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Exposure to environmental toxins an everyday occurrence

Minnesota Spokesman Recorder
March 27, 2009
By Susan Budig

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Children in communities of color are the most vulnerable

In the refurbished Georgian revival dwelling that now houses the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy (IATP), we squeezed into a room not meant to hold the 70 people who had gathered. The backgrounds of the audience members ranged from social advocate to politician to childcare worker and more, but our common interest was in the health of today’s child who is exposed to environmental toxins.

On the Monday evening of February 2, IATP provided information regarding the latest findings of our toxic environment and how toxins impact the public, particularly children. We learned where toxins in our environment originate, how toxins manifest in our bodies, and how to avoid exposure to toxins.

Dr. David Wallinga, director of the food and health program at IATP, reminded us that back in the 1950s Rachel Carson first publicly established the link between chemicals and their affects on environment. Carson, who died from breast cancer, warned the public about the long-term effects of misusing pesticides. She authored the ground-breaking environmental book, Silent Spring.

Carson was not the only academic advocate for the environment. Robert Bullard’s 1990 work, Dumping in Dixie, highlighted the disproportional environmental toxicity burden that communities of color bear.

Bullard is often described as the father of environmental justice. In an online interview, Bullard stressed that environmental hazards, whose effects are more profound in the Black communities, are worse for children of color.

"Poor children in urban areas are poisoned in their homes. And when they go to school, they get another dose. And when they go outside and play, they get another dose. It’s a slow-motion disaster:

the most vulnerable population in our society is children, and the most vulnerable children are children of color. If we protect the most vulnerable in our society — these children — we protect everybody," explained Bullard in an interview with Gregory Dicum in the March of 2006 issue of Grist, an online environmental journal.

Minnesota's Secretary of State, Mark Ritchie, one of the founders and 20 president of IATP, was present. Keynote speaker Dr. John Peterson Myers thanked Ritchie profusely for his work on the environment. Yet, despite our awareness and progressive actions, Myers noted, "We are living in a generation where kids are less healthy than their parents."

Along with co-authors Dr. Theo Colborn and Dianne Dumanoski, Myers wrote Our Stolen Future (1996), a book that explores the scientific basis for how contamination threatens fetal development. To accentuate his point, Myers quizzed the audience: "How many have dealt with breast cancer, prostate cancer, ADHD, Parkinson’s, or infertility?" Hands shot up throughout the room, often more than once or even twice. "A portion of these diseases are due to environmental contaminants and are preventable," suggested Myers.

Therefore, Myers continues, "[While] it matters what genes you inherit, the environmental factors that turn genes on and off [have] equal importance.” Diseases that are linked to the influence of genes are diseases that are vulnerable to environmental causes.

What's more, said Kathleen Schuler, MPH, senior policy analyst at IATP speaking with MSR after the lecture, "Communities of color, low income communities and indigenous people all across the world are dealing with disproportionate impacts from environmental pollutants."

Specifically, Schuler said, "Toxic chemicals like bisphenol A, found in everyday consumer products, affect everyone. However, for communities of color, low income communities and indigenous people, these common exposures to chemicals in products are in addition to disproportionately higher exposures to industrial pollutants, Superfund sites, air pollution, work exposures and pollutants in fish and other foods," explained Schuler.

Consequently, the impact of toxins might intensify in an individual depending on not only exposure, but also the level of resistance the person has established due to healthy diet, clean environment, and access to preventative health measures.

Prevention, as indicated in IATP's literature, begins at the embryonic stage of life. That a developing fetus is affected by its mother's consumption of food and beverage is not revelatory, but as suggested by organizations dedicated to health and environmental causes, contaminants are everywhere and these adversely affect the fetus.

Not only concerned with residual pesticides and other chemicals that remain on foods, we are now challenged to use proper storage, cooking and serving containers. The myriad ways that harmful toxics enter into our lives and bodies can become overwhelming.

Schuler addressed the issue of low-income populations regarding contamination prevention. "These groups, already carrying a higher burden of pollution, often don't have the resources to make safer consumer choices. For example, low-income families might not be able to afford organic products or shop at specialty stores that carry safer products. 'Dollar' stores and secondhand stores carry more affordable products, but the safety of these products is less certain," she said.

Deb Torraine, education program coordinator/instructor at Environmental Justice Advocates of Minnesota (EJAM), a grassroots environmental justice organization based at the Minneapolis Urban League, emphasized the difficulties of obtaining information on environmental hazards for communities of color.

"There might be an obstacle to acquiring information," said Torraine. "For instance, a person might have two or even three jobs and children. When will they have time to watch the news? I don’t often see information specifically about these toxicities in newspapers aimed at communities of color.

"African immigrants and Hispanics, et cetera, whose first language is not English have trouble reading labels and understanding the codes on plastics in order to avoid toxic leaching. It really has to do with class. It's an economic disparity," insisted Torraine.

Now actively involved in primary research on the impact of endocrine disruption on human health, Myers said, "Traditional toxicology and epidemiology [experts] are highly likely to have underestimated contaminants on our health," leaving the consumer to muddle through information that’s often too vast and complex to fully and authoritatively grasp.

Myers emphasized repeatedly that, "Environmental factors impact at everyday levels — levels people had become accustomed to calling "normal" background levels — matter greatly."

Avoiding toxins makes the most sense. According to IATP literature, "There is growing scientific consensus that even very small doses of pesticides can adversely affect people, especially during the vulnerable periods of in-utero and early childhood development when organ systems are maturing most quickly, when toxic defenses are least established, and when early programming of risks for chronic disease later in life takes place."

IATP's website, www.iatp.org, lists dozens of steps consumers can take to lessen or avoid completely their exposure to toxins. Agencies such as the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency, found at www.pca.state.mn.us, also disseminate information about decreasing toxic risks. Both IATP and PCA are available by phone (651-296-6300 and 800-657-3864 respectively) or visiting their office.

Ample information about environmental health issues is provided by Environmental Health News both in print and electronically at www.environmentalhealthnews.org.

NOTICE: In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving this information for research and educational purposes.