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ORUM Sign ofthe Times? The TruthAbout Toxics BY DR. PETER MONTAGUE The New York Times baffled many of its last article offered "principles" that could readers lastApril with a five-part front put America's environmental programs page series entitled "What Price Cleanup?"b.ack on track: The series hammered home one main Requiring cost-benefit analysis for a message: America's environmental protec regulation before it is issued. (The Times tion programs have gone awry, wasting seems not to know that President Reagan billions of dollars on non-problems, such signed executive order 12291 in 1981 as low levels of toxic chemicals in our requiring just such cost-benefit analyses, environment, because Congress has ig which are conducted routinely by govern nored scientific experts, responding in ment regulators today.) stead to public panic. Said the Tim es, Increasing spending on problems now The toxic waste program stands as the regarded as more important, like protect most wasteful effort of all" because "many ing endangered plants and animals, and of the [chemical dump] sites pose little if reducing financing for less dangerous any danger." problems like cleaning up toxic waste They repeated this theme in various sites. ways, quoting unnamed "experts" who Giving businesses and cities, more asked whether the nation is "wasting flexibility in deciding how to comply with billions of dollars regulating substances' an environmental standard-a principle that might pose little risk." One expert so vague as to be nearly meaningless. they did quote was Dr. Richard Goodwin, Environmentalists all across the coun whom the Times identified as a "private try are scratching their heads, wondering environmental engineer," who said we're whythe Times would choose to whitewash wasting money on toxic dumps. The Times toxic chemicals just now'. After all, evi failed to mention that Goodwin is a consul dence accumulated during recent years tant to the incineration industry who has indicates that many toxic chemicals don't conducted a campaign to have toxic in merely cause cancer, but cinerator ash exempted from federal and actually mimic state laws. In case any doubts lingered, the Times' hormones, especially estrogen, the female' sex hormone. Hormones are chemical switches that trigger cascades of chemical reactions inside the bodies of all birds, fish and mammals. Hormones control growth and development, sexual cycles, moods and behavior. The Times itself reported this emerging view of toxic chemicals as hormone mimickers a year ago, under the headline, "New Effect of Pollutants: Hor mone Mayhem." People in industrialized societies all carry a burden of toxic chemicals within their bodies from everyday exposure to pesticides, solvents, paints and industrial poisons discharged into the environment. As a result, toxic chemicals that mimic hormones are present in some Americans at levels that are 10 to one million times higher than our naturally-occurring hor mones. It seems reasonable, therefore, to ' wonderwhether such chemicals are affect ing us. This new view of toxic chemicals emerged from wildlife studies around the Great Lakes, where fish, birds and mam- 00006? mals have had their reproductive systems damaged by exposure to low levels of pesticides and industrial poisons dis charged into the environment. Some spe cies failed to reproduce while others exhibited unusual sexual development such as female sex organs in male herring gulls and female pairing in birds, resulting in unfertilized eggs. The wildlife studies gave rise to studies of laboratory animals subjected to low levels of hormone-like chemicals such as DDT, PCBs and dioxin. When it became clear that these laboratory studies were confirming damage to the reproductive systems of various mammals, scientists wondered whether humans might be ad versely affected as well. In 1992. a study of women living within a mile of toxic dumps in 20 counties in New York State revealed a 12 percent increase in the rate of major birth defects in their children, compared to children of women living further away. (This study \cumulating scientific evidence indicates that low levels of many toxic chemicals are more dangerous than they once seemed, certainly for wildlife and perhaps for humans as weil.,; did not pinpoint any particular chemi cals.) That same year, a study' of breast tissue from 40 women with breast cancer showed unusually high levels of DDT, PCBs and other chlorinated chemicals, compared to breast tissue from women not having breast cancer. The-National Institute of Environmental Health Sci ences has now undertaken a much larger study of breast tissue from women with breast cancer, to see if the earlier findings can be confirmed. In sum. accumulating scientific evi dence indicates that low levels of many toxic chemicals are more dangerous than they once seemed, certainly for wildlife and perhaps for humans as well. It seems like an odd time for the Times to begin a campaign to convince the public that toxic chemicals are benign. There are two theories being argued now among environmentalists. One is simply that, as owner or past owner of several paper mills in Ontario, Canada (which are notorious sources of chlor inated toxins, including dioxin), the Times itself has been accused of major pollution. So it might serve the Times's self-interest to try to make toxic chemicals seem safe. It is true that two Canadian Indian tribes have sued the newspaper for S1.3 billion, claiming damage from dioxin in fish and waters downstream from a paper mill the Times used to own. The second theory is that the Times is helping the petrochemical industry and the federal government, both of which would very' much like the public to accept increasing contamination by toxic chemi cals. As Dr. Barry Commoner pointed out in 1991, the petrochemical industry dis charges roughly 200 million tons of hazard ous wastes directly into the environment each year. At S100 per ton, it would cost $20 billion to incinerate all these wastes. But after-tax profits for the entire industry in 1986 were only $2.6 billion, so the pet rochemical industry simply cannot afford modern waste treatment and must con tinue to discharge massive quantities of poisons directly into the environment, if the industry is to survive in its present form. The federal government has a related problem. After spending more than $12 billion dollars since Superfund began in 1980, the government has managed to clean up fewer than 100 chemical dump sites. Furthermore, the extent of the problem is enormous. There may be as many as 439.000 contaminated sites, plus six million underground storage tanks, 15 to 25 percent of which are already leaking. Since cleanup efforts have largely failed, the government has two choices: to either excavate contaminated sites and store the toxic soil in immense steel-reinforced concrete buildings (thus creating an em barrassing monument to technical fail ure), or convince the public to accept low levels of toxins in their soil, air. water, homes and bodies. According to this view, the Times is just doing its part to help convince the public that industrial poisons are our friends. H DR. PETER MONTAGUE isfounder and director of the Environmental Research Foundation, and editor of Rachel's Hazardous Waste News, both based in Annapolis. Maryland. . . should be read by everyone concerned with the future of our planet." --John H. Chaffee, U.S. Senator The Gnat Is Older than Man Global Environment and Human Agenda Christopher D. Stone Christopher Stone presents a clear overview of the perils facing humans around the world. This provocative book-- and the thought-provoking plans it promotes-- will raise the environ ^ Amental debate to a new level. * "Christopher Stone has the rare ability to blend idealism and realism. Like such classics as Silmnt Spring and A Sand County Almanac, his book has the power to revolutionize the w a y we think about protecting the global environment." --Durwood Zaelke, President, Center for International Environmen tal la w "Christopher Stone is sensitive, rigorous, and visionary---all at once. This book is a remarkable achievement."--Sir Geoffrey Paimer, Former Prime Minister of New Zealand Cio4h: $ 21.95 ISBN 0-691-03250-5 Princeton University Press OROERS 800-777-472 OR FROM YOUR LOCAL BOOKSTORE emaga^ o0 6 8