Gen Teflon: unborn US babies soaked in chemicals

[rooboy]

Unborn US babies are soaking in a stew of chemicals, including mercury, petrol by-products and pesticides, according to a report released today.

Although the effects on the babies are not clear, the survey prompted several members of US Congress to press for legislation that would strengthen controls on chemicals in the environment.

The report by the Environmental Working Group is based on tests of 10 samples of umbilical cord blood taken by the American Red Cross.

They found an average of 287 contaminants in the blood, including mercury, fire retardants, pesticides and the Teflon chemical PFOA.

"These 10 newborn babies ... were born polluted," said New York Democrat Representative Louise Slaughter.

"If ever we had proof that our nation's pollution laws aren't working, it's reading the list of industrial chemicals in the bodies of babies who have not yet lived outside the womb," Ms Slaughter said.

Cord blood reflects what the mother passes to the baby through the placenta.

"Of the 287 chemicals we detected in umbilical cord blood, we know that 180 cause cancer in humans or animals, 217 are toxic to the brain and nervous system, and 208 cause birth defects or abnormal development in animal tests," the report said.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/health/gen-teflon-unborn-babies-soaked-in-chemicals/2005/07/14/1120934346820.html

[aquart]

1. Finally figured that meant their own grandchildren?

[silverweb]

2. Gen toxic

We are poisoning ourselves and the planet -- and millions of people don't know or give a damn, as long as they're having a good time for as long as their ride lasts.

:banghead:

[jbnow]

3. Then when they are born

we can let them ingest our contaminated breast milk, also filled with chemicals and toxins. That use to concern me and I wondered if we should have milk analyzed if we were breastfeeding. We should know what that little fast growing brain owner was ingesting.

But reading this article that hardly matters.

I'm glad some in Congress are concerned. Let's see, 'Silent Spring' was published in 1962. So here over 40 years later some in Congress are concerned at the surprising news that chemicals in the environment might affect humans.

[Maddy McCall]

4. My pediatrician told me that any breast milk is better than the canned...

stuff.

Of course, meaning a mother who doesn't smoke, drink a lot, consume drugs, etc.

I agree with him.

[Iris]

9. A recent study found most breast milk has traces of jet fuel in it.

[Igel]

37. Perchlorate. n/t

[RaRa]

21. Actually, they did a study on mom's who smoked

and even THEN, breastmilk is better than "formula".

[noonwitch]

13. If you lived in Michigan in the 70s, you probably should have your milk

checked for PBB. That's what they told us in health class in the late 70s. Everyone pretends now that it never happened, and for most people in the metro Detroit area, it didn't because their biggest milk and beef providers at the time bought from out of state farmers. But for those of us who grew up in the rest of the state, we were all exposed. The farmers suffered the worst of it because they drank the milk before it was pastuerized. On top of that, they had to turn over their cows to the USDA so they could be destroyed and buried in huge cement vaults to protect the groundwater from being contaminated. I remember being a kid at the time and hearing about this on the news and just being scared to death.

[jbnow]

24. I did live in Michigan

Gave birth to a son in June 73. Great timing. The PBB was already there but we didn't know yet. I nursed for almost a year.

Whenever I find articles about the long term health and mental benefits to babies who were nursed I forward them to my son, suggesting he might want to send me Godiva in lieu of thanking me.
But I always end it "Sorry about those PBB's though"

They have found problems with daughters of those exposed to it but I am not sure how hard they are studying any long term effects.

[noonwitch]

38. I don't have any kids, but my sister has two girls

We were in elementary school at the time we were exposed, so we were at an age where we drank a lot of milk. Plus, my dad was always a meat and potatoes kind of guy, so we ate lots of beef.

Everybody pretty much pretends it never happened, now. Michael Moore discusses it in his book "Stupid White Men".

[knitter4democracy]

15. Breast milk is still safer.

Formulas have all that stuff in them, too. They also don't have all the probiotics that breast milk has (macrophages, white blood cells, antibodies, etc.), and babies don't have a fully up and running immune system.

One study found that more babies die in the US from formula (bad batches and diseases they wouldn't get if breastfeeding) than from SIDS.

