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eMiiountiiif Volume 13, Number 8 6t\ -- THE NEW-CAR SMELL By Kevin P. Shea 2 EDITOR Sheldon Novick CONSULTING EDITOR Virginia Brodine SCIENTIFIC DIRECTOR Kevin P. Shea ASSOCIATE EDITOR Julian McCauIl f- ASSISTANT EDITOR Judith G. Meyer - BUSINESS MANAGER Nancy Shea Phthalates, a class of chemicals generically related to thalidomide, are used to make common plastics soft and flexible. These "plasticizers" evaporate from the plastic interiors of cars, creating the familiar "new-car smell." They and other plastic components have been implicated in the sometimes fatal shock-lung syndrome that follows massive blood transfusions.; in laboratory experiments they have affected the nervous system and fetal development of animals; and, as usual, no one knows the effects of exposing millions of people to their vapors. . THE POLLUTION OF ASIA 10 By M. Taghi Farvar, Margaret L. Thomas, Howard Boksenbaum, ART DIRECTOR Robert Charles Smith NEWS EDITOR Terri Aaronson PHOTOGRAPH RESEARCH Dianne Hoener STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER Daniel T. Magidson and Theodore N. Soule .... . Asian students recently met with Western scientists and found serious dis agreements over environmental problems and their causes in Asia. Western ers recommend slowing population and even economic growth, while Asian students and officials emphasize the need for development; a few question the Western technology which lies at the crux of the dilemma. Environment is published monthly except bimonthly January/February and July/August by the Committee for Environmental Information, 438 N. Skinker Boulevard, St. Louis, Missouri 63130. An official publication of Scientists' Institute for Public Information. METALS IN THE AIR 18 By Henry A. Schroeder Twenty-two metals found in the air are derived principally from the burning of coal and oil; cadmium, nickel, and lead present real public health hazards. Nickel is present in coal, but is also added to gasoline, a practice which substantially increases the hazard from this toxic metal, which has been implicated in cancer of the lungs and respiratory tract. Subscription rates are as follows: I year $8.50, 2 years $14.50, 3 years $20.00,student 56.00, foreign subscriptions $1.50 per year additional. ALDRIN AND DIELDRIN 33 Additional information regarding bulk rates and overseas and air mail rates may be By Charles F. Wurster obtained from the Circulation Manager. Contributions are tax deductible. Checks may be made payable to Environment or Committcefor Environmental information. Two closely related pesticides which present a greater hazard to man and animals than DDT, which they resemble, are under consideration for removal Subscription and change-of-addrcss information should be addressed to Circulation Department, Environment, Post Office Box 755, Bridgeton, Missouri 63044. i Allow two months for changes of address. Indexed in Readers* Guide to Periodical from the market. They are highly resistant to breakdown, are distributed throughout the world, and are increasingly concentrated in food chains. Their effects range from the inhibition of photosynthesis at extremely low concentrations to induction of cance^-in experimental animals. Literature beginning January 1968. Entitled Scientist and Citizen previous to the January/February 1969 issue. Microfilm copies available from Xerox DEPARTMENTS University Microfilms, 300 North Zceb Road, Ann Arbor, Michigan 48106. SPECTRUM 25 Back volumes ($ 15.00 each) and back issues are available from Maxwell Reprint Company, Fairview LETTERS 46 Park, Elmsford, New York 10523. Copyright 1971 Committecfor Environmental Information. No portion of this magazine may be reproduced in any form without the REVIEWS THE JAUNDICED EYE 50 53 express permission of the publishers. Editorial correspondence and manuscripts should be addressed to The Editor, Environment, 438 N. Skinker Blvd,, St. Louis, Missouri 63130. Second-class postage paid at St. Louis, Missouri. B DSW 588289 STLCOPCB4093625 w iI '1 3\t By Kevin P. Shea 4 |he pleasant smell of the new car; the annoying but the other was quickly identified as glycolyl phthalate oily film that appears on the inner surface of its (gp). Further work showed that gp arose as a metabolite X windshield; the slightly slick .texture the steering* wheel acquires when the car has been parked in (a material formed by the chemical breakdown of another . compound) of a phthalate plasticizer leached from the the hot sun with windows closed; these are minor sigpnslastic tubing used to deliver the blood to the isolated rat that a variety of chemicals are evaporating from the plas livers. Further testing, in which Dr. Jaeger and Dr. Rubin tics with which the interiors of new cars are lined. Sitting deliberately introduced the plasticizer into the apparatus, in a new car on a hot day may provide the most intensive confirmed the conversion of the plasticizer mlheTht fivers exposure to the vapors of plasticizers, stabilizers, and to its metabolite, GP. other components of plastics that the ordinary citizen is Dr. Jaeger and Dr. Rubin then tested another formula likely to encounter, but so nearly ubiquitous are these tion of polyvinyl tubing containing a different plasticizer. materials that their effects have begun to come under This one, di (2-ethylhexyl) phthalate (dehp) was also found question in situations varying from battlefield blood-trans in the plasma after it had circulated through the tubing fusions to outer-space probes. alone, but it was not found when circulated through the The assumption that plastics, particularly polyvinyl chlo livers. Furthermore, no metabolite of dehp could be de- ride (pvc) plastics, are inert is so widespread that they tected. It was found that unlike the first plasticizer, dehp are routinely used in the storage of blood, in various was not metabolized, but rather it was accumulated entirely medical appliances, in scientific instruments, and, of course, in the liver in an unmetabolized form. in hundreds of thousands of consumer products. This led the two scientists to further studies on the Recent discoveries, however, have shown evidence that ability of various fluids to extract plasticizers from plastic components of the plastics may be the cause of an increas materials. They found that simple salt solutions did extract ingly common and sometimes fatal syndrome, called "shock plasticizers, while a 4 percent solution of bovine serum lung," which follows massive blood-transfusions. Labora albumin was able to extract measurable amounts of dehp. tory experiments have identified a number of other possible toxic effects of pvc plastic components, including Release Into Stored Blood effects on the nervous systems of laboratory animals and on developing chick and rat embryos. Most frequently More significant, however, was the finding that whole implicated are compounds called phthalates, generically human blood, stored in polyvinyl chloride blood bags, related to thalidomide, which are used as plasticizers. could also extract the plasticizer dehp. It was found that The first widely publicized indication that polyvinyl at the end of the maximum storage, period of 21 days, chloride plastics were not completely inactive began with blood stored in polyvinyl chloride bags contained 5 to 7 some unusual observations made by Dr. Rudolf J. Jaeger milligrams of dehp per 100 milliliters of blood (50 to 70 and Dr. Robert J. Rubin at Johns Hopkins School of ppm). Dr. Rubin has calculated2 that under these conditions Hygiene and Public Health.1 The two scientists were studying isolated rat livers in an apparatus in which the blood being passed through the livers was delivered via polyvinyl plastic tubing. Dr. Jaeger and Dr. Rubin found It is now known that certain plasticizers, three ultraviolet absorbing materials accumulating in the plasma of the blood. One of the materials was found in once thought to be inert, can escape the plasma when the blood was circulated through the apparatus regardless of whether the liver was absent or from numerous plastic products into present. This compound was soon identified as uric acid. The other two compounds were found onlv when the livers were present. Of the latter two, one is yet to be identified, fluids or into the air. --- DSW 588290 y V ! ^ i ; 1 i j ! ! j ' j j i i | j * * A. j ; I ! i ' -Environment. Vol. 13. No. S' Ii i STLCOPCB4093626