets to decide?" And, "How DO the few control the many, and what might be done about it?"

Rachel's Democracy and Health News is published as often as necessary to provide readers with up-to-date coverage of the subject.

Editors:
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Tim Montague - tim@rachel.org

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