We are starting to test breast milk, but it's still the best option.

[jbnow]

25. I know how good breast milk is for the infant.

I nursed and mentioned in another reply it was just in time to feed my infant PBB's.

That might be what made me think I would be likely to want to test my milk in this day and age, it's honestly loaded with chemicals.

What is really crazy is that essential fatty acids important to brain development were not even available in formula sold in the United States. A couple were approved and marketed starting in 2002, but it's not required and other formulas still don't have it. The probiotics in breast milk surely account for the many health benefits but the EFA's likely accounts for the difference in IQ.

I wasn't advocating bottle feeding, I was bemoaning the issues of what we might offer in our breast milk. I didn't know about all the benefits to the baby when I nursed in the 70's, but I was sure it would be nicer not to be mixing, warming and washing bottles. How nice to pick up a hungry baby and just feed them.

[knitter4democracy]

28. I agree.

I always wondered why people were making all that extra work for themselves. Parenting a baby is hard enough.

I'm sorry that I didn't catch that you were a nursing mama. It is scary that all that stuff is in there, poisons and toxins and whatnot. Given our choices, though, I'm still glad I nursed both of mine. I'm always concerned, though, that mamas choose formula based on their fear of their own bodies and breastmilk, thinking that it must be safer if it's out of a can or bottle.

[Arkansas Granny]

17. I don't have any data to support my suspicion

but I'll bet that any chemical found in breast milk would also be found in the cow's milk that is the basis for most commercial baby formulas.

[Pretty_in_CodePink]

30. I think it is really important

for moms to watch what they eat. Fish in particular and some of the heavier sprayed veggies and fruits - alas also the most common ones we eat. I had to stop with so much of the fish I ate. No tuna, mackeral, grouper, swordfish, chilean sea bass (endangered too) and now even anything by Alaskan salmon. I guess it's time to return to vegetarian diet.

[leftchick]

32. wild alaskan salmon?

:(

[Pretty_in_CodePink]

52. or I think Pacific Salmon

It is quite expensive when you can get it. My market had it foar $15.99 pound. Still cheaper than going out an ordering salmon which is usually farmed or Atlantic. I buy the canned stuff sometimes labeled Wild Alaskan. Don't really know where it comes from. I'm not really that knowledgeable about salmon. Just trying to eat healthy.

[Lorien]

54. I thought that wild caught coho salmon (from Alaska)

was the last "clean" fish available. :shrug:

[Pretty_in_CodePink]

56. That's my understanding too

With farmed and Atlantic being the dirtiest.

[jbnow]

36. And isn't the fish issue a sad one!

Such a healthy food,especially ones like salmon and tuna so rich in the good fatty acids. Fish oil (capsules) is surprisingly free of contaminants (I subscribed to consumerlab.com where they tests a variety of supplements for purity and truth in labeling) but it's sad when the pill is healthier then the food itself.

There are issues with vegetarian diets in pregnancy and with nursing too with certain essential nutrients. But it really gets to me when I hear of contamination in raw veggies, like sprouts. We just poison everything.

[reprobate]

35. "Silent Earth" would be more appropriate for today.

I wonder just how long it will be before Corporate Capitalism succeeds in destroying all life on earth. It can't be too long. They've already succeeded in killing much of the oxygen producing phytoplankton.

So I guess the embryonic toxicity is the backup plan for the suffocation of all life on earth. Think I'm exaggerating? Then put a plastic bag over your head and try living without oxygen.


I said it before and I'll say it again: Living with corporations is like swimming with sharks; you need to keep an eye on them, and you want to be able to kill them when they turn on you.

Prediction: Unless we quickly bring the laws controlling corporations into line with reality, the corporate mind will kill us all.

[jbnow]

39. One of the earliest things bush did

was change older directives regarding anti-pollution equipment mandated when upgrading or new building in factories and he went from there. They eased up to allow dumping industrial waste directly into waterways. Then the super-fund tax! Now clean ups is on tax payers, not the companies that pollute, taking away that disincentive. He makes standards "voluntary"

I'm sure you know all this but it's amazing how many people don't. He has pretty name like clean sky act or whatever and people feel good.

