Document 6w56pVjLwE8E9ky4Mx9EMkMed

% adly Cancer] : gases. Train signs chloride products for indoor r banning all vinyl uses. ____ HOUSTON CHRONICLE -, S\E\C*TKIJON1.4,*/ HOUSTON, TEXAS, SUNDAY, MAY 12, 1974 C Seven Urgent Investigations Going3SI^.W ..ISBCK' KMSKJsSIS Aerosol Gas Causes Deadly Cane BY JOHN SAAR 1974. Los Ansoist Times' Wuntnetan Post News Service Washington -- Before U was identified earlier this year as the carcinogenic killer of 12 industrial workers vinyl chlo ride was accepted as a cheap and almost innocuous gas with a variety of uses. Pressurized into consumer-sale aerosol cans, it served as the propel lant for insecticides and hair- With responsibility for gov erning vinyl chloride use fall ing between the overlapping jurisdictions of several federal agencies -- all adjusting at differing speeds to new knowl edge on the gas -- some important gaps still exist. The recent history of vinyl chloride shows a helter-skelter pattern of scientific initiative and governmental response; April 24, citing those tests and the easy availability of sprays; as the base ingredient Jan. 20, Dr. Joseph A. in a common plastic -- polyvi nyl chloride (PVC1 -- it is omnipresent as bottles, pipes, wrapping, car upholstery, phonograph records and sun Wagoner, director of NIOSH's field investigation division, begins an epidemiological study of four long-established dry other products. PVC manufacturing plants. At ith dramatic speed over this time the research is oc e last few months, our cupying 18 out of 32 people on understanding ly compliant of the slave agpapsarehnahtsis staff. One branch has shut been unpleasantly changedd.own work on .every other Unmasked by an Italian re project to handle the vinyl search chemist, it now stands convicted in the deaths by a rare and invariably fatal liver cancer of the 12 plastics work ers in the last 13 years. 6,500 Workers The relationship between vinyl chloride and angiosarco ma -- a liver cancer which generally kills an average of only 21 persons a year in the United States -- is the latest of the chemical time bombs to threaten our industrial work ers and. if the forebodings of some researchers are borne out, it may be the worst That suspicion is under high priority investigation by at least seven governmental and medical research groups. They want to know exactly what the health risks are for approximately 6.500 people who work in 3? plants where vhui chloride is polymerized ^^polyvinylchloride. ^B^ond that, there is an ur gent need to establish the haz ards, if any, for thousands of others who fashion PVC into products and for the public at large which uses them. Found First in Mice chloride emergency. In mid-February, Italian scientist Cesare Maltoni told a hurriedly assembled OSHA hearing that two out of 67 rats subjected to daily dosages of vinyl chloride developed angiosarcomas. At a very high level of 6,000 parts per million, 11 out of 72 rats de veloped the rare tumors. How ever. tile bombshell in Maltoni's findings that led to an im mediate emergency revision of the industrial atmosphere levels then standing at 500 PPM was the statement that some rats developed the tumors at 250 PPM. Feb. 21, the FDA was asked by the health research group to ban and name cos metics employing vinyi chlo ride as a propellant on the basis of "well-documented carcinogenicity.'' A similar petition went to EPA Adminis trator Russell Train, calling for suspension of vinyl chlo ride products regulated by the EPA. The Health Research Group (HRG) is a privately funded organization. March 23. responding to substitute gases. Train signs `(Aloride products an order banning all vinyl T-uses. FO 3345 346 LursTi al a piutlt,* ------- - -- fining pace since animal re ades, the EPA states it has searchers found several no listing of products contain months ago that mice and ing vinyl chloride and is send rats dosed with the chemical ing a warning letter to all 35.- developed angiosarcoma. This 000 pesticide manufacturers was followed by discovery of suggesting substitution of the same type of rare tumor another gas. among workers with vinyl March 26. HRG -- unsuc- chlorine. cssful in persuading Clairol to Last January. B. F. Good withdraw vinyl chloride-pow rich announced the death of ered hairsprays from the three longterm employes at market -- takes the dispute to the Louisville polyvinyl chlo the FDA in a letter to the ride plant with the significant administrator. Dr. Alexander addendum that the company N\ Schmidt. The substance of was investigating whether the the HRG's case was Clairol's deaths "were related to occu admission that users of the pational causes." sprays were exposed to 200 . Since then, 94 consumer Dom for one-minute duration. products containing vinyl chlo The HRG director. Dr. Sidney ride either have been volun M. Wolfe, reproved the FDA. tarily withdrawn by manufac- "Whereas this inaction by the f ` Hirers or banned from sale by FDA must be welcome and the EPA and FDA. These in financially beneficial to cluded 41 aerosol pesticides Bristol-Myers and its Clairol for household use, 26 home subsidiary, it may be fatal for ^ and professional hairsprays, many unsuspecting citizens of 13 deodorants and antiper- this country." spirants. April 3. The FDA an . Emergency Hole Changes nounces action to end the use ;Tha radical change in atti of vinyl chloride in products tude toward the colorless gas under its control. The order is reflected in Department of concerns three manufacturers Labor regulations on the expo and about 50 products. Calling sure of industrial workers. the hazard to hairspray users Previous regulations limiting "extremely remote," Clairol workers to 500 parts per mil Inc. nevertheless announces lion were based on avoiding combustible concentrations and toxic levels sufficient to cause dizziness and nausea. A new emergency standard limiting exposure to 50 parts per million is now in force and the Occupational and Safety Health Administration K5SHA) plans to seek a permanent standard of no the recall of 100,000 cans of Summer Blonde and Miss Clairol aerosol hair sprays. April 5, in response to a March 11 recommendation from NIOSH that the accept able industrial level should be zero, the Department of Labor announces an Interim emer gency level of 50 ppm. measureable leveL April 17, the EPA identi The perceptions of vinyl fies 20 products containing chloride as dangerous in any vinyl chloride, leaves 21 more amount leads to comparison unnamed pending manufactur with the levels accepted as ers' approval of their publica reasonable by the chemical tion. industry as late as January of April 19, EPA Administra this year. Vinyl chloride read tor Russell Train hears the re ings declared by the compa sult of crucial experimentation nies themselves ranged in by his own people. Under test, ordinary production from 20 to pesticides on public sale rais 100 ppm. But occasional very ed the vinyl chloride concen high readings were admitted. tration in a small room such The plastics division of Uni as a bathroom to 400 ppm in royal at Painesville. Ohio, for a 30-second burst. Without light instance, told NIOSH re or ventilation, the researchers searchers that workers scaling reported to their chief, the the vessels in which PVC is concentration of gas diminish made were briefly exposed to ed by oniy 1 per cent in a levels as high as 1,600 ppm. four-day period. ** *** One-Third of U.S. Output From Houston Area A few weeks ago, a Wash ington scientific group, the Center for Science in the Pub lic Interest, died the Houston- chloride present in the air. Harris County pollution chief Waiter A. Quebedeaux, however, was critical of the '