This is one of so many areas where there is such a blatant disregard for the good of the country, the people, the earth. It is simply about profit. Is that what being a caretaker of the earth means to that "christian?"
Corporations are made of people and they don't have to be so selfish and irresponsible. But they are sure in the right political environment to get away with it.

We have known about all this for so long yet those who really try to do something are still mocked. Is it because we can't see it, are we that stupid?

[reprobate]

46. "Corporations are made of people" Yes, but the problem is with ......

.....the structure of the laws governing the corporations and their 'employees'.The rules regulating corporations remove the individual from any responsibility for his actions in the corporation.

This promotes irresponsible behavior on the part of the corporation.

It also removes any morality or moral behavior from an individual in a corporation. Since the purpose of the corporation is to return profits to the pockets of the stockholders, and any behavior that is moral but does not return dividends to the stockholder is forbidden, morality becomes defined as profitability.

Therefor, I suggest to you that the corporation is by nature immoral. By it's very nature it can do nothing to help the earth unless it shows a profit.

[LeftyMom]

40. Cow's milk is just as polluted

We just test human milk because it's the easiest way to get fats from the human body to test. It isn't that breastfeeding mothers have a higher body burden than other people or that breastmilk is more toxic than other parts of the human body, it's simply the easiest thing to test.

BTW, fat soluble toxins move up the food chain. The best way to keep your body burden low in our polluted world is to eat low on the food chain.

[jbnow]

47. Not quite as polluted in things like PC Bs or dioxins

since cows are herbivores and there is less bioaccumulation, as you say they eat lower on the food chain. But they do have other toxins in a higher degree and it is not as nutritionally suited to an infants development.

I know breast milk isn't more toxic then the rest of our body, it is the only part of me I let my baby eat though.

From responses I know I didn't phrase my post well. I was upset about breast milk but the article reminded me we poisoned them in utero already. My child never had formula. I was in college so could get home between classes to feed him. That would be 73/74 in Michigan so he got his daily PBBs from my milk, then later from cows milk.
Not planning to birth more children at 50 but as I said...if I had a baby since I know about these things, I would get it tested. If it was very bad I would also get formula (the two brands containing all the essential fatty acids) tested. Then I would decide.

I loved nursing, it was easy and simple and emotionally amazing. I know the health benefits to mother and child, though I wasn't aware of all that back then. I think it is sad that we live in a world that has continued to poison the land, water and air many decades after they knew it wasn't safe. Breast milk is hardly the greatest danger, I just wish it was as innocent as it ought to be.

[area51]

5. republinazis

Gotta love those republinazis, claiming they're "pro-life", when they're more than happy having fetuses stew in a noxious chemical soup.

[leftchick]

6. EPA is powerless??

so we are nothing more than mice for the corporations to test on?

~snip~

The Environmental Working Group report coincided with a Government Accountability Office report issued yesterday that said the Environmental Protection Agency does not have the powers it needs to fully regulate toxic chemicals.

The GAO, the investigative arm of Congress, found that the EPA's Toxic Substances Control Act gives only "limited assurance" that new chemicals entering the market are safe and that the EPA only rarely assesses chemicals already on the market.

"Today, chemicals are being used to make baby bottles, food packaging and other products that have never been fully evaluated for their health effects on children - and some of these chemicals are turning up in our blood," said New Jersey Democrat Senator Frank Lautenberg, who plans to co-sponsor a bill to require more testing of toxic chemicals.

Pollutants and other chemicals are believed to cause a range of illnesses. But scientists agree the only way to really sort out the effects is to measure how much gets into people and then see what happens to their health.

[ScamUSA.Com]

8. the epa has been handed over to the industrial lobbyists!

[mopinko]

19. long time ago

bird owners have been fighting against teflon for a long, long time. they have not only not managed to get it banned, they can't even get a label requirement for it. it is now in so many products that it is crazy. clothing, cleaning products, my personal favorite is toilet bowl cleaner. that's right folks, you can dump it straight into the water supply, just so you don't have to scrub your toilet so often.
if it is actual dupont teflon, they like to brag, so those products are often labeled. but many of the other manufacturers just use fuzzy language like, stays clean or some such. you have to be really paranoid to avoid it.

[MountainLaurel]

29. Literally

One of Bush's first acts was to fire all of the attorneys in the Justice Department who were handling environmental-related federal cases and replaced them with attorneys who two months before had been on the other side of the table, defending those very same companies that they would now be prosecuting. Not surprisingly, these attorneys dismissed most of the pending cases for lack of evidence or lack of reason to pursue the case.

:puke:

[WLKjr]

7. You know, my mother always talked about this kind of stuff

and I propmtly talk about the ingnorance of the radical national party and xtians when they spout 'culture of life'.


They only care about the fetus. Fuck the child's life.

[Iris]

10. Consider where they focus birth defect prevention - on the mother's

behavior. There's no conclusive evidence that caffeine is necessarily bad yet pregnant women are encourage (pressured?) to give it up. The focus on alcohol when our mothers were actually ENCOURAGED to drink a glass of wine each evening to help with sleep. All to blame birth defects on the mother.

People would like to jail drug addicted pregnant women to protect the fetus yet this crap goes on all around us.

Disgusting.

[Paradise]

11. and, the poisoning goes on...

http://www.medicationsense.com/articles/july_sept_03/reactions_cipro_other.html

it happened to me; life-destroying... the poison, of my doctor's choice, was 'levaquin'.

the devastation from these chemical drugs is pandemic, however the majority of the public is unknowing, unaware, oblivious...

[zalinda]

12. Check out the program 30 Days on FX

Spurlock (from Supersize Me) is doing a really good series on spending 30 days in another man's shoes. This week is 30 days in an eco-village.
There's a replay saturday and sunday.

zalinda

[Orangepeel]

14. well, maybe now the right wing will pay some attention to the environment

now that there is evidence that pollutants affect unborn babies.

[wallwriter]

16. What? And put right wing campaign funds at risk?

I doubt it will happen...

[The Stranger]

18. Tell the Republicans that these same babies could one day die in Iraq.

See if that will get them to end the illegal mass murder going on. They seem only to be able to focus on the needs of unborn babies.

[symbolman]

20. One of the reasons we had our son in Hawaii

I figured that it has to be one of the least polluted spots on the planet where I can still gas up the old Chevy..

THere is some conjecture on the spraying of chemicals on all the many golf courses and the runoff into the ocean, as well as tour/whale boats dumping human waste & chemicals associated with it three miles offshore..

Some folks have complained of floating next to human waste while sailboarding way out there in the ocean, but I've never seen anything like that, nor needles and medical waste on the beach like you see on the east coast, etc..

I almost wish now I'd had the boy's cord blood tested, my wife doesn't smoke or drink or take anything other than inhalants for her mild case of asthma (sp?) so she's clean..

I take pain meds for my back daily, but I guess I still had some swimmer left at age 52 :)

THis is really sad, especially considering the righties are all up about abortions.. I wonder how many perfectly fine babies get flushed out of the womb from the womb being too toxic..

Industrial Abortions, why don't they get pissed about that?

Because they are crazier than shithouse rats..

[lateo]

22. Culture of life! Culture of life!

Yeah, right.

[Brooklyn Michael]

23. "Culture of Life", sure, but only.....

....if it doens't interfere with an industry's bottom line. Because, don't you know, if corporations had to spend money to cut back on the number of pollutants they dump into thew environment, they wouldn't be able to pay their CEO's so much @#$%^&*! filthy lucre...

Y'know what? Howard Dean and the Dems need to start ramming that "Culture of Life" line down their fucking hypocritical throats...

[lateo]

27. I can see Howard the Destroyer doing it but..

The Dems will mostly not back him up.

[KittyWampus]

26. The "Our Chemical In Minute Traces Is Safe" Crap. It Ignores The Reality

that their one little chemical in a tiny trace is joined with thousands of other little tiny trace amounts of chemicals.

For breast feeding Mom's worried about anything in their systems- remember that you may be helping your baby aquire an immunity to the chemicals.

In chinese medicine there are certain food that help clean the body of toxins, radiation etc.

Sea vegetable is one.

I'd suggest DU'ers learn to put them in their diet.. They are tasty and good 4U.

[Kraklen]

33. Actually it's science.

The toxicity of any given compound depends on its concentration. Not its existence. Even traditional chinese medicine quacks know that.

[Baconfoot]

42. "toxicity of any compound depends on its concentration.Not its existence."

Just a good point I thought people should read. They would have missed it just scrolling the message titles. Now they won't.

:)

[KittyWampus]

43. And Real Science Wouldn't Ignore The Dangers Of Cumulative Effects

and Chinese Medicine, unlike the myopic Science Zealots, treats the whole system rather than just singular parts.

[Sgent]

51. I wouldn't be so sure

Isn't it homeopathy where just the hint of a substance is as good as a pure substance -- it can be diluted ad infinitum.

[slackmaster]

31. I've never liked non-stick cookware

My mom had a few pieces of it when I was a kid. I stopped using it decades ago mainly because roommates and girlfriends always destroyed it. Now I cook only on cast iron, glass, steel, or stainless.

[symbolman]

34. That same cookware (nonstick) can kill a Bird FAST

if you leave it on the stove and the food boils out, or water..

the gas from it will KILL a pet bird in MINUTES.

Imagine what it's doing to kids or anyone for that matter.. canary in a coal mine springs to mind..

You're best rid of it, besides, good old cast iron skillets give you a good dose of the iron your body needs :)

[Massachusetts]

41. We will destroy OURSELVES.

[Neoma]

44. ACK!

:scared:

[Neoma]

45. More sources.

http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2005/7/14/worldupdates/2005-07-14T102030Z_01_NOOTR_RTRJONC_0_-209236-1&sec=Worldupdates

http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/afp/20050714/ts_alt_afp/afplifestylehealth_050714193342

http://www.cnn.com/2005/HEALTH/07/14/health.chemicals.reut/index.html?section=cnn_latest

http://www.northjersey.com/page.php?qstr=eXJpcnk3ZjczN2Y3dnFlZUVFeXkyNSZmZ2JlbDdmN3ZxZWVFRXl5NjcyMzA0MCZ5cmlyeTdmNzE3Zjd2cWVlRUV5eTI=

http://www.wndu.com/news/mommo/072005/mommo_43437.php

http://www.enn.com/today.html?id=8239

[Robert Oak]

48. additional article

http://www.palmbeachpost.com/news/content/nation/epaper/2005/07/14/m1a_peststudy_0714.html

This one reports on toxins that have been banned for 30 years found
in newborns.

[Robert Oak]

49. here's what pisses me off the most

How many times have you been told by either your parents, your friends
or a salesperson with a very "gee, aren't you just so radical or
aren't you so, abnormal" when you pointed out things like the teflon
coating was flaking off in your eggs and that cannot possibly be good..
or chem-lawn was making you feel sick in your youth...

They do this today...most people beyond do not question in fact
look at you as "outside" or "paranoid" or a "trouble maker" etc. when
you simply question the safety of these sorts of products!

yet here it is!

My motto is this: If something inside of me says intuitively and in a gut reaction "poison", I listen to it.

I got rid of all teflon 20 years ago and also any pesticides plus "weed killers".

If I get a headache walking down the "lawn care" row at Home Depot...
you know it can't be good.

[theHandpuppet]

50. I see I'm not the only one, then

I get so sick getting anywhere near the "lawn care" aisles at Lowe's that I will detour around the whole store to get to the (outdoor) garden section. You need a gas mask to make your way through all that poison gas.

;) Note I said Lowe's -- you do know that Home Depot is a huge GOP booster, doncha?

[Robert Oak]

53. no i didn't know that

I know they hired a bunch of out of work engineers when no one
would because they were so overqualified.

Thx for telling me....sucks, one of the few that would hire overqualified people who truly were desperate for money...
now they fund the GOP..

[Megahurtz]

55. I'm so PROUD to live in the U.S.A!!!

:sarcasm::sarcasm::sarcasm::sarcasm: