|
|
|
Mo. Agency Sees Spike in Mercury Cases
N.J. official: Owners saw mercury warnings
Mercury contamination keeping people from homes
Lawmakers consider plan to
regulate mercury. They note concern over danger element poses to children
USA: September 9, 2002
Wednesday,
October 02, 2002
Study of Californians
Records Elevated Mercury Levels in Fish Consumers
Whose Hands Are Dirty?
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/11/25/opinion/25HERB. Thimerosal is a preservative that contains mercury and was used for many years as an additive in some routinely administered children's vaccines. Fears developed a few years ago that the additive might have been causing dangerously elevated levels of mercury in infants, resulting in neurological impairment and, in some cases, autism. Studies thus far have neither shown nor ruled out a link between the vaccines and neurological damage in children. But in the summer of 1999 the American Academy of Pediatrics and the Public Health Service urged vaccine manufacturers to stop using thimerosal as quickly as possible. Thus, thimerosal, which was
developed by
Lyn Redwood, a nurse practitioner and the wife of a physician in suburban Atlanta, spoke to me last week about her 8-year-old son, Will. "I have a little boy who was completely normal at birth — walking, talking, smiling, meeting all of his developmental landmarks," she said. "Then, shortly after he turned 1 year old, he lost his ability to speak, to make eye contact. He started regressing and ultimately was diagnosed with pervasive developmental disorder, which falls into a spectrum of autism disorders." Ms. Redwood contends that three infant vaccines administered to her son when he was 2 months old exposed him to levels of mercury that far exceeded all safety guidelines. At this point we must interrupt our narrative and turn our attention to the federal government's effort to fight terrorism in the United States. Last week the Senate approved legislation to establish a Department of Homeland Security and it will soon be signed into law by the president. Buried in this massive bill, snuck into it in the dark of night by persons unknown (actually, it's fair to say by Republican persons unknown), was a provision that — incredibly — will protect Eli Lilly and a few other big pharmaceutical outfits from lawsuits by parents who believe their children were harmed by thimerosal. Now this has nothing to do with homeland security. Nothing. This is not a provision that will in any way protect us from the ferocious evil of Osama bin Laden and Al Qaeda. So why is it there? Perhaps it has something to do with the fact that the major drug companies have become a gigantic collective cash machine for politicians, and that the vast majority of that cash goes to Republicans. Or maybe it's related to the fact that Mitch Daniels, the White House budget director, is a former Eli Lilly big shot. Or the very convenient fact that just last June President Bush appointed Eli Lilly's chairman, president and C.E.O., Sidney Taurel, to a coveted seat on the president's Homeland Security Advisory Council. There's a real bad smell here. Eli Lilly will benefit greatly as both class-action and individual lawsuits are derailed. But there are no fingerprints in sight. No one will own up to a legislative deed that is both cynical and shameful. An official spokesman for Eli Lilly, Edward Sagebiel, insists the company knew nothing about it, nothing at all. While the vote for the Homeland Security Department was overwhelming, even some Republicans were upset by the provision to benefit Lilly and the other drug companies. Senator John McCain of Arizona characterized the provision as "among the most inappropriate" in the homeland security legislation. He said: "This language will primarily benefit large brand-name pharmaceutical companies which produce additives to children's vaccines — with substantial benefit to one company in particular. It has no bearing whatsoever on domestic security." The politicians with their hands out and the fat cats with plenty of green to spread around have carried the day. Nothing is too serious to exploit, not even the defense of the homeland during a time of terror. Lyn Redwood put together an advocacy group, called Safe Minds, for parents struggling with the thimerosal issue. They're at a slight disadvantage, wielding a popgun against the nuclear-powered influence of an Eli Lilly.
Harmful effects of mercury debated Studies on toxic fish and links to heart disease contradict ASSOCIATED PRESS
Nov. 27 — Two studies have
yielded contradictory findings about the possible heart dangers of eating
mercury-laden fish. Plenty of research shows that mercury accumulated from fish
can harm the developing brain of a fetus or child, but far less is known about
how the toxic, widespread pollutant affects the heart. TWO STUDIES in Thursday’s New
England Journal of Medicine on the long-term effects of mercury exposure on the
hearts of middle-aged and elderly men had opposite findings. One found no clear
link between mercury levels in the body and the risk of developing heart
disease; the other found men who had suffered a heart attack had higher mercury
levels than similar men who had not.
Besides
nature's own emissions, humans release mercury as well, mostly via the air and
eventually into water where fish absorb particles.
The American Heart
association,
citing new research showing the omega-3 fatty acids in fish reduce the risk of
heart disease, last week reiterated its guidelines that people eat at least two
servings of fish per week, preferably fatty fish. One of the New England Journal
studies indicated that the mercury contamination in fish offsets the benefits of
a key fatty acid, DHA.
Researchers at Harvard School
of Public Health studied 470 men who had had heart surgery or a heart attack,
comparing each with a similar man without heart disease. Dr. Walter C. Willett,
a professor of epidemiology and nutrition, said mercury levels in the men’s
toenails corresponded well with the levels of fish they reported eating, but his
team found no association between mercury exposure and risk of heart disease.
“We can’t exclude the possibility that there’s some moderate risk,” Willett
said. Willett and Guallar said there could be several explanations for their
disparate results, from differences in the fish eaten in America and Europe to
how the patient and comparison groups were picked in each study. Mercury may outweigh health benefits of fish Contaminant can result in dangerous effects Nov. 27 — Wendy Moro wanted a healthy diet, so she began eating lots of fish. But then she started feeling severe fatigue. Eventually Dr. Jane Hightower, a San Francisco internist, diagnosed Moro as having excess mercury in her body. Hightower says she sees the problem in many of her health-conscious patients. “IN THE last 20 years, fish
has been pushed as good nutrition. But no one told us that some of these fish
can have contaminants,” says Hightower. Mercury is a natural element — it’s the
familiar liquid in thermometers. Because it is in coal, air pollution puts it
into the atmosphere and eventually it settles in the ocean where it builds up in
the flesh of fish, especially large fish.
There is no question that high doses of mercury can be extremely toxic, even
fatal. Just how much danger Americans face from the mercury they get by eating
fish remains a subject of debate among scientists. But many are concerned by a
number of potential health effects. “The symptoms that were really frightening
were these symptoms of muscle weakness and muscle pain and numbing.” says Moro.
The Not-So-Crackpot Autism Theory
By ARTHUR ALLEN
Neal Halsey's life
was dedicated to promoting vaccination. In June 1999, the Johns Hopkins
pediatrician and scholar had completed a decade of service on the influential
committees that decide which inoculations will be jabbed into the arms and
thighs and buttocks of eight million American children each year. At the urging
of Halsey and others, the number of vaccines mandated for children under 2 in
the 90's soared to 20, from 8. Kids were healthier for it, according to him.
These simple, safe injections against hepatitis B and germs like haemophilus
bacteria would help thousands grow up free of diseases like meningitis and liver
cancer.
Halsey's view, however, was not shared by a
small but vocal faction of parents who questioned whether all these shots did
more harm than good. While many of the childhood infections that vaccines were
designed to prevent -- among them diphtheria, mumps, chickenpox and polio --
seemed to be either antique or innocuous, serious chronic diseases like asthma,
juvenile diabetes and autism were on the rise. And on the Internet, especially,
a growing number of self-styled health activists blamed vaccines for these
increases.
Like all medical interventions, vaccines
sometimes cause adverse reactions. But unlike pills, vaccines come packaged with
high expectations, which make them particularly vulnerable to public criticism.
Vaccines don't cure people, and they are administered to healthy children, which
gives them few opportunities for good press. When they work, nothing happens.
When vaccinated children become ill, their parents are grief-stricken and often
enraged, even if vaccines aren't proved to be at fault. All of this puts
public-health advocates like Halsey on the defensive. Most attacks on vaccines,
they say, are based on hysteria, bad science and dubious politics.
Halsey, 57, has green eyes, a white beard that
makes him look like a ship's captain and an air of careful authority. As
chairman of the American Academy of Pediatrics committee on infectious diseases
from 1995 through June 1999, he often appeared in the media administering calm
reassurance. ''Many of the allegations against vaccines,'' Halsey said in one
interview, ''are based on unproven hypotheses and causal associations with
little evidence.''
And then suddenly in June 1999, during a visit
to the Food and Drug Administration, a squall appeared on the horizon of
Halsey's confidence. Halsey attended a meeting to discuss thimerosal, a
mercury-containing preservative that at the time was being used in several
vaccines -- including the hepatitis B shot that Halsey had fought so hard to
have administered to American babies. By the time the dust kicked up in that
meeting had settled, Halsey would be forced to reckon with the hypothesis that
thimerosal had damaged the brains of immunized infants and may have contributed
to the unexplained explosion in the number of cases of autism being diagnosed in
children. That Halsey was willing even to entertain this possibility enraged some of his fellow vaccinologists, who couldn't fathom how a doctor who had spent so much energy dismantling the arguments of people who attacked vaccines could now be changing sides. But to Halsey's mind, his actions were perfectly consistent: he was simply working from the data. And the numbers deeply troubled him. ''From the beginning, I saw thimerosal as something different,'' he says. ''It was the first strong evidence of a causal association with neurological impairment. I was very concerned.''
The job of adding up the amount of mercury in
vaccines and assessing its risk fell to Robert Ball, an F.D.A. scientist, and
two F.D.A. pediatricians, Leslie Ball, Robert's wife, and R. Douglas Pratt.
Thimerosal, which is 50 percent ethyl mercury by weight, had been used as a
vaccine preservative since the 1930's in the diphtheria-tetanus-pertussis shot,
known as D.T.P., and it was later added to some vaccines for hepatitis B and
haemophilus bacteria, which by the early 1990's had become routine immunizations
for infants.
The F.D.A. team's conclusions were
frightening. Vaccines added under Halsey's watch had tripled the dose of mercury
that infants got in their first few months of life. As many as 30 million
American children may have been exposed to mercury in excess of Environmental
Protection Agency guidelines -- levels of mercury that, in theory, could have
killed enough brain cells to scramble thinking or hex behavior.
''My first reaction was simply disbelief,
which was the reaction of almost everybody involved in vaccines,'' Halsey says.
''In most vaccine containers, thimerosal is listed as a mercury derivative, a
hundredth of a percent. And what I believed, and what everybody else believed,
was that it was truly a trace, a biologically insignificant amount. My honest
belief is that if the labels had had the mercury content in micrograms, this
would have been uncovered years ago. But the fact is, no one did the
calculation.''
Making matters worse, the latest science on
mercury damage suggested that even small amounts of organic mercury could do
harm to the fetal brain. Some of the federal safety guidelines on mercury were
relaxed in the 90's, even as the amount of mercury that children received in
vaccines increased. The more Halsey learned about these mercury studies, the
more he worried.
''My first concern was that it would harm the
credibility of the immunization program,'' he says. ''But gradually it came home
to me that maybe there was some real risk to the children.'' Mercury was turning
out to be like lead, which had been studied extensively in the homes of the
Baltimore poor during Halsey's tenure at Hopkins. ''As they got more
sophisticated at testing for lead, the safe level marched down and down, and
they continued to find subtle neurological impairment,'' Halsey says. ''And
that's almost exactly what happened with mercury.''
Halsey was beginning to think that it would be
prudent to limit thimerosal-containing vaccines and urge pediatricians to use
thimerosal-free shots when possible. But his decision inflamed some of his
peers. After all, although the thimerosal data was worrisome to Halsey, the
available science offered no clear proof that the preservative posed a genuine
danger to children when given in parts per million. Moreover, it wasn't clear
that there were enough thimerosal-free vaccines available for diseases like
pertussis and hepatitis B. Should an unproven fear justify the cessation of a
procedure that protected children from proven dangers?
Halsey looked into the matter further and
found only complexity. In the medical literature, most cases of acute mercury
poisoning result from doses hundreds or thousands of times higher than what
infants received with thimerosal-laden vaccines. And although the thimerosal
levels in vaccines exceeded the E.P.A.'s guidelines for methyl mercury,
thimerosal contained ethyl mercury, a compound that behaves somewhat differently
in the body. The E.P.A. based its guidelines on a series of studies of 917
children born in 1987 in the Faeroe Islands, a windswept North Atlantic
archipelago, to women who ate methyl-mercury-tainted whale meat. The Faeroes
children, whose umbilical cord blood averaged four times the E.P.A.'s daily
''safe'' dose -- which was 0.1 micrograms per kilo -- exhibited small but
measurable neurological deficits seven years later. They had slower reaction
times and diminished attention spans and their word choice and memorization were
less keen than those of their classmates who had been exposed to less mercury,
according to Philippe Grandjean, a Danish researcher who leads the continuing
Faeroes study and teaches at Boston University.
During most of the 90's, many American
6-month-olds received a total of 187.5 micrograms of ethyl mercury through
vaccination. While the Faeroes children were exposed to mercury as developing
fetuses, and therefore were more vulnerable than the vaccinated American
infants, the American babies included about 60,000 each year who had already
been exposed to high mercury levels because their mothers had eaten a lot of
contaminated fish. What's more, hundreds of thousands of Rh-negative pregnant
women and their unborn Rh-positive babies received additional thimerosal each
year through injections designed to keep the mothers' immune systems from
attacking the fetuses.
The Faeroes studies, though they dealt with
methyl mercury, unnerved Halsey. Other researchers were troubled, too. George
Lucier, a toxicologist who led a 1998 White House review of mercury's dangers,
went so far as to say it was ''very likely'' that thimerosal had damaged some
children. There was precious little data to back up that precise suspicion --
and little to dismiss it -- because of the lack of toxicology research on ethyl
mercury.
On July 7, 1999, at Halsey's urging, the
American Academy of Pediatrics and the Public Health Service released a
statement urging vaccine manufacturers to remove thimerosal as quickly as
possible and advising pediatricians to postpone giving most newborns the birth
dose of the hepatitis B vaccine. The decision, which helped to create vaccine
shortages and led some babies to become infected with hepatitis B, outraged some
senior vaccine experts. Walter Orenstein, director of the National Immunization
Program at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, would charge that the
rush to remove thimerosal-containing vaccines was ''precipitous.'' Stanley
Plotkin, a renowned vaccine developer, said that it was fruitless to try to
soothe vaccination critics. ''If antivaccinationists did not have mercury, they
would have another issue,'' he said at one meeting. ''One cannot prevent them
from making hay regardless of whether the sun is shining or not.''
In Halsey's view, however, thimerosal wasn't
simply a bone for rabid vaccine opponents to gnaw on. In the middle of that
hectic summer he took a vacation in Maine. Canoeing on a lake, he came across
posters that advised fishermen to ''protect your children -- release your
catch.'' Halsey took that message to heart. If the government was warning people
against eating fish with mercury, he asked his colleagues, ''does it make sense
to allow it to be injected into infants?'' Although other vaccinologists
criticized Halsey, many of his colleagues rallied around him. ''Neal put kids
ahead of the vaccination program, which was gutsy,'' says Lynn Goldman, a former
E.P.A. official who has been on the Hopkins faculty since 1999 and worked with
Halsey on thimerosal. ''It would have been easier for him to line up on the
other side.''
Few scientists believe that the spike in
autism could have been caused solely by the thimerosal in vaccines, but in
October 2001, a vaccine-safety committee at the starchy Institute of Medicine
confirmed that it was ''biologically plausible'' -- though by no means proved --
that thimerosal could be related to neurodevelopmental delays in some children.
The committee recommended that thimerosal be removed from vaccines and called
for extensive research to determine any damage it had caused.
Halsey's fellow researchers were right about
one thing. Antivaccine advocates immediately seized upon the thimerosal theory,
and Halsey became something of an unwilling hero to the vaccine-safety advocates
with whom he had so often sparred. In fact, thousands of parents with autistic
children have responded to the Institute of Medicine report by filing lawsuits.
Michael Williams, who has won millions in toxic tort settlements from
pharmaceutical companies, was among the first lawyers to sue vaccine
manufacturers, on behalf of William Mead, a 4-year-old Portland, Ore., boy with
autism. Williams also filed a separate class-action lawsuit with William's
healthy older sister, Eleanor, as lead plaintiff, demanding that vaccine makers
also pay for studies to determine thimerosal's effects on millions of children
who might have lower I.Q.'s or other less obvious signs of mercury poisoning.
Past studies have shown that mercury's effects vary tremendously from person to
person, presumably because of genetic differences in the body's capacity to
protect delicate organs from it.
'In order to win the Eleanor lawsuit you need
to establish liability, but I don't think that is going to be that hard,''
Williams said in a recent chat in his Portland office. ''Organic mercury is a
very serious neurotoxin.'' Williams embodies the vaccine establishment's worst
fear about Halsey's course of action -- which is that taking the precautionary
step of eliminating thimerosal would be read as an admission of fault. ''The
agenda was set by the lawyers and the antivaccine activists,'' a source close to
a number of manufacturers complained to me. ''The scientists responded to it
scientifically, and that put them behind the eight ball right away. You had Neal
Halsey running around saying: 'We've got to do something! We've got to show
we're concerned!'''
Paul Offit, a vaccinologist at the Children's
Hospital of Philadelphia, takes it a step further. ''In some instances I think
full disclosure can be harmful,'' he says. ''Is it safe to say there is zero
risk with thimerosal, when it is remotely possible that one child would get
sick? Well, since we say that mercury is a neurotoxin, we have to do everything
we can to get rid of it. But I would argue that removing thimerosal didn't make
vaccines safer -- it only made them perceptibly safer.''
For Halsey, thimerosal injury is a possibility
that must be addressed -- but by science, not by the courts. The scientific
agenda, however, is already deeply politicized. From the start, the C.D.C.'s
efforts to examine the possibility of thimerosal damage became snarled in
acrimony. Critics of the vaccination system don't trust the C.D.C., which
monitors evidence of adverse reactions to vaccines through the Vaccine Safety
Datalink, a computerized set of 7.5 million medical records. Safe Minds, an
advocacy group of parents who believe that their autistic children were damaged
by thimerosal, has used the Freedom of Information Act to obtain documents
showing that as early as December 1999 the C.D.C. had reason to believe that
thimerosal caused developmental delays in some children. It was far from
conclusive evidence, but vaccine critics charged that the C.D.C. tried to play
it down. One of those critics was Dan Burton, a Republican congressman from
Indiana, who says he firmly believes that his grandson's autism is a result of
vaccines. ''I'm so ticked off about my grandson, and to think that the
public-health people have been circling the wagons to cover up the facts!''
Burton fumed at a June hearing. ''Why, it just makes me want to vomit!''
What comes through in an examination of the
documents uncovered by Safe Minds is less a coverup than an impression of
scientists anxiously watching over their shoulders as they work. One document,
for example, records comments made by Robert Brent, a Philadelphia pediatrician
who served as a consultant for the thimerosal study. ''The medical-legal
findings in this study, causal or not, are horrendous,'' Brent said. ''If an
allegation was made that a child's neurobehavioral findings were caused by
thimerosal-containing vaccines, you could readily find a junk scientist who
would support the claim with a reasonable degree of certainty. But you will not
find a scientist with any integrity who would say the reverse with the data that
is available. . . . So we are in a bad position from the standpoint of defending
any lawsuits if they were initiated.'' More research is in the works. The C.D.C. is setting up a study of neurodevelopmental effects based in part on the Faeroe Islands model. The N.I.H. is financing studies of thimerosal metabolism in animals and children. (An early University of Rochester study was reassuring: it indicated that children eliminate thimerosal much more quickly than expected.) Clearly, a lot is riding on this research, and pressure is being brought to bear on both sides. Can the vaccine authorities accept a positive answer? Can the vaccine opponents accept a negative one? ''No one wants to think that harm might have been done,'' Halsey says. ''I don't want to think harm might have been done.''
During much of the 20th-century, children
suffered from an ailment called pink disease, which caused peeling skin on the
extremities as well as regressive behavior. In 1948, a keen-eyed Cincinnati
pediatrician named Josef Warkany noticed a common risk factor in these children:
they had all been given teething powders containing calomel, a mercury
derivative. Only about 1 in 500 children whose parents gave them calomel got
pink disease -- suggesting that a constitutional vulnerability to mercury was
part of the clinical picture. Soon after the powders were taken off the market,
pink disease disappeared.
Autism is a global phenomenon that was first
reported in America in 1943, long before the potential dangers of thimerosal
vaccines were raised. Removing the preservative won't -- even in the best case
-- eliminate the illness. But scientists estimate that the current rate of
autism in its various forms might be as high as 1 in 500. If the autism trend
begins to recede now that thimerosal has been removed, it could certainly
suggest a cause. If it does decline, we might have Neal Halsey to thank. If it
doesn't, his colleagues in the vaccine establishment may blame him for stoking
an irrational protest from the public. Halsey, who still heads the Hopkins Institute for Vaccine Safety, which he was a founder of in 1997, is on the fence. ''I don't believe the evidence is convincing now that there has definitely been harm done by thimerosal,'' he says, absently stroking his balding head. But to keep the vaccine program on a steady keel, Halsey says, the public-health authorities simply must follow through with the studies and face the consequences without flinching. If there is damage, he says, ''there should be some kind of compensation, though I don't know how.'' He pauses, and sighs. ''I empathize with families of children with these disorders. How are you going to put dollar values on that?''
Does this study seem unethical to anyone else? If there was chance that this
study could damage these babies, what does that say about the people doing it?
Who in the world would take this kind of chance with their child knowingly?
Autism - Etiology:
Evidence conflicts on mercury, heart disease
link
http://www.elsevier.com/cdweb/views/article.htt?jnl=0300
Most vaccines free of 'toxic' preservative
ToxicologyVolume 185, Issue 1-2, pp. 23 - 33, 14 March, 2003 Placental
transfer of mercury in pregnant rats which
|
|
Thimerosol in
Vaccines, May 2002 |
|
|
Parents say Vaccine
Preservative Causes Autism Thanks to aggressive vaccine campaigns over the years we've seen a significant decrease in infectious, even deadly diseases like polio and smallpox. However, some parents believe a preservative in those vaccines is causing another problem -- autism. Now those parents are taking the issue to court. Four year old Alex Maher has come a long way since he was diagnosed with autism about three years ago. 'When he was 20-months old I noticed that he wasn't talking and things that he had said in the past had more or less faded.' Alex's mother, Becky says he has had to work on verbal, social and learning skills. Becky Maher belives Alex's autism was caused by the mercury-based preservative Thimerosol, found in children's vaccines. 'If you were to look at the symptoms of someone with mercury poisoning and the characteristics of an autistic child, they're practically identical.' So how can Becky explain why one of her children has autism and her older child does not? The literature she has read indicates that some children might be more susceptible or predisposed than others.Since the 1930's, vaccines like DTaP (Diptheria, Tetanus, Pertussis), MMR (Measles, Mumps, Rubella), and Hepatitis B contained thimerosol. Pediatrician Dr. Stephanie Dewar says, 'It's in there to prevent the growth of bacteria in those vaccines to keep kids safe.' Dr. Dewar says there is no direct scientific link between mercury and autism. However, three years ago, the Food and Drug Administration was called to review thimerosol and it's link to 'neurodevelopmental effects,' as stated in a 1997 report. Dr. Dewar says, 'Neurodevelopmental effects could mean anywhere from vision or hearing problems. Problems with walking, talking, sensation.'Just this year, the FDA officially banned thimerosol from vaccines. Now, the Mahers' are among 100 families from the area taking part in a class action lawsuit. Attorney Dave Betras is representing Northeastern Ohio's faction of the suit. 'The question becomes does the thimerosol fall within the national vaccine recovery act or is this something to go after the drug manufacturers directly?' Betras says the suit is
pending, until a link between thimerosol and autism is found.
'There's a lot of people in the country that are firmly convinced of it. Now
the question is can we prove that in a court of law is something we're still
gonna have to wait and see.' So it's a waiting game and while no
compensation can reverse autism, families like the Mahers' say at least
their voices will be heard. An important note ..if
your children are getting vaccines now, they no longer contain thimerosal.
So children's vaccines are safer now, more than ever before. |
The Wall Street Journal
Re: The Truth About Thimerosal
December 5, 2002
I'm not sure which is more offensive, the gross mischaracterization of
Thimerosal toxicity you present, or the cavalier dismissal of families pursuing
compensation for their Thimerosal-damaged children as "frivolous".
I see only one fact you got right: Thimerosal was introduced in the 1930's as a
vaccine preservative. You fail to mention that autism was never described in
medical literature until roughly a decade after Thimerosal use in vaccines
began. Nor do you mention that all symptoms of autism are identical to symptoms
of heavy metal toxicity. Also missing is the fact that the rise in autism
diagnoses is in lockstep
with the rise in the number of thimerosal (49.6% ethyl mercury by weight)
vaccines added to the immunization schedule over the decades.
Thimerosal in vaccines did not "theoretically, slightly" exceed EPA mercury
guidelines. The EPA's safe mercury exposure level for adults (no guidelines
have ever been established for infants and toddlers) is
.1 mcg per kg body weight. I invite you to take a look at the amounts of
mercury my two non-theoretical, greatly over-exposed autistic children received
by adhering to the vaccine schedule. My son, at two months of age and weighing
14 lbs., was injected with an amount of mercury the EPA would consider safe for
a 1,100 lb. adult. Theoretical? Slight?
As for all those years of detailed research into the safety of vaccines you
refer to-could you please share them with me? I've been dredging through Pub
Med and the local medical library for years and those
Thimerosal safety studies have somehow eluded me. I've come across a few things
I'd be happy to share with you in return.
For example, here's just a small portion of the NIH's frightening Material
Safety Data Sheet for Thimerosal:
"Symtoms...Exposure may be fatal..fine tremors, loss of side
vision, speech, writing and gait, inability to stand or carry out voluntary
movements, irritability and bad temper leading to mania, stupor, coma, mental
retardation in children, anxiety, mental depression, insomnia, hallucinations,
and central nervous system effects".
In the case of skin contact, the NIH recommends the following:
"IMMEDIATELY flood affected skin with water while removing and
isolating all contaminated clothing." In hindsight, I wish I'd never allowed my
children within a 50-mile radius of Thimerosal. Yet it was directly injected
repeatedly into their tiny bodies where it did, in fact, wreak havoc. The
Thimerosal rider deserves the scandal surrounding it as does Thimerosal itself
and those who produced it.
Sincerely,
Rita Cave Shreffler
MO
by Janet Raloff
In the spring of 2000, one of Jane M. Hightower's patients had been concerned
about hair loss, so the internist referred the woman to a specialist in her
building. That dermatologist probed the woman's medical history but could find
no explanation. That is, until she suddenly recalled a radio broadcast about
mercury poisoning in people who had been eating lots of fish from tainted lakes.
Their symptoms included hair loss.
Although the individual pieces of sushi are small, a meal of such bite-size
seafood morsels could deliver a substantial dose of mercury, depending on the
fish species selected and the waters from which they were pulled.
So, the dermatologist asked her patient if she ate much fish. Indeed, the woman
said, she loved it. The doctor quickly arranged for the woman to get a blood
test and then faxed the results back to Hightower. After reviewing the findings,
which suggested the patient's mercury concentrations were in fact somewhat
elevated, Hightower put the document atop the papers in her in-box.
Which is where it was still sitting, when a patient came in complaining, "My
house is poisoning me!"
Hightower listened as the woman described how she sometimes felt so enervated
that she could barely summon the will to get out of bed. Other times,
especially while traveling abroad for months on end, the woman felt fine.
Oh yes, one other thing: The patient's thinning hair had become such a problem
that the woman turned to Rogaine. She told Hightower she had been using this
antibalding drug for 2 years.
Glancing at the in-box and her other patient's mercury data, Hightower asked
whether her new patient ate much fish. "And she said, 'Yes, as a matter of
fact-nine times a week,'" Hightower recalls.
This "serendipitous" pairing of cases launched the doctor on a quest to
understand whether a taste for fish might be poisoning any of her other
patients.
For the next year, Hightower formally surveyed the fish-consumption patterns of
every person who came through her practice. Among those 720 people, 123 appeared
to be eating fairly high concentrations of fish.
She then convinced 113 of these fish eaters-several of whom also showed symptoms
indicative of possible mercury poisoning-to get tested for the metal. All but
seven had blood drawn for testing. The remainder, including several children,
submitted only their hair for testing.
Most of tested individuals exhibited elevated mercury concentrations despite
having little or no known exposure to mercury besides eating fish, report
Hightower and Dan Moore of the California Pacific Medical
Center, also in San Francisco, in an upcoming issue of Environmental Health
Perspectives. Among the patients who had blood tests, 89 percent had blood
concentrations exceeding 5 micrograms per liter ( m g/L). Indeed, 16 percent had
blood concentrations over 20 mg/L of blood-and 4 individuals surpassed 50 mg/L.
Because fetal exposure to mercury can later play out as IQ deficits, the
National Academy of Sciences in 2000 recommended that women of childbearing age
should try to keep mercury concentrations in their
blood to less than 5 mg/L(or hair concentrations to below 1 mg/L). They didn't
address other parts of the population.
Hightower advised all her patients with blood or hair values well above those
cutoffs to pare fish from their diets over the next few months. And though
follow-up blood tests showed that their bodies indeed began shedding mercury,
the drop was slow. In some cases, even 21 weeks later, the patients' mercury
concentrations remained elevated well above the NAS guideline figures.
Among adults, most symptoms abated as their blood concentrations dropped. Alas,
Hightower says, that didn't spare one child, who initially was screened with
nearly 15 times the NAS recommended ceiling concentrations for mercury.
Hightower notes that this boy had experienced a documented "mental decline"
during the 4 years he had regularly been eating not only canned tuna but also
fresh tuna and salmon steaks. Though his parents eventually purged fish from his
diet, the boy retains a significant neurological impairment, Hightower says.
Since her initial study ended, she has continued to evaluate fish consumption in
her patients. Another 60 or so of them turned out to be at risk for subtle
mercury poisoning. Perhaps most troubling, Hightower told Science News Online,
was that her patients-much like herself-had viewed fish as a healthy food. Study
after study had extolled the heart benefits of fish-rich diets. She asked: How
could her patients have been so seriously misled? Why weren't they aware that
this food can also serve as the vehicle for a potent poison?
In a Nov. 20 letter to President George Bush, she asked for actions to help
consumers avoid unnecessary exposure. For instance, she requested that the
government continue testing fish for mercury tainting and that the results-and
any necessary fish advisories about mercury-"be readily available where fish are
sold."
But they ate pricey fish. . .
That fish can serve as a dietary vehicle for bringing mercury to the dinner
table is hardly new. Mercury is the most commonly cited basis for state warnings
that locally caught fish might be dangerous to consumers' health.
American lobster is among the shellfish species that tends to carry mercury,
typically about 0.3 parts per million, according to FDA data. Though roughly
comparable to the mercury tainting of tuna steaks, it carries only about a third
as much as swordfish or shark. By contrast, its mercury load is generally about
twice the concentration typical of crab or canned tuna.
However, Hightower says, those advisories generally addressed only freshwater
species caught by noncommercial anglers from especially tainted waters. Her
patients were eating primarily marine fish. Moreover, these bankers, scientists,
physicians, business executives, investment brokers, and Internet entrepreneurs
weren't hauling in their own catch of the day. They either ordered it from the
counter of a local food retailer or from the menus of white-tablecloth
restaurants.
A message that federal health officials have failed to effectively communicate
to the public, she says, is that many large, predatory, and long-lived oceanic
species also accumulate plenty of heavy metals, including mercury. Many of
Hightower's patients noted that they had been selecting precisely these large,
predatory marine species because they tasted least fishy and their bones were
easy to remove.
Overall, elevated mercury readings among her patients tended to correlate most
strongly with any consumption of swordfish. However, many with high mercury
scores also ate plenty of tuna-especially steaks-and salmon.
The heart of the matter
In her readings on health effects of mercury, Hightower ran across a 1999
Italian study in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology. It described
finding highly elevated concentrations of mercury in heart-but not other
muscle-of patients who had died from heart failure related to a condition known
as idiopathic dilated cardiomyopathy. Because none of the patients had known
elevated exposures to mercury, the data hinted that heart muscle might
selectively accumulate the metal, leading to its selective poisoning.
On November 28, the New England Journal of Medicine published two
epidemiological studies offering further support for a heart sensitivity to
methylmercury-the organic form of the metal found in fish.
In one international study probing cardiovascular risks, Eliseo Guallar of the
Johns Hopkins Medical Institutions and his colleagues correlated risk of first
heart attack with toenail concentrations of mercury and concentrations of a fish
oil (docosahexaenoic acid, or DHA) in body fat. Their data came from 684 men who
had had a heart attack and another 724 who hadn't.
In this study, increasing concentrations of mercury in toenails-which serve as a
relatively long-term record of exposure-were "directly associated" with
increasing risk of heart attack, the study found, whereas DHA concentrations in
body fat appeared protective against heart attack. Guallar and his colleagues
say that their data suggest that mercury tainting of fish diminishes the
cardioprotective effect normally associated with heavy consumption of DHA and
oily fish.
The authors noted that they had not collected information on the sources of
mercury or DHA among their participants-nor data on fish intake. However, they
noted, the substantial DHA concentrations measured in some subpopulations of the
participants would suggest their mercury likely derived from consumption of
marine fish.
To date, health advisories against eating mercury-tainted fish have tended to
focus on pregnant women and children, with a goal of protecting the neurological
development in youngsters, Guallar's group
observes. "Our results raise the possibility that this advice should be extended
to the general adult population," the researchers say. They recommend that
people should not eschew fish, just judiciously choose species that are not
likely to be heavily contaminated.
According to a table of data that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration compiled
nearly 2 years ago, tilefish, swordfish, shark, and king mackerel lead the list
with mean mercury concentrations of between 0.7 and 1.4 parts per million (ppm).
Although the agency had fewer samples from a number of other popular marine
species, among them red snapper, moonfish, orange roughy, marine bass, and
marlin also tended to be fairly heavily tainted, typically averaging 0.4 to 0.6
ppm.
FDA reported somewhat lower-but still far from negligible-mercury tainting in
grouper, tuna, halibut, pollock, cod, whitefish, and herring. All were down in
the 0.2 to 0.15 ppm range. Canned tuna had less contamination than fresh or
frozen. Some shellfish also fall in that category, with lobster containing more
mercury than crab.
Seafood with the least mercury contamination includes tilapia, salmon, shrimp,
oysters, clams, sole, and flounder.
Bon appetit!
Continuing Use of Mercury in Vaccines
Questioned
Consumer Groups Call On Drug Makers, Congress and the White House to Stop
Thimerosal Use-Especially in Infants and Pregnant Women
WASHINGTON, DC, Jan. 8 -/E-Wire/-- Parents and advocates are meeting today on
Capital Hill to ask the Nation's leaders and pharmaceutical companies to stop
using the mercury preservative thimerosal in all
vaccines, to inform Americans about vaccines with mercury, and to recall
existing thimerosal stocks from health care facilities. Mercury is a known
neurotoxin and has been linked to brain disorders including autism, Alzheimer's
and other chronic neurological dysfunction.
"Why are vaccine makers still using thimerosal and unnecessarily exposing
infants, pregnant women an unsuspecting Americans-including members of
Congress-to mercury?" asked Michael Bender, Director, Mercury Policy Project.
"Vaccines are supposed to help prevent health problems and not create them.
Continued use of mercury in medical products for any human use, where avoidable,
is simply irresponsible and not worth the risk."
US health and governmental officials seem to agree. In 1982, a Food and Drug
Administration (FDA) expert panel recommended that mercury be eliminated from
over-the-counter health products. In 1999, the FDA and the American Academy of
Pediatrics (AAP) urged manufacturers to remove thimerosal from childhood
vaccines. In 2001, the Institute of Medicine recommended that children and
pregnant women avoid thimerosal whenever possible.
While today, most but not all infant vaccines are mercury-free, the preservative
is still added to formulations for influenza (flu vaccines),diphtheria-tetanus,
tetanus, hepatitis B, pneumococcal and rabies. This year the Centers for
Disease Control (CDC) recommended for the first time that healthy children
receive influenza vaccine. No influenza vaccines are available that are
completely mercury-free, although two brands only contain trace amounts.
"During the past decade children were given many more vaccines containing
mercury, and the rate of autism skyrocketed. Mercury can cause the same symptoms
and abnormalities we see in autism. Like lead exposures, there is no "safe"
level for mercury," said Sallie Bernard, Director, SAFE MINDS. "The removal of
thimerosal from OTC products and most childhood vaccines shows this preservative
is an absolutely unnecessary ingredient. We urge that US policies be changed and
that vaccines manufacturers completely and unequivocally refrain from using this
deadly toxin without delay."
The US health science panel that extensively reviewed thimerosal was unable to
"either accept or reject a causal relationship" between autism and thimerosal,
and stated that additional studies were needed. According to the Institute of
Medicine's 2001 Immunization Safety Review Committee, "While the available
scientific data do not establish that these neurodevelopmental disorders are
caused by thimerosal, at the same time, they do not establish that these
neurodevelopmental disorders are not caused by thimerosal. The hypothesis that
exposure to thimerosal-containing vaccines could be associated with
neuordevelopmental disorders was biologically plausible."
"Vaccine manufacturers have now been given protection from financial
liability for mercury-related vaccine injuries in the Homeland Security Act so
they don't have to worry about the harm it's caused to the brains of children
and adults," said Barbara Loe Fisher, Co-founder & President, National Vaccine
Information Center. "They may be off the hook financially but they are not off
the hook morally. They should do the right thing and make all vaccines
mercury-free.
For Immediate Release
Continuing Use of Mercury in Vaccines Questioned
Consumer Groups Call On Drug Makers, Congress and the White House to Stop
Thimerosal Use-Especially in Infants and Pregnant Women
Washington, DC - January 8, 2003 - Parents and advocates are meeting today on
Capitol Hill to ask the Nation's leaders and pharmaceutical companies to stop
using the mercury preservative thimerosal in all vaccines, to inform Americans
about vaccines with mercury, and to recall existing thimerosal stocks from
health care facilities. Mercury is a known neurotoxin and has been linked to
brain disorders including autism, Alzheimer's and other chronic neurological
dysfunction.
"Why are vaccine makers still using thimerosal and unnecessarily exposing
infants, pregnant women and unsuspecting Americans-including members of
Congress-to mercury?," asked Michael Bender, Director, Mercury Policy Project.
"Vaccines are supposed to help prevent health problems and not create them.
Continued use of mercury in medical products for any human use, where avoidable,
is simply irresponsible and not worth the risk."
US health and governmental officials seem to agree. In 1982, a Food and Drug
Administration (FDA) expert panel recommended that mercury be eliminated from
over-the-counter health products. In 1999, the FDA and the American Academy of
Pediatrics (AAP) urged manufacturers to remove thimerosal from childhood
vaccines. In 2001, the Institute of Medicine recommended that children and
pregnant women avoid thimerosal whenever possible.
While today, most, but not all, infant vaccines are mercury-free. The
preservative is still added to formulations for influenza (flu vaccines),
diphtheria-tetanus, tetanus, hepatitis B, pneumococcal and rabies. This year
the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) recommended for the first time that
healthy children receive influenza vaccine. No influenza vaccines are available
that are completely mercury-free, although two brands only contain trace
amounts.
"During the past decade children were given many more vaccines containing
mercury, and the rate of autism skyrocketed. Mercury can cause the same symptoms
and abnormalities we see in autism. Like lead exposures, there is no "safe"
level for mercury," said Sallie Bernard, Director, SAFE MINDS. "The removal of
thimerosal from OTC products and most childhood vaccines shows this preservative
is an absolutely unnecessary ingredient. We urge that US policies be changed and
that vaccines manufacturers completely and unequivocally refrain from using this
deadly toxin without delay."
The US health science panel that extensively reviewed thimerosal was unable to
"either accept or reject a causal relationship" between autism and thimerosal,
and stated that additional studies were needed. According to the Institute of
Medicine's 2001 Immunization Safety Review Committee, "While the available
scientific data do not establish that these neurodevelopmental disorders are
caused by thimerosal, at the same time, they do not establish that these
neurodevelopmental disorders are not caused by thimerosal. The hypothesis that
exposure to thimerosal-containing vaccines could be associated with
neuordevelopmental disorders was biologically plausible."
"Vaccine manufacturers have now been given protection from financial liability
for mercury-related vaccine injuries in the Homeland Security Act so they don't
have to worry about the harm it's caused to the brains of children and adults,"
said Barbara Loe Fisher, Co-founder & President, National Vaccine Information
Center. "They may be off the hook financially but they are not off the hook
morally. They should do the right thing and make all vaccines mercury-free.
To view the Center for Disease Controls list of influenza vaccines
containing mercury, see:
http://www.909shot.com/Issues/mercury.htm.
To view the manufacturers list of vaccines still containing mercury, see:
http://www.vaccinesafety.edu/thi-table.htm.
More information is available at -
aap.org/advocacy/archives/julvacc.htm
http://www.iom.edu/IOM/IOMHome.nsf/Pages/thimerosal+report
www.safeminds.org
www.mercurypolicy.org
www.909SHOT.com
Poison at the end of the rainbow:
In a shantytown in Ecuador, mercury poisoning plagues children of miners
By William J. Cromie
Gazette Staff
http://www.news.harvard.edu/gazette/2003/01.30/01-mercury.html
All photos courtesy of S. Allen Counter
It sounds like an "Alice in Wonderland" tale. Children intoxicated by mercury
shake and grab themselves like Mad Hatters in a mountain settlement known as the
place that no one can find.
But, sadly, it's a true story. Mercury vapors from gold mining are causing brain
damage in the children of Nambija, an Indian word that means "the place that no
one can find." It's a shantytown in southern Ecuador that represents a piece of
a large and growing health problem.
"What's happening in Nambija is a local example of what's happening to children
of gold miners in indigenous communities all over the Andean and Amazon regions
of South America," says S. Allen Counter, an associate professor of neurology at
the Harvard Medical School. A humanitarian and an explorer as well as a doctor,
Counter describes the problem in the January issue of the Journal of
Occupational and Environmental Medicine. "We have laboratory evidence of what
mercury poisoning does to gold miners," he says, "but this is the first time we
have been able to show from tests in the field what is happening to their
children and wives."
The evidence he and his colleagues have found in the blood and brains of
children in Ecuador also bears on growing concerns in the United States. Some
hospitals and doctors' offices are replacing blood pressure gauges that contain
mercury, and at least one state, Connecticut, is phasing in a ban on mercury
thermometers.
Counter is also concerned about other uses of mercury in the United States and
Africa. Some immigrants to the United States from Caribbean countries, such as
Haiti, scatter mercury powder around their homes as part of religious rituals.
Unusually high levels of mercury in the urine of people living around Lake
Victoria in East Africa have been traced to skin lighteners that contain the
element. A small group of doctors in the United States worries that mercury,
used as a preservative in children's vaccines, may underlie the alarming
increase in cases of autism in this country. Gold poaching
In Nambija, and many other gold camps, men break up gold-containing rock with
dynamite, then carry the fragments in sacks to processing areas. On the way,
they surreptitiously drop off some of the ore for their wives to pick up. The
women mix the ore with quicksilver, or liquid mercury. Gold flecks combine with
the mercury and the amalgam can be easily separated from worthless soil and
rock.
It's a common sight to see Indian women, with children on their backs, or
together in a small hut, heating the silver-colored, gold-flecked amalgam balls
in metal pots. The heat vaporizes the mercury, leaving a pot of pure gold worth
about $100 to impoverished families. The process also leaves mercury vapors that
are inhaled by the children.
Some of the women are aware enough about the danger to cover their mouths with
shirts or cloths, but that's ineffective. It doesn't stop poisonous vapors from
passing into the lungs and from there into blood vessels. This blood carries
mercury to the brain, and can affect the brains of fetuses in the womb.
After overcoming the reluctance of children to get stuck by needles, Counter's
group took samples of their blood. When these samples where analyzed in a U.S.
laboratory, it was found that the Andean children had extravagantly high levels
of mercury.
In this country, 0.3 micrograms of mercury per liter of blood is average for the
general population, 10 micrograms is the level at which dental technicians,
dentists, and others who handle mercury (for tooth fillings) begin to worry.
Indian children in Nambija reach 26, 59, even 89 micrograms. Some of their
mercury intoxication may also come from eating fish from local rivers
contaminated by mercury spills from the mines.
Anomalies appear in the way information is processed by the brains of these
children. Nerve signals generated by outside sounds and sights move more slowly
than normal and sometimes disappear completely. Outward physical signs include
involuntary shaking, grabbing their heads and upper bodies, and hyperactivity.
Counter compares their activities to those of the Mad Hatter in "Alice in
Wonderland," a character based on hat makers in England who used mercury to give
their products shape.
Masking the problem
Counter is the Indiana Jones of neurology. He has studied acupuncture in China,
deafness in the Inuits of the Arctic, and poisoning among Indians in Ecuador who
use lead from old batteries to glaze roof tiles. Crossing swift rivers and
hiking uphill to Nambija, 6,000 feet into the mountains, is routine for him.
Gold bandits, armed soldiers, 12-year-old boys with automatic rifles, and
dynamite explosions in mining caves do not deter him, nor does the stance of
mining companies toward his "interfering" in their business. In addition to
everything else he does, Counter directs the Harvard Foundation for
Intercultural Studies, an institution dedicated to fostering greater
understanding and interaction between different cultures and races. So he is
used to people telling him to mind his own business.
At first, the women of Nambija denied that they were poaching and cooking gold
ore. It is, after all, illegal. But the practice is too widespread to hide. With
the help of Fernando Ortega, from the Universidad de San Francisco de Quito in
Ecuador, Counter explained how mercury was poisoning them. He distributed
medicine, nutritional supplements, and respirator masks to the women and
children, purchased with funds he raised from Harvard alumni and other
contributors. He has informed the government of Ecuador about the situation, and
insists that the gold can be separated from soil and rock particles without
mercury.
Counter intends to bring some of the most severely affected victims to
Children's Hospital in Boston. Michael Shannon, a Harvard Medical School
pediatrician, and Leo Buchanan of Harvard University Health Services have
volunteered to treat the children as they have those in Ecuador. Since the Sept.
11, 2001, terrorist attacks, however, visas for foreigners have been much harder
to obtain.
In addition to helping such children, Counter thinks the United States should
take a closer look at the use of mercury in religious rituals. In some
inner-city enclaves, people who have come here from various Caribbean nations
burn mercury powders that create vapors similar to those that come from burning
amalgam in Nambija. Counter would like to see an education program for these
people like the one he created for the gold mining families.
He also brings experts together to discuss other possible sources of mercury
poisoning. In one such meeting they talked about the fact that many vaccines
used to immunize children against diseases like whooping cough contain a
mercury-based preservative. Most vaccine makers no longer use the preservative,
and there is no proof that it is tied to recently documented increases in
autism. Nevertheless, lawsuits have been filed against drug companies by the
parents of autistic children.
"We should do further research to determine if a connection does exist," Counter
comments.
The principal of the school in Nambija was so pleased with Counter's efforts
that he offered him a piece of rock laced with gold. Counter looked up at the
excavations that have gouged and despoiled the mountain from which the gold
came, and thought of a woman whose five children have been poisoned by mercury -
children like his own two young daughters. "No thank you," he said politely.
Study Finds Lower Level
of Old Toxins but New Trends Are Worrying
By ANDREW C. REVKIN
The broadest study yet of toxic chemicals that Americans absorb in their
bodies showed a continuing decline in the clearest threats, like lead,
pesticides and tobacco residues, but turned up numerous other findings that
federal scientists and other experts called troublesome yesterday.
The study tested blood and urine collected in 1999 and 2000 from more than
2,000 volunteers chosen as a representative slice of the American population.
It determined that almost 8 percent of the roughly 50 million American women
ages 16 to 49 had blood levels of mercury exceeding 5.8 parts per billion, the
precautionary standard set by the Environmental Protection Agency.
Federal health officials said the danger level for mercury was 10 times that
high, a level not found in any of the women in the study. But they said the
finding justified a greater effort to find ways to cut women's exposure to
mercury, which at high levels can cause birth defects and other problems.
Much of the mercury exposure is likely to accumulate through eating fish. It
is the second such study by the federal Centers for Disease Control and
Prevention, but in examining 116 chemicals it greatly expands on the first
report, published in 2001, which looked for only 27. Health researchers,
environmental campaigners and industry representatives hailed the report as a
vital tool in trying to discern, or rule out, health effects from chemicals in
the environment. "This allows us to begin connecting the dots," said Dr.
Patricia Butterfield, a researcher and professor of nursing at Montana State
University. "We can begin in the next generation of citizens to understand
these issues and make science-based decisions."
The study, the Second
National Report on Human Exposure to Environmental Chemicals, was posted at
www.cdc.gov/exposurereport yesterday. Because the study measured exposures
by age, sex and ethnic background, it could help public health officials focus
their priorities, officials and experts said. For example, it found that all
other population groups, including children, had blood levels of mercury well
below the government safety limit.
Future surveys will be
published every two years. Among other findings, the new study disclosed that
children had higher levels of residues from secondhand smoke, some pesticides
and plastics than adults, and that Mexican-Americans have three times the
levels of a DDT residue of other Americans.
The children's higher levels of residues could be a result of several factors,
federal scientists said. For one, children eat, drink and breathe three times
as much as adults pound for pound. More work should be done to understand the
DDT levels in Mexican Americans, scientists from the disease control agency
said. The pesticide has long been banned in the United States and since 1997
has been phased out in Mexico. The study did not differentiate between
native-born Americans of Mexican
descent and Mexican immigrants.
The study used new methods able to detect the slightest traces of chemicals in
the blood and urine. Tests were run to check for dozens of constituents or
breakdown products of pesticides and plastics as well as long-lived compounds
that are now largely banned but persist in the environment. Already, federal
officials said, the smaller 2001 survey has borne fruit. They cited a recent
investigation of a cluster of childhood leukemia cases in Fallon, Nev.
Investigators sifted for clues to any link to 132 chemicals, said Dr. James L.
Pirkle, the deputy director for science at the federal laboratories that
conducts the studies. A significant finding was that levels of tungsten, a
toxic metal, were higher locally than in the 2001 general overview of the
population. Now the researchers can try to determine whether tungsten levels
can be linked to the leukemia, he said. The new study echoed the 2001 study's
findings on DDT; tobacco residue, called cotinine; lead; and other toxic
compounds that have been measured for many years. All concentrations have
continued to drop in all age and ethnic groups, according to the new study.
Cotinine is a compound left behind after the body breaks down cigarette smoke
and is used as an indicator of exposure to a host of other cigarette
ingredients that can cause cancer and other diseases. The new study found that
children had more than double the level of cotinine found in nonsmoking
adults. The researchers said this was probably because most efforts to curtail
smoke exposure had occurred in workplaces and public spaces, not the home.
Environmental and chemical industry groups had different reactions to the
report yesterday. Environmental campaigners highlighted the need for more work
to reduce chemical releases into the environment and more research on risks.
Industry groups said the data showed the robustness of humans, whose longevity
and health have been steadily improving even with trace exposures like those
measured in the new research.
For immediate release:
October 23, 2002
US Plans to Thwart Global
Mercury Treaty Talks,
Leaked Document Shows:
Groups Demand US to Remain Open to Global Talks
Washington, DC. January 27, 2003 - A leaked internal government document shows
that the United States will attempt to foil future talks on the creation of an
international instrument (treaty) on mercury during the upcoming February
meeting of the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) Governing Council in
Nairobi. Today, the Ban Mercury Work Group (Ban-Hg-Wg), a coalition of 28
non-profit groups from around the world, condemns the latest US foreign policy
and demands the US to fulfill its earlier pledge to remain open to future
treaty talks on global mercury issues.
"The global mercury crisis is a conflagration raging under our noses,
meanwhile the US is intent on ensuring that the global community fiddles,
while the world burns," said Jim Puckett, a Ban-Hg-Wg spokesperson.
The leaked document states that, "we [US] should block any attempt to move
forward" on a binding mercury treaty and "strive to prevent specific
references to a convention" in the anticipated Mercury Resolution expected to
be adopted by UNEP Governing Council in Nairobi. The document further
revealed, "the USG [US government] should oppose convening a formal expert or
policy group meeting such as the September 2002 Mercury Working Group" and
"oppose assessment of other heavy metals." This comes in apparent response to
a unified December European Union position, which states ".that the Member
States support and actively work for concrete international actions to be
initiated on mercury and its compounds, for instance a legally-binding
instrument.and that global assessment of other heavy metals
such as lead and cadmium shall commence."
Already, the European Union and the Latin American and Caribbean countries (GRULAC)
in Geneva last September at UNEP's special meeting on the Global Mercury
Assessment concluded that options for a legally binding global treaty
addressing mercury and perhaps other toxic heavy metals should be explored.
Earlier during these talks the US stated that they would remain open to such
treaty possibilities but now they appear to be clearly laying down a policy
opposing such action.
Additionally, the Environmental Council of the States (ECOS), an organization
made up of local and state government environmental officials throughout the
United States, has also asked the federal government to call for a treaty to
be accomplished within 6 years.
"Mercury is a toxic time bomb that is about to explode. We are talking about
an immortal toxic substance that is reaching threshold levels in the
biosphere. This crisis can only be ignored at the peril of all fish
consumption, child development, and the very genetic integrity of our species,
worldwide," said Michael Bender of the Ban-Hg-Wg. "The US must not be allowed
to prevent the global community from taking obvious actions to save the health
of future generations."
Bender also said that the US could do more to reduce mercury releases from
coal-fired power plants-the world's largest mercury polluters-but that the
internal US document attempts to downplay the issue. "Furthermore, for the
largest anthropogenic source of mercury, coal-fired power plants, mercury
emissions are just a small part of a much broader air pollution problem that
many nations need to confront," states the document.
Background:
Mercury is a persistent, bio-accumulative toxin that has increased at least
three fold in the atmosphere and ocean over the past century, posing a risk to
human health, wildlife and the ecological balance. The US Food and Drug
Administration and 41 states warn consumers to limit or not eat certain fish
due to mercury levels and ten states advise pregnant women and children to
limit consumption of canned tuna, the most consumed fish in the US. A potent
neurotoxin, mercury exposures can affect the brain, kidneys and liver, and
cause developmental problems. Data from the Centers for Disease Control
indicates that 1-in-12 women of childbearing age have unsafe mercury levels,
translating into over 300,000 children born each year in the US at risk of
exposure to mercury.
The UNEP Working Group met in Geneva in September 2002 and finalized the
global mercury assessment report for submittal to the Governing Council/Global
Ministerial Environment Forum in Nairobi, Kenya,
February 3 to 7, 2003. Based on the report's key findings, the Working Group
concluded "there was sufficient evidence of significant global adverse impacts
to warrant international action to reduce the risks to human health and/or the
environment arising from the release of mercury into the environment." In its
September 23, 2002 meeting summary, the Working Group "stressed the need to
pay particular attention to vulnerable populations subject to special
(mercury) risk, namely children, pregnant women, and woman of childbearing age
as well as indigenous people, communities dependent on fish as a source of
food and occupational exposure when addressing the global adverse impacts of
mercury." The Working Group also "emphasized that it was not necessary to have
full consensus or complete evidence in order to take action and therefore
potentially significant global adverse impacts should also be addressed." The
Governing Council will also consider whether other heavy metals of possible
global concern warrant assessments.
For more information contact:
Michael Bender, Mercury Policy Project, 802-223-9000, E-mail:
mercurypolicy@a...
Jim Puckett, Basel Action Network, 206-652-5555, E-mail:
jpuckett@b...
For more information visit:
http://www.mercurypolicy.org.
http://www.ban.org/Ban-Hg-Wg
http://www.chem.unep.ch/mercury
Continuing Use of Mercury in Vaccines
Questioned Consumer Groups Call On Drug Makers, Congress and the White House to
Stop Thimerosal Use-Especially in Infants and Pregnant Women
Washington, DC - January 8, 2003 - Parents and advocates are meeting today on
Capitol Hill to ask the Nation's leaders and pharmaceutical companies to stop
using the mercury preservative thimerosal in all vaccines, to inform Americans
about vaccines with mercury, and to recall existing thimerosal stocks from
health care facilities. Mercury is a known neurotoxin and has been linked to
brain disorders including autism, Alzheimer's and other chronic neurological
dysfunction.
"Why are vaccine makers still using thimerosal and unnecessarily exposing
infants, pregnant women and unsuspecting Americans-including members of
Congress-to mercury?," asked Michael Bender, Director, Mercury Policy Project.
"Vaccines are supposed to help prevent health problems and not create them.
Continued use of mercury in medical products for any human use, where avoidable,
is simply irresponsible and not worth the risk."
US health and governmental officials seem to agree. In 1982, a Food and Drug
Administration (FDA) expert panel recommended that mercury be eliminated from
over-the-counter health products. In 1999, the FDA and the American Academy of
Pediatrics (AAP) urged manufacturers to remove thimerosal from childhood
vaccines. In 2001, the Institute of Medicine recommended that children and
pregnant women avoid thimerosal whenever possible.
While today, most, but not all, infant vaccines are mercury-free. The
preservative is still added to formulations for influenza (flu vaccines),
diphtheria-tetanus, tetanus, hepatitis B, pneumococcal and rabies. This year
the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) recommended for the first time that
healthy children receive influenza vaccine. No influenza vaccines are available
that are completely mercury-free, although two brands only contain trace
amounts.
"During the past decade children were given many more vaccines containing
mercury, and the rate of autism skyrocketed. Mercury can cause the same symptoms
and abnormalities we see in autism. Like lead exposures, there is no "safe"
level for mercury," said Sallie Bernard, Director, SAFE MINDS. "The removal of
thimerosal from OTC products and most childhood vaccines shows this preservative
is an absolutely unnecessary ingredient. We urge that US policies be changed and
that vaccines manufacturers completely and unequivocally refrain from using this
deadly toxin without delay."
The US health science panel that extensively reviewed thimerosal was unable to
"either accept or reject a causal relationship" between autism and thimerosal,
and stated that additional studies were needed. According to the Institute of
Medicine's 2001 Immunization Safety Review Committee, "While the available
scientific data do not establish that these neurodevelopmental disorders are
caused by thimerosal, at the same time, they do not establish that these
neurodevelopmental disorders are not caused by thimerosal. The hypothesis that
exposure to thimerosal-containing vaccines could be associated with
neuordevelopmental disorders was biologically plausible."
"Vaccine manufacturers have now been given protection from financial liability
for mercury-related vaccine injuries in the Homeland Security Act so they don't
have to worry about the harm it's caused to the brains of children and adults,"
said Barbara Loe Fisher, Co-founder & President, National Vaccine Information
Center. "They may be off the hook financially but they are not off the hook
morally. They should do the right thing and make all vaccines mercury-free.
|
India may become 'hot
spot' for mercury poisoning: UN |
|
NAIROBI: Asia is the biggest villain in polluting the atmosphere with new mercury emissions, impacting the health of people as well as wildlife, a new UN report says. In even worse news for India, the first global study on this hazardous heavy metal says India could be one of a dozen hot spots after an upsurge in gold mining over three decades. Mercury, once it is released, persists in the atmosphere, first impacting locally and then hitting the global commons, travelling thousands of miles. While it is also released naturally, human activities have boosted atmospheric levels of mercury threefold since pre-industrial times. Mercury is a neurotoxin which leaves children, in particular, very vulnerable. It can lead to memory loss, impaired coordination, vision disturbance. There is a suggested link to cardiovascular problems. It also affects the thyroid gland, the digestive system, the liver and skin. These findings will be discussed here during the week as the UN Environment Programme's governing council meeting and the fourth global ministerial environment forum get underway. The meeting opened Monday with ministers and senior government officials from over 100 countries, NGOs, business and industry expected to attend. Launching this first global mercury assessment report, UNEP executive director Klaus Toepfer said it is clear action is essential. "The mercury report gives us another compelling reason to reduce society's dependence on carbon-intensive energy supplies," said Toepfer. The report, compiled by an international team of experts, says coal-fired power stations and waste incinerators now account for about 1,500 tonnes, or 70 per cent of new quantified man-made mercury emissions to the atmosphere, annually. The biggest share of 860 tonnes is from Asia. Africa, second on the list, contributes 197 tonnes. Acid rain, also one of the results of power station pollution, may be aggravating the problem. Artisinal mining of gold and silver in some less developed countries is releasing an estimated 400-500 tonnes of mercury each year to the air, soils and waterways. Some 10 million people in the gold mining industry could be at risk of mercury poisoning. Rising temperatures and violent climatic events such as storms influence the release of mercury from contaminated sediment and soils into rivers, lakes and freshwater bodies. Here, it can be transformed into methylmercury and enter the food chain, primarily through seafood. Other mercury exposure can occur through dental amalgams, skin lightening creams and soaps, use in some traditional medicines, use of vaccines and some pharmaceuticals containing mercury preservatives. Sources include cement production, chlor-alkali production, manufacture of electrical switches and thermometers, garbage heaps containing waste such as old batteries. Slash and burn agriculture and forest clearing may also be releasing mercury into rivers. Mercury contamination in parts of Europe, the report says, could be affecting tiny organisms regulating soil fertility, possibly even impacting the climate change process. India is on the governing council but environment minister Baalu has not made it to Kenya to join delegates who will discuss a range of options to deal with this poison. These include finding substitutes to mercury use, establishing a global programme of action, even launching talks for a contentious legally-binding treaty. While the US is understood to be against such a treaty, most others, it is suggested, would also prefer other options to begin with. India has its environment secretary here. The first governing council meeting after last August's World Summit on Sustainable Development is expected to have a strong focus on implementation of decisions there, including programmes on changing unsustainable consumption patterns. Meeting, as Toepfer put it, in "a difficult and uncertain international environment", ministers are also expected to discuss the environmental condition of conflict areas, from West Asia to Afghanistan. |
http://www.thescotsman.co.uk/index.cfm?id=43382003
Mercury in baby vaccines is linked to autism
FRASER NELSON
MERCURY, one of the most dangerous substances known to man, is being used in a
series of infant vaccines - in spite of a warning from NHS advisers that its use
as a cheap preservative "may be toxic" to babies aged under six months.
Thimerosal, a compound 50 per cent composed of ethyl mercury, which is banned in
the United States amid fears of its links to autism, is being used in the DTwP
vaccines given to infants aged eight weeks.
A report from NHS scientists has indicated that thimerosal is not only dangerous
to infants, but also to the unborn child if contained in products used by
pregnant women.
The UK Medicines Information (UKMI) service, run under the NHS banner to provide
advice to doctors, has compiled a report naming the 13 UK vaccines which contain
thimerosal - referred to as "thiomersal" by some scientists.
The list includes four out of the seven flu vaccines issued this year by the
government, a pneumonia vaccine and four of the 11 child vaccines. The main
source is the triple DTwP jab, for whole-cell diphtheria, tetanus and pertussis.
There is no mercury in vaccines for MMR, polio, meningitis C or the DTaP
injection, which also protects against diphtheria and tetanus. But UK infants
are always given the DTwP vaccine, which does contain mercury.
"The very low thiomersal concentrations present in the pharmacological and
biological products are relatively non-toxic in adults," the UKMI report says.
"But it may be toxic in utero [in the foetus] and during the first six months of
life."
It is the first time any UK health official has admitted to the danger posed by
mercury in vaccines.
Pressure groups described the UKMI advice as a "bombshell" which should "make
Britain wake up to what the Americans have known for years" and force ministers
to take mercury out of all medicine.
Action Against Autism, a pressure group, said this tallied with the boom in
autism since vaccination ages were lowered in 1990.
"If the Department of Health is aware that thimerosal is unsafe for childhood
vaccines, than we may be looking a criminal medical negligence on a massive
scale," said Bill Welsh, the group's chairman.
The Department of Health last night confirmed to The Scotsman that the UK
vaccination schedule will have exposed infants to thimerosal, and therefore
mercury, three times by the age of 17 weeks.
"The level of thiomersal present is 50 micrograms per injection," a spokesman
said. "UK childhood exposure to thiomersal is via DTP-containing vaccine only
and, as such, up to four months of age-cumulative exposure to thiomersal is 150
micrograms from three injections."
Although it did not refute that this substance is toxic, it said the UK
Committee on Safety of Medicines "has advised that there is no evidence of harm
caused by doses of thiomersal in vaccines, except for hypersensitivity
reactions".
It is hypersensitive reactions to thiomersal, however, which are now being
linked to autism by research. The UKMI advice says as many as 18 per cent of
children - almost one in five - can experience side-effects.
It added that a memo warning about the toxic risk in thiomersal was provided by
the Wessex Drug and Medicines Information Centre in Southampton University
Hospitals Trust, dated October 2002.
The Department of Health said it was "independent advice from independent
doctors" and that it is not necessarily endorsed by ministers.
Thimerosal has been used in vaccines since 1939. The first case of autism was
diagnosed four years after - a condition never before recorded in medical
science.
The US Institute of Medicine has warned that thiomersal has a "biologically
plausible" link to autism, an admission which has fuelled £30 billion class
action in the US against Eli Lilly, the main thiomersal producer.
The Scottish Parliament has the power to ban mercury in vaccines. In spite of
pressure from the SNP and the Tories, ministers have decided to stay within the
UK vaccination programme.
Dear Friends:
We know that aluminum has been suspect for years in Alzheimer's. Interestingly,
it isn't that serious unless and until two or three things are present. A lack
of zinc allows more aluminum into the brain, and mercury depresses zinc.
Fluoride increases uptake of aluminum from the gut and access to the brain, and
a lack of magnesium causes fibrillary breakdown. Adequate magnesium prevents the
fibrillary breakdown! Malic acid chelates aluminum and enables better energy
production in mitochondria. Thus, Magnesium Malate would be a preferred form.
Additionally, Melatonin protects against mercury toxicity. Selenium chelates
mercury as does cilantro. Zinc deficiency is widespread. Supplement zinc. See
"Mastering Autism" and appended notes for details.
I am appending two messages dealing with aluminum in Vaccines.
Willis
These several notes point the way to prevention, yes, even recovery from
Alzheimer's. (Complete article available on request.)
According to Hugh Fudenberg, MD, the world's leading immunogeneticist and 13th
most quoted biologist of our times (nearly 850 papers in peer-review journals):
"If an individual has had 5 consecutive flu shots between 1970 and 1980 (the
years studied) his/her chances of getting Alzheimer's Disease is 10 times higher
than if he/she had one, two, or no shots!" He said that it was due to mercury
and aluminum that is in every flu shot (and most childhood shots).
Mercury is being implicated in Alzheimer's Disease and other chronic
neurological complaints. In 1988, it was reported from Alzheimer's cadaver
studies that mercury was found in much higher levels in the nucleus basalis of
Meynert than in controls (40ppb vs. l0ppb). Subsequent studies have shown
elevated mercury throughout the brain in persons with Alzheimer's.
Mercury is the metal found in greatest concentrations in the brains of
Alzheimer's victims! The major source of mercury exposure is in vaccinations (thimerosal),
amalgam fillings in teeth, and in contaminated fish! It is established that
mercury depresses the immune function tending to Candida overgrowth:
Mercury damages proteins in brain as in Alzheimer's. The damage is identical.
Recent studies clearly illustrate how destructive the interaction between
mercury (Hg) and sulfhydryl groups can be. Hg inhibits the polymerization of
tubulin, causes depolymerization of existing microtubules, and in animal
studies, results in brain lesions that closely resemble those found in patients
with Alzheimer's Disease.
The aldehyde group of arabinose caused by Candida overgrowth in the intestines
can react with the extra amino chemical group (called an epsilon amino group) of
an amino acid called lysine that is present in a wide variety of proteins. This
combined arabinose-lysine molecule may then form cross-links with an amino acid
called arginine in an adjoining protein, forming a compound called a pentosidine.
Protein modification caused by pentosidine formation is associated with
cross-link formation, decreased protein solubility, and increased protease
resistance. The characteristic pathological structures called neurofibrillary
tangles associated with Alzheimer's Disease contain modifications typical of
pentosidine formation. Specifically, antibodies against pentosidine react
strongly to neurofibrillary tangles and senile plaques in brain tissue from
patients with Alzheimer's Disease. In contrast, little or no reaction is
observed in apparently healthy neurons of the same brain. Thus, it appears that
the neurofibrillary tangles of Alzheimer's disease may be caused by the
pentosidines. The modification of protein structure and function caused by
arabinose could account for the biochemical and insolubility properties of the
lesions of Alzheimer's Disease through the formation of protein cross-links.
Folic Acid Possibly A Key Factor In Alzheimer's Disease, "Prevention",
March 1, 2002.
Mouse experiments suggest that folic acid could play an essential role in
protecting the brain against the ravages of Alzheimer's Disease and other neuro-degenerative
disorders, according to scientists at the National Institute on Aging. It was
found that high homocysteine, that accumulates when folic acid, vitamin B6 and
B12 are lacking, kills neurons. Other reports indicate that high homocysteine
doubles the risk.
Neurological Degeneration Due to Aluminum (Al) Load and Low Magnesium (Mg)
Intake.
Garden soil and drinking water in some Western Pacific areas with high incidence
of Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis and Parkinsonism-dementia (ALS-PD) contain high
concentrations of polluting metals such as Al, Iron (Fe), and manganese (Mn),
and low concentrations of common metals such as Mg and calcium (Ca). Decreased
exposure to traditional sources of foodstuffs and drinking water resulted in a
dramatic decline in ALS-PD.
With a high Al diet alone, Al content in the nervous system in rats showed no
difference with a control group although serum Al was high. No degenerative
process was observed. However, with an insufficient intake of Mg the same Al
load induced an increase in Al and Ca concentrations in the nervous system and
neurodegeneration with precipitation of insoluble hydroxyapatites.
There are geographical links between Alzheimer's Disease and high aluminum in
drinking water. Elevated hair aluminum has been observed in Alzheimer's
patients, and some Alzheimer's patients experience stabilization of their
symptoms following treatment with the aluminum-chelating agent desferrioxamine.
Experiments have shown that those Alzheimer's Disease patients given treatment
to remove aluminum from their system experience an immediate reduction in the
rate of deterioration. Feeding even relatively small amounts of some aluminum
salts to laboratory animals results in brain tissue damage identical to that
found in Alzheimer's patients. Recent research has identified aluminum fluoride
as a particularly nasty substance, shown to cause the deposition of amyloid
proteins (the proven cause of the tangled brain cells in most dementia cases) in
the brains of rats when they are given drinking water with only 0.5 parts per
million concentration.
If you do your research, you will find that it shows that aluminum is twice as
effective as cadmium in producing the neurofibrillary tangles that are
characteristic of Alzheimer's Disease. There is also a paper that describes
tests of a substance, aluminum fluoride that is present in drinking water.
Minute quantities, as little as 0.5 parts per million were found to result in
the formation of beta amyloid proteins, characteristic of Alzheimer's
Treatment of adult rats with aluminum over a two-week period increased the rate
of generation of reactive oxygen species in cerebral tissues while glutathione
levels were also higher. These effects were not enhanced by a concomitant
exposure to dietary iron. Levels of cerebellar nitric oxide synthase were also
elevated in aluminum-treated animals. Apopain, an enzyme selectively induced in
cells undergoing apoptosis (cell death), was specifically elevated following
aluminum exposure. Thus, aluminum may promote pro-oxidant status and cell death
within the brain, and an induction of nitric oxide synthase may underlie these
events.
The body does not readily absorb aluminum by itself. However, when present,
fluoride ions combine with the aluminum to form aluminum fluoride, which is
absorbed by the body. In the body, the aluminum eventually combines with oxygen
to form aluminum oxide or alumina. Alumina is the compound of aluminum that is
found in the brains of Alzheimer's disease.
New research from the Harvard Medical School has discovered that fluoride
accumulates in brain tissue where it can damage the central nervous system.
Recent research has associated an excessive aluminum concentration in the brain
structure in some people suffering from Alzheimer's disease, despite this toxic
element having a low permeability of the blood-brain barrier, suggesting that
some form of membrane defect may permit the excessive influx of aluminum into
the brain. It is already known that an adequate zinc supply is necessary to
maintain the integrity of all biological membranes. For example, it was found,
when experimenting with rats fed with sub-optimal zinc, that aluminum
concentrations increased three-fold in the frontolateral cortex and eight-fold
in the hippocampus. Therefore, it has been suggested, that a reason for
Alzheimer's disease could be suboptimal zinc nutriture, leading to 'leaky'
blood-brain barrier and thereby to increased transfer of aluminum and other
toxins to the brain.
Do any of your loved ones have white flecks or spots on fingernails? This is a
clear sign of gross zinc deficiency! Supplement zinc and possibly copper (8:1)
to avoid a copper deficiency. It may be vitamin B6 that is lacking, for it is
necessary for metabolizing zinc and magnesium.
Zinc is an important component of superoxide dismutase (SOD), one of the most
important enzymes that function as cellular antioxidants. The absence of this
enzyme is lethal. It protects intracellular components from oxidative damage,
converting the superoxide ion to hydrogen peroxide. SOD appears to be able to
prevent activation of phospholipase A2 and proanoid synthesis by scavenging free
radicals, thereby reducing lipid peroxidation products. It is a powerful free
radical scavenger that has been clinically shown to protect the brain, heart,
liver, lungs, kidneys, skin, muscles, penis, nerves, and spinal cord from
ischemic injury. SOD has been shown to inhibit articular tissue damage
associated with osteoarthritis. It decreases lipid peroxidation in damaged skin
cells, protects against late radiation-induced tissue injury, improves clinical
symptoms associated with Bechet's syndrome, helps protect the retina, helps
protect against iron toxicity, inhibits vasogenic brain edema after brain
injury, increases flu survival rates in mice, plays a role in bacterial defense,
helps normalize blood pressure, helps with cardiovascular problems, reduces LDL
oxidation involved in atherosclerosis, improves sperm motility, and is reduced
in Alzheimer's patients.
Dr. Ashley Bush, Massachusetts General Hospital at Charleston, found that
Alzheimer's brain contained three to four times as much copper, zinc, and iron
as normal, mostly concentrated in the plaques.
When zinc was missing, the copper bound at a higher rate to mutant SOD1, and
stole electrons from other chemicals in the cell 3,000 times faster than normal
SOD1 does. It then handed over the extra electrons to make more superoxide! This
undoubtedly explains why elderly people with zinc deficiencies seem to be at
greater risk of developing senile dementia.
When a metal chelator was applied to the mashed post-mortem brain from an
Alzheimer's patient, the plaques vanished like sugar in warm water!
Magnesium protects the cell from aluminum, mercury, lead, cadmium, beryllium,
and nickel. Evidence is mounting that low levels of magnesium contribute to the
heavy metal deposition in the brain that precedes Parkinson's, multiple
sclerosis, and Alzheimer's. It is probable that low total body magnesium
contributes to heavy metal toxicity in children and is a participant in the
etiology of learning disorders.
Aluminum transcript from 2000
I have received a email with the downloads of original transcripts from the
Aluminum in Vaccines meeting which was held in Puerto Rico in May 2000. The
file has been scanned as a PDF but is quite large, and I cannot send it to this
list (or yahoo lists). Please send me your e-mails and let me know that you
have the capacity to receive the file of the two-day meeting and I will send it
to you, if you don't already have it. It takes a while to receive it. I have
sent it to Red Flags Weekly in the hopes that it will run on the Health line.
Highlights of the meeting, along the lines of the Simpsonwood meeting include:
1) Gender studies indicate that females process the vaccines better than males;
2) Aluminum in shots migrates to the lymph nodes under the arms, first before
being excreted. At temperatures below 38 degrees some forms of aluminum
crystallize and in animals have been found to cause selling reactions and
sarcomas. There is a study about swelling reactions to aluminum in humans.
3) They have done mass spectrometer studies to show that aluminum impacts the
bones, and there may be some interaction triggering arthritis.
4) Very, very preliminary studies indicate that some lab bunnies, called the
"bad" bunnies, don't seem to excrete aluminum, and there is some question as to
the same would apply to "bad" humans…
5) The day babies are born, the aluminum dose exceeds what an adult would eat
(aluminum, as we know is common in our food products and mostly excreted).
6) They discuss the fact that there needs to be research into the synergy of the
combined heavy metals and their impact in the vaccines.
7) Aluminum impacts peptides, but I couldn't absorb the specifics, very detailed
science presentation.
8) Discussion about the MT Protein and how it works. How mercury, for instance,
causes the MT Protein to bind to it and the human body dumps zinc and
magnesium. (i.e., Bill Walsh's work at the Pfeiffer Clinic).
I think everyone would be interested in this information. I am forwarding this
information and meeting minutes to congress and senate and have already alerted
them to its arrival so they will watch for it. There are clearly issues that are
being raised that have significant impact on our public health, and huge gaps in
the science that we need to have to understand the dangers. I knowledge that
individuals we depended on was gravely conflicting to the information the public
was given. There have been conflicts of interest, meeting minutes uncovered, and
what is still left that is untold is scary to even think about. We need to
ensure safety of the people as a top priory, and the truth IS that they knew
there were problems with the mercury and aluminum contained in our vaccines. Now
is the time to say legislators need to see the truth. While in Washington, DC we
talked with many congress and senate legislators and were asked to come back
within 2-8
Weeks to deliver one PC compatible CD filled with the research, investigations,
exhibits, meeting minutes, and so much more. We agreed and sad said each
legislator should have a copy of all of the proof and contents of this CD so
they can make informed decisions when it is time to vote. They need to see the
facts this affects not only those with autism but our entire great nation.
Autism is in a Pandemic Widespread Epidemic. If we do not address this on senate
as well as congress the one half have the knowledge to make informed decisions
allowing them to make informed votes. How will legislators know if their vote
might have changed if only they had a chance to review the documents that were
untold and have been uncovered? We encourage each legislator to set 10-20
minutes aside when the US Autism Ambassadors visit their office by February.
10 years ago autism was 1 in 10,000
2 years ago 1-500
Last year 1-250
This year 150 so far??
What will it be by 2005 Estimate at the rate over last two years could it
be? 1 in 75 in 2004
1 in 37.5 in 2005
When will it be your neighbor's child, your friend's child, your relative, your
grandchild, or will it be your child next?
Find out the untold and uncovered Vaccine and Autism connections.
Peacefully,
DR Rev. LD Wedewer, DD, NA, CAN, US Autism Ambassador
1900 K Street SW
Cedar Rapids, Iowa 52404-3620
319-364-2687
http://news.scotsman.com/index.cfm?id=43382003
FRASER NELSON
MERCURY, one of the most dangerous substances known to man, is being used in a
series of infant vaccines - in spite of a warning from NHS advisers that its use
as a cheap preservative "may be toxic" to babies aged under six months.
Thimerosal, a compound 50 per cent composed of ethyl mercury, which is banned in
the United States amid fears of its links to autism, is being used in the DTwP
vaccines given to infants aged eight weeks. A report from NHS scientists has
indicated that thimerosal is not only dangerous to infants, but also to the
unborn child if contained in products used by pregnant women.
The UK Medicines Information (UKMI) service, run under the NHS banner to provide
advice to doctors, has
compiled a report naming the 13 UK vaccines which contain thimerosal - referred
to as "thiomersal" by some scientists.
The list includes four out of the seven flu vaccines issued this year by the
government, a pneumonia vaccine and four of the 11 child vaccines. The main
source is the triple DTwP jab, for whole-cell diphtheria, tetanus and pertussis.
There is no mercury in vaccines for MMR, polio, meningitis C or the DTaP
injection, which also protects against diphtheria and tetanus. But UK infants
are always given the DTwP vaccine, which does contain mercury.
"The very low thiomersal concentrations present in the pharmacological and
biological products are relatively non-toxic in adults," the UKMI report says.
"But it may be toxic in utero [in the foetus] and during the first six months of
life."
It is the first time any UK health official has admitted to the danger posed by
mercury in vaccines.
Pressure groups described the UKMI advice as a "bombshell" which should "make
Britain wake up to what
the Americans have known for years" and force ministers to take mercury out of
all medicine.
Action Against Autism, a pressure group, said this tallied with the boom in
autism since vaccination ages
were lowered in 1990. "If the Department of Health is aware that thimerosal is
unsafe for childhood vaccines, than we may be looking a criminal medical
negligence on a massive scale," said Bill Welsh, the group’s chairman. The
Department of Health last night confirmed to The Scotsman that the UK
vaccination schedule will have exposed infants to thimerosal, and therefore
mercury, three times by the age of 17 weeks.
"The level of thiomersal present is 50 micrograms per injection," a spokesman
said. "UK childhood exposure to thiomersal is via DTP-containing vaccine only
and, as such, up to four months of age-cumulative exposure to thiomersal is 150
micrograms from three injections."
Although it did not refute that this substance is toxic, it said the UK
Committee on Safety of Medicines
"has advised that there is no evidence of harm caused by doses of thiomersal in
vaccines, except for
hypersensitivity reactions".
It is hypersensitive reactions to thiomersal, however, which are now being
linked to autism by research. The UKMI advice says as many as 18 per cent of
children - almost one in five - can experience side-effects.
It added that a memo warning about the toxic risk in thiomersal was provided by
the Wessex Drug and
Medicines Information Centre in Southampton University Hospitals Trust, dated
October 2002.
The Department of Health said it was "independent advice from independent
doctors" and that it is not
necessarily endorsed by ministers. Thimerosal has been used in vaccines since
1939. The first case of autism was diagnosed four years after - a condition
never before recorded in medical science.
The US Institute of Medicine has warned that thiomersal has a "biologically
plausible" link to autism, an admission which has fuelled £30 billion class
action in the US against Eli Lilly, the main
thiomersal producer.
The Scottish Parliament has the power to ban mercury in vaccines. In spite of
pressure from the SNP and the Tories, ministers have decided to stay within the
UK vaccination programme.
Neurotoxicology 1996
Fall-Winter;17(3-4):583-96
Evidence for delayed neurotoxicity produced by methylmercury.
Rice DC.
Toxicology Research Division, Bureau of Chemical Safety, Health
Canada.
Delayed toxicity as a result of developmental methylmercury exposure was
identified in mice two decades ago by Spyker, who observed kyphosis,
neuromuscular deficits, and other severe abnormalities as the mice
aged.
Delayed neurotoxicity was also observed in monkeys treated with methylmercury
from birth to seven years of age. When these monkeys reached 13 years of age,
individuals began exhibiting clumsiness not present previously. Further
exploration revealed that treated monkeys required more time to retrieve treats
than did nonexposed monkeys and displayed abnormalities on a clinical assessment
of sense of touch in hands and feet, despite the fact that clinical examinations
performed routinely during the period of dosing had not yielded abnormal
results.
Another group of monkeys, dosed from in utero to four years of age, also took
longer to retrieve treats when assessed years after cessation of exposure. These
observations were pursued in both groups of monkeys by objective assessment of
somatosensory function in the hands: both groups of monkeys exhibited impaired
vibration sensitivity. These results are strongly suggestive of a delayed
neurotoxicity manifested when these monkeys reached middle age. Data from
persons with Minamata disease also provide evidence for delayed neurotoxicity.
Perhaps the strongest piece of evidence comes from a study of over 1100 Minamata
patients over 40 years old, in which difficulty in performing daily activities
increased as a function of age compared to matched controls. Methylmercury may
represent the only environmental toxicant for which there is good evidence for
delayed neurotoxicity that may be manifested many years after cessation of
exposure.
Should Health Insurance Companies
Provide Full Health Care Benefits for Vaccine Injured Autistic Children ?
What is your State Representatives Opinion ?
Mercury is a highly toxic metal, has been documented to be a cause of cancer,
and can be absorbed through the digestive track, skin, and respiratory system.
Mercury is:
* 1,000 times more toxic than Lead, and ranking second behind radioactive
uranium is the second most toxic metal. This metal is available in three basic
forms, organic, ionic, heavy metal, and is known to form very tight bonds within
the bodies sulfur-hydro groups. The enzymes, which our immune system relies on
for chemical reactions to occur, become disrupted as a result of the mercury
binding to these sulfur-hydro groups.
* Sulfur is used as a binding compound within these groups and without such, or
if absent, the body cannot make connective tissue or anti-bodies for the Immune
System. Mercury easily collects in the brain, kidney, and lungs, is present in
most all vaccines and some dental fillings..
* Mercury has also been known to collect up to 22,000 times more in the heart
over other peripheral muscles in the body. (Journal of the American College of
Cardiology Vol. 33, No 6, 1999 pp. 1578-1583). The FDA approved
vaccines contain:
* Mercury, Formaldehyde, Aluminum, and Recommit DNA and RNA in addition to
foreign species proteins.
Some vaccines contain live living micro-organisms designed through genetic
engineering. We do not know if these living organisms will mutate or what they
might change into in the future. The polio vaccine has contained the ....
SV-40 Cancer Virus and it is now .....
* documented to be genetically transferred from the parents who received this
vaccine on to their Children
* corrupting the genetic line of the family decedents
(The Journal of Infectious Diseases: September 1999: 180:884-887).
* This virus is now documented as a cause of Cancer, and is linked to the
contaminated lots of the polio vaccine (The Lancet Volume 359, Number 9309,
March 9, 2002).
The CDC has reported the polio vaccine caused every case of wild polio in the
United States in the last 20 years. A Quote from Science Magazine in reference
to what the Salk Brothers say about their own Vaccine is:
* "Live virus vaccines against Flu or Polio may in each instant produce the
disease it is intended to prevent, .... the live virus against Measles and
Mumps may produce such side affects as brain damage".
The CDC classified clinical reports as secret, which were not released to the
public, stating they knew the vaccines containing mercury were extremely toxic
and dangerous for our children.
* The Hepatitis -B vaccine, received within the first 24 hours after birth,
containing 12 micrograms of mercury, was tested only 5 days by the FDA prior to
being approved.
* If the infant received all the recommended vaccines they would have received
an additional 62.5 microg at 2 months, 50 microg at 4 months, and 62.5 microg
at 6 months.
* These Infants may have receive 60 times a toxic dose or:
* 2,370 times the allowable EPA Safe Limit for mercury in the first two years of
life !
The FDA has now continued and approved the administration and use of these
vaccines containing mercury be continued for the next three years or until the
stock pile of vaccines containing mercury have been depleted (There is plenty of
Vaccine available without mercury). In a recent Congressional hearing (congress
requested the FDA stop all vaccines containing mercury) it was reported:
* Autism has increased as much as 5,000 percent in 14 of our Nation's 50 states.
* The cost for this problem was set at $2,000,000 per child.
Mothers and Fathers have to absorb the cost of medical care because health
insurance will not cover the care for an autistic Child. The FDA, CDC, and NIH
are now asking congress for millions of dollars for research to find a medical
cure and prevention for Autism.
Why should we trust these Government entities to wage a war for a cure and
prevention for autism when they have shown their true colors of
untrustworthiness by classifying past clinical laboratory reports documenting
the danger and health hazard of mercury to our children's health be classified
secret from the publics view ?
(Contact your elected official or school nurse for a copy of the documents the
CDC classified secret regarding the clinical trials documenting the hazards of
mercury). Also, Anyone who vaccinates a child and has not forewarned the Mother
and Father the substance contains mercury is personally liable for the injury
the mercury in the vaccine has caused. I feel sorry for all the school nurses
and school administrators who required a Child be immunized, and failed to
provide and receive full and informed legal consent from the Mother and Father
of the child receiving the vaccine containing mercury.
* The CDC reports it is the parents responsibility to research the safety and
effectiveness of a vaccine and there are no laws requiring the child be
immunized. In December 1999, shortly before Eli Lilly quit producing thimerosal,
the company changed its packaging insert again. This time, Lilly warned that
Thimerosal was "toxic" Additionally, it stated that (WFAA-TV Dallas, Texas
dated 5-22-02) effects of exposure may include
* "fetal changes,
* decreased offspring survival,
* and lung tissue changes".
Many medical professionals and parents of autistic children believe there is a
link between the vaccines containing mercury and "Autism", while at the same
time, the government agencies continue to state there is no scientific evidence
supporting such. With only 10 percent of the vaccine injuries being reported,
(there are no requirements to report these injuries) and with the autistic rate
moving from 1 in 10,000 to 1 out of 150 children (Time Magazine, May 6, 2002
Pages 46-52), plus the addition of more than 200 vaccines in research and
development targeted toward our children to fight disease, when will our elected
officials say enough is enough ? Does it make sense to have non-elected public
officials in the CDC and FDA make decisions for the administration of these
vaccines when they are on the payroll of the pharmaceutical manufactures
producing them? It is only a matter of time before these entities lose the
public's blind faith and trust in their ability to decide what is best for our
children.
I believe the action and decisions of these government agencies targeting our
children with vaccines containing mercury to be an act of GENOCIDE. The Criminal
Code has no statute of limitations, & provides: Whoever, whether in time of
peace or time of war, with specific intent to destroy, in whole or in
substantial part, a national, ethnic, racial or religious group as such--
(1) Kills members of that group.
(2) Causes serious bodily injury to members of that group.
(3) Causes the permanent impairment of the mental faculties of members of the
group through drugs, torture or similar techniques.
(4) Subjects the group to conditions of life that are intended to cause the
physical destruction of the group in whole or in part.
(5) Imposes measures intended to prevent births within the groups.
Shall be punished as provided in subsection B
Subsection B says if death results:
Death or life imprisonment & a fine of not more than $1,000,000
The forth leading cause of death in the United States reported in 1999 by the
Journal of the American Medical Association
* was side effects from properly administered, FDA - approved drugs.
All who are reading this should want to mail a copy to their Legislator and
their Attorney, then pick up their phone, and ask their elected official if the
forward is true, and if it is, do they think your Child's health is at risk ?
* Mail the Legislator's written response to your attorney.
Your Medical Doctor will be able to provide the Mercury Challenge Test
documenting heavy metal in your child. Also, who is legally responsible for the
removal of the mercury plus regaining the loss of our Children's future
reasoning abilities and cognitive development?
* How many IQ points have been destroyed and lost forever?
Will the financial cost of future lawsuits dwarf the Tobacco settlements of just
a few years ago? Will the federal government agencies be covering the cost of
these lawsuits or will the local school board officials and the school nurse be
held legally responsible because they required these children be immunized prior
to entering class without informing the parents of mercury in the vaccines ?
* Was Full and informed legal consent provided for the Mother and Father to make
a decision ?
A conflict of interest exist when public officials serving on committees in the
FDA, NIH, and CDC make decisions toward public consumption of pharmaceutical
products, and should immediately be given the boot, kicked out the door, and
sent looking for a new job when they are receiving any money directly or
indirectly from the multi-billion dollar pharmaceutical industry.
Angry, Mad, and Hurt,
Tom Kohler
Kaplan & Morris: USNWR: Kids At Risk 6.19.00:
US News & World Report
June 19 2000 p.47 "Kids At Risk"
Sheila Kaplan and Jim Morris
Chemicals in the environment come under scrutiny as the number of childhood learning problems soars
For more than 40 years, the family shared the big house and two trailers a mile from the Monsanto chemical plant, on the west side of Anniston, Ala. In time, the 18 of them learned to put up with the rotten-cabbage odor that wafted through town. The plant, after all, is what stood between many residents and poverty. Besides, there were family troubles: Jeanette Champion, 44, is nearly blind and has what she calls a "thinking problem." Her 45-year-old brother, David Russell, can't read or write. Her 18-year old daughter, Misty Pate, has suffered seizures and bouts of rage. Misty's 15 year-old cousin, Shari Russell, reads at a second-grade level.
The Monsanto plant has made industrial and pharmaceutical chemicals since the 1930s. But for decades it also saturated west Anniston with polychlorinated biphenyls. PCBs have long been linked to cancer. More recently, however, researchers have discovered evidence tying the compounds to lack of coordination, diminished IQ, and poor memory among children. So when the extent of the PCB contamination in Anniston became clear a few years ago, a hazy picture came into focus. Perhaps the multigenerational problems of some families were not the result of poverty or bad genes. Perhaps they were caused by the chemicals in the ground.
More than 20 years ago, when Champion was still threading looms in the cotton mill, toxicologist Deborah Rice was conducting studies on young monkeys for Health Canada. The studies strongly suggested that substances like PCBs and mercury didn't just cause cancer or birth defects—the only problems for which they were tested in the United States. They also suggested that even at extremely low levels, these substances could affect the developing human brain. When given doses comparable to what a child would receive, the monkeys became impulsive and distracted and couldn't learn.
Many scientists were slow to see the significance of such research. Why worry about the loss of a few IQ points, they argued, when the real threat of chemical exposure was life-threatening disease? Today, however, a dramatic increase in learning disabilities has forced Environmental Protection Agency officials to acknowledge that they have ignored a much broader problem. One of every six children in America suffers from problems such as autism, aggression, dyslexia, and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder.
In California, reported cases of autism rose 210 percent,from 3,864 to 11,995, between 1987 and 1998.
In New York, the number of children with learning disabilities jumped 55 percent, from 132,000 to 204,000, between 1983 and 1996. It was in the midst of reports like these that the EPA last week essentially banned the popular pesticide Dursban as an unacceptable risk to children. Experts have advanced a variety of theories for the increase in disorders, including better diagnostic methods. But a growing body of evidence suggests that compounds called neurotoxicants may be contributing significantly to the problem. Neurotoxicants are found in substances as common as tuna, lawn sprays, vaccines, and head-lice shampoo.
Fetuses and infants exposed to these chemicals during critical windows of development, researchers now believe, may be at far higher risk for childhood learning problems than once thought. A new study from the National Academy of Sciences suggests that a combination of neurotoxicants and genes may account for nearly 25 percent of developmental problems. Chemicals alone may account for only 3 percent of cases, the study shows, but they can trigger many more. "Think of the genes as the country road," says John Harris of the California Birth Defects Monitoring Program, "and the neurotoxicants as driving 90 miles per hour in the rain."
The lead factor.
Although inconclusive, the studies on neurotoxicants are intriguing.
Researchers at the State University of New York-Oswego, in a federally funded
study, showed that babies who had significant amounts of PCBs in their
umbilical cords performed more poorly than unexposed babies in tests assessing
visual recognition of faces, ability to shut out distractions, and overall
intelligence.
Herbert Needleman, of the University of Pittsburgh, examined 216 youths convicted in the juvenile court of Allegheny County, Pa., and 201 non-delinquent youths. In a study released last month, Needleman found that the delinquents had significantly higher bone-lead levels.
In March, Frederica Perera, of Columbia University's Joseph L. Mailman School of Public Health, reported that air-sampling "back-packs" worn by 72 pregnant women in New York City picked up high concentrations of three neurotoxic pesticides that could cause disorders in their fetuses.
Chemical manufacturers—as
well as some researchers and regulators—are not convinced by such findings.
"There is no reason to believe we have an epidemic [of chemical-related
illness] on our hands," says Robert
MacPhail, chief of the EPA'S Neurobehavioral Toxicology Branch. "There are
still a jillion tests that have to be carried out." Robert Kaley, director of
environmental affairs for Solutia, a 1997 spinoff of Monsanto's chemical
operations, says that "everybody's jumping to conclusions. These kinds of
links are premature at best and speculative at worst."
But the new findings,
coming on the heels of more than two dozen earlier studies, have prompted the
U.S. Department of Health and Human Services to dig deeper into the issue. The
agency is expected to ask Congress for $1 billion to track up to 100,000
children from the womb through high school to assess the effects of chemical
exposure on childhood development. U.S. Surgeon General David Satcher, who
grew up
in Anniston, finds the existing evidence compelling enough. "How long do you
wait," he asks, "before you take the necessary action to protect children?"
The answer, in the case of the EPA, appears to be a long time. More than a dozen high-ranking current and former EPA officials say the agency has failed to exert its authority to obtain data on chemical exposure from manufacturers and to restrict the use of neurotoxicants that may be harmful to kids.
The EPA'S enforcement record with the chemical industry is hardly an activist one. Between 1989 and 1998, it managed to get neurotoxicity data on only nine pesticides and three industrial chemicals. The chemical industry, meanwhile, has effectively rebuffed the few efforts the EPA has made to address the issue. In 1998, the agency tried to force makers of some of the most common chemicals to test their products for hazards to children. But the EPA backed down under election-year pressure from both political parties and decided on a voluntary system.
The agency and industry are still arguing about what tests will be required. Chemical companies are among the best-connected businesses in Washington. Since January 1999, chemical manufacturers have given nearly $4.2 million to presidential candidates congressional campaigns, and national political parties.
The revolving door is
nothing new in the nation's capital, but it seems to spin to particularly good
effect for
the Chemical Manufacturers Association. This year, the CMA retained a former
top White House environmental aide who helped Al Gore develop a plan to
address what the vice president called "the special impact industrial
chemicals may have on children." Today, the aide, Beth Viola, is working to
make the plan more industry friendly, thus contributing to delays.
Potentially hazardous chemicals should be judged "guilty until proven innocent," says EPA adviser and Yale University Prof. John Wargo. But the EPA doesn't work that way. The agency requires chemical manufacturers to prove that their products do not cause cancer or birth defects, but it does not require them to provide data on neurological effects—even though the technology for such testing now exists. The EPA is caught in a bind: It can't require a company to submit data without proof that a product is harmful. But it can't prove harm without the data. 'We're in the dark," says Ward Penberthy, an EPA deputy director.
Children are particularly vulnerable to toxic chemicals. Normal brain development begins in the uterus and continues through adolescence. It requires a series of complex processes to occur in a carefully timed sequence: Cells proliferate and move to the correct spot, synapses form, neural circuits are refined, and neurotransmitters and their receptors grow. Neurotoxicants may slow, accelerate, or otherwise modify any of these processes. Says Philip Landrigan of New York's Mt. Sinai School of Medicine: "You end up with gaps in the wiring."
The idea that substances in the environment can harm the human brain is not new. In ancient Rome, miners were felled by what the medical literature of the time called "lead colic." The Mad Hatter in Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland comes from the l9th-century expression "mad as a hatter," a reference to mercury's effects on felt-hat makers.
Over the past 70 years, adults and children around the world have been poisoned—and, in some cases, killed—by mercury in fish, PCBs in rice oil, a fungicide in seed grain, and a rat-killing agent in tortillas.
After hearings in 1985, the House Committee on Science and Technology reported that there were 850 known neurotoxicants, any of which "may result in devastating neurological or psychiatric disorders that impair the quality of life, cripple and potentially reduce the highest intellect to a vegetative state."
The report prompted virtually no action.
Today, however, the federal government is under increasing pressure from pediatricians, academics, and its own scientists all clamoring for more testing of neurotoxicants. Agency officials are focusing on the following areas:
Pesticides.
Organophosphate pesticides are domesticated versions of wartime nerve agents.
The best known, Dursban and Diazinon, have been on the market since 1965 and
1956, respectively.
The active ingredient of Dursban, chlorpyrifos, is found in some popular Raid sprays and Black Flag roach and ant killer. After re-examining the toxicity of chlorpyrifos, however, the EPA announced last week that it will ban nearly all household uses of it and restrict its use on tomatoes, apples, and grapes. The EPA found that Dursban could damage the brain. It also determined that children could receive up to 100 times the safe dose in some cases.
Diazinon, one of 37 other organophosphates under review, could be next.A preliminary EPA analysis recently found that a child could inhale up to 50 times the safe amount after a basic "crack and crevice" treatment by an exterminator.
Linda Meyer, a toxicologist with Novartis, which makes Diazinon, says that the EPA extrapolated from a worst-case Novartis study—in which rats were placed in a chamber pumped full f the pesticide in aerosol form. As a result, Meyer says, "the risk for children is grossly overestimated." Novartis also notes that the EPA, in its draft analysis, states that animal studies of Diazinon have revealed "no evidence of abnormalities in the development of the nervous system."
The chemical industry prefers to police itself, when given a choice. But this approach seldom works, as evidenced by the EPA's failed attempt to restrict a pesticide known as chromated copper arsenic, or CCA. The compound is applied to pressure-treated wood and commonly found on decks and playground equipment. Since the late 1970s EPA researchers have reported that CCA poses a special threat to pregnant women and children because it combines three neurotoxic compounds. People can be exposed to CCA by breathing fumes from unfinished wood during home repair or construction. As a structure ages, the compound may leach out into the dirt. In lower doses, according to numerous studies, CCA can impair intelligence and memory.
The EPA tried to restrict CCA in 1984, but homebuilders' and wood preservers' groups lobbied Congress so hard that the EPA retreated, asking only that retailers distribute advisories that the compound could endanger children. A decade later, the effort had gone nowhere. "We checked retailers,"said John McCauley of the Kentucky Department of Agriculture, "and they had no clue what a consumer information sheet was." The EPA promised to decide on new restrictions by 1998, but officials now say the agency won't act until at least next year.
Mercury.
When toxicologist David Brown helped prepare a mercury study for eight
Northeastern states and three Canadian provinces in 1997, he knew that fish in
the region's lakes would contain mercury; he just didn't know how much. As it
turns out, the numbers were considerably higher than he expected. "The most
pristine lakes," he says, "had the highest levels." Brown, formerly with the
Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry, did the math and concluded
that a pregnant woman who ate a single fish from one of these lakes could, in
theory, consume enough mercury to harm her unborn child. But the Food and
Drug Administration has no enforceable limit for mercury in fish—only a
guideline of I part per million, which the National Academy of Sciences deems
"inadequate to protect the developing fetus."
Mike Bolger, chief of the FDAs Division of Risk Assessment, says the agency hasn't set a limit primarily because "the science has to be sorted out."
That shouldn't be surprising. For years, operators of the coal-fired power plants and trash incinerators responsible for most mercury pollution have been working to quash attempts to further regulate mercury. When the EPA concluded in 1996, for example, that more than 6 million Americans were at risk of mercury poisoning, industry lobbyists persuaded the agency not to make the report public for more than a year. It was released only after a group of senators complained. Lawmakers in states with substantial fishing and utility interests responded to the report by calling for yet another study, this time by the NAS. The new report, to be released next month, is expected to agree that current mercury levels are unsafe. But advocates for tighter regulations aren't expecting any quick changes in policy. "The reason," says Democratic Sen. Patrick Leahy of Vermont, "is that mercury has a constituency in Washington."
There is also evidence that mercury found in some childhood vaccines can hamper development. Will Redwood, for instance, a 6-year-old from suburban Atlanta, seemed perfectly normal at birth. Within two years, he had stopped interacting with his family. By age 5, he was diagnosed with a mild form of autism.
His mother, Lyn, a nurse practitioner, read that some childhood vaccines contain the mercury-based preservative thimerosal, cumulative doses of which could be harmful. She had a lock of Will's hair analyzed and it was found to be loaded with mercury. In his first round of vaccinations alone, given when he was 2 months old, Will received 62.5 micrograms of mercury, or 125 times the EPA's daily limit. No one can say whether the vaccines—which contained the maximum amount of thimerosal—caused Will's autism. And experts say that parents should not withhold inoculations. In a statement last year, a group of manufacturers said that vaccines containing thimerosal "have been administered to billions of children and adults worldwide, with no scientific or medical data to suggest that it poses a public health risk." Still, the American Academy of Pediatrics raised enough questions last year that vaccine manufacturers have agreed to phase out thimerosal as soon as possible.
PCBs.
The EPA banned the manufacture of polychlorinated bi-phenyls in 1977, but the
compounds continue to haunt children. PCBS are a well-known cancer risk, but
recent studies show that they can also impair learning and memory. EPA adviser
Joseph Jacobson and Sandra Jacobson of Wayne State University reported in
1996 that children in Michigan with significant prenatal exposures were three
times as likely as unexposed children to have low IQ scores and twice as
likely to lag behind in reading comprehension.
Jeanette Champion says that her family's mental difficulties now make sense. She and roughlv 5.000 others are suing St. Louis-based Solutia, which made PCBs in Anniston under the Monsanto name from 1935 to 1971, seeking compensation for what they claim are pollution-related maladies and property devaluation.
One of the plaintiffs is Karen McFarlane, who lives near the plant with her husband and five children. McFarlane, 31, attended special school and has failed four times to get her GED. Six-year-old Derrick Hubbard has speech, vision, and memory problems. "If we go over his ABCs, he forgets them right away," says his mother, Dessa. Gadsden, Ala., psychiatrist Judy Cook is astounded at how many local children have IQs in the "borderline retarded" range and exhibit a penchant for violence. "These kids are different," she says. "Their wiring's not right."
In February, the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry reported that PCBS in soil in parts of Anniston present a public health hazard" and that some adults and children had elevated amounts of the chemicals in their blood. Exposures, the agency speculated, "may still be occurring at high levels." The EPA has identified 22 other sites in Anniston that may contain dangerous amounts of PCBs, metals, and solvents.
Solutia's Kaley concedes there may have been "historical exposure." But, he says, "We do not believe that people are currently being exposed." Nevertheless, the company has spent more than $30 million to clean up its Anniston site and surrounding land, bought out about 100 properties, and made a tentative settlement offer of $44 million to landowners along downstream waterways.
That prospect aside, there are still many unanswered questions about neurotoxicants and their effects on children. The dearth of data will continue to stymie parents like Terry DeCosta, who believes that pollution from the Tosco oil refinery in Clyde, Calif., contributed to the alleged and attention problems in both her children. According to the EPA, Tosco discharged more than 1 million pounds of pollutants into the air in 1998, many of them neurotoxicants. When the DeCostas sued the refinery, however, their case was dismissed for lack of causation.
Richard Jackson, of the
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, says that the easy work is done.
"We've been able to find the things that are so toxic that they make people
dizzy and fall down," he says. Now comes the harder work
of identifying and regulating the compounds that insidiously misarrange the
brain. "I've heard people say that we still don't have a smoking gun," says
Chris De Rosa of the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry. "And
then I've heard others say, 'Yes, but there are bullets all over
the floor.'"
Facts on mercury and fish consumption
Eric Wooltorton
CMAJ
Reason for posting: Fish is a healthy food choice. However, some predatory fish
accumulate particularly high levels of mercury that can be toxic, particularly
to developing fetuses.1 Recent case reports of toxic exposure2 and research
suggesting that groups at risk may be unaware of past advisories3 reinforce the
need to highlight Canadian recommendations for limiting the intake of
contaminated species.4
The toxin: Elemental mercury from rocks and soil exists naturally in background
levels in lakes and streams but is concentrated in the environment by emissions
from hydroelectric projects, the burning of garbage and fossil fuels, and
industrial pulp and paper and mining processes.3 Microorganisms in lake and
stream sediments convert elemental mercury to organic methylmercury, which binds
tightly to the proteins in fish tissue and is concentrated in fish higher up the
food chain. When ingested by humans, methylmercury is easily absorbed and
retained by the body; it has a half-life in blood of about 44 days, which makes
blood tests useful measures of acute exposure.5 It concentrates in new hair, and
consecutive hair segments indicate a person's exposure history.5 Methylmercury
is eliminated fecally as inorganic mercury.6
Methylmercury is a potent neurotoxin, causing axonal demyeliniation.7 Adults can
experience symptoms months after an acute exposure consisting of ataxia, blurred
vision, hearing deficits and paraesthesias.7 Fetuses are particularly sensitive
to methylmercury, as shown by the more than 1400 infants from the Minimata area
of Japan who were acutely exposed in utero when their mothers ate fish
contaminated by a factory discharge. The children, often normal at birth,
developed abnormal reflexes, problems with suckling and swallowing, gait,
speech, and mental retardation.3 The effects of chronic, low-level exposure,
typical of many Aboriginal populations in Canada,8 is less clear but is being
explored in other countries. There is no effective treatment for methylmercury
exposure.
Health Canada judges 0.5 parts per million (ppm) to be the limit for total
mercury content in commercial fish.1,4 The consumption of mussels, pollock,
salmon, scallops, shrimp and sole — the majority of aquatic species consumed in
Canada — are not of concern. Fish with a total mercury content between 0.5 and
1.5 ppm include fresh and frozen tuna (but not canned tuna, which consists of
smaller, shorter-lived species with lower mercury levels), swordfish and shark.1
Rather than ban the sale of these species, Health Canada recommends that they be
consumed no more than once per week, or once per month by children and women of
child-bearing age.4 Mercury levels in freshwater fish varies, but in general
bass, pike, muskellunge and walleye have high levels and should be eaten in
moderation (provincial guidelines for sport fish often mirror federal seafood
recommendations).9 What to do: Educating patients, especially those at highest
risk (children and women of child-bearing age and populations traditionally
consuming large amounts of fish), about the Canadian recommendations may be the
best approach to preventing methylmercury poisoning. For patients who regularly
consume sport fish, additional tips9 for reducing methylmercury exposure include
not eating fish organs (in which heavy metals accumulate), eating only the
smaller fish of affected species, and relegating trophy fish to the wall, not
the table. Although practices such as trimming off fat can reduce the intake of
organic pollutants such as polychlorinated biphenyls, pesticides, insecticides
and dioxins, mercury intake is unaffected because it is deposited uniformly
throughout fish tissue.
Eric Wooltorton CMAJ References
1.Food safety facts on mercury and fish consumption [fact sheet]. Ottawa:
Canadian Food Inspection Agency; May 2002.
Available: www.inspection.gc.ca/english/corpaffr/foodfacts/mercurye.shtml
(accessed 2002 Sept 18).
2.Schmer J. Mercury in seafood [letter]. CMAJ 2002;167(2):122,124.[Free Full
Text]
3.Abelson A, Gibson BL, Sanborn MD, Weir E. Identifying and managing adverse
environmental health effects: 5.
Persistent organic pollutants. CMAJ 2002;166(12):1549-54.[Abstract/Free Full
Text]
4.Advisory: Information on mercury levels in fish. Ottawa: Health Canada; 2002
May 29. Available:
http://www.hc-sc.gc.ca/english/protection/warnings/2002/2002_41e.htm (accessed
2002 Sept 18).
5.Ruedy J. Methylmercury poisoning [letter]. CMAJ 2001;165(9):1193-4.[Free Full
Text]
6.Weir E. Methylmercury poisoning [letter]. CMAJ 2001;165(9):1194.[Free Full
Text]
7.Weir E. Methylmercury exposure: fishing for answers. CMAJ
2001;165(2):205-6.[Free Full Text]
8.Dumont C, Girard M, Bellavance F, Noël F. Mercury levels in the Cree
population of James Bay, Quebec, from
1988 to
1993/94. CMAJ 1998;158(11):1439-45.[Abstract/Free Full Text]
9.Guide to eating Ontario sport fish, 2001–2002. 21st ed rev. Toronto: Ontario
Ministry of the Environment; 2001.
Available: www.ene.gov.on.ca/envision/guide (accessed 2002 Sept 18).
February 10, 2003
By MARC LACEY
NAIROBI, Kenya, Feb. 8 - Delegates attending a United Nations environmental
conference here last week endorsed a global crackdown on pollution caused by
mercury, although the United States blocked efforts for binding restrictions on
its use.
Mercury, a highly toxic heavy metal, is particularly dangerous for infants and
children, and it can be passed
from pregnant women to their fetuses. Human exposure to mercury comes from a
variety of sources - consumption of fish, occupational and household uses,
dental fillings and some vaccines.
The United Nations Environment Program will begin assisting countries,
particularly those in the developing world, in devising methods for cutting
emissions of mercury from sources like coal-fired power stations and
incinerators. Further action, possibly including a binding protocol, was put off
until 2005.
The decision followed the release of a report outlining a significant global
threat to humans and wildlife from mercury, a naturally occurring metal. Mercury
exposure can cause development problems and can affect the brain, kidneys and
liver.
The conference drew more than 1,000 delegates from 130 nations. The delegates
agreed that "there is sufficient evidence of significant global adverse impacts
from mercury and its compounds to warrant further international action to reduce
the risks to human health and the environment."
The United Nations report found that mercury travels throughout the earth at a
far greater rate than was
previously known, circulating between the air, water and soil as well as in
living things. Even regions without significant mercury releases of their own,
such as the Arctic, were found to be adversely affected by the global spread of
mercury.
Mercury has many industrial applications, although safer alternatives exist. It
is used in small-scale mining of gold and silver as well as in thermometers,
fluorescent lamps and some paints. The substance is also contained in many
skin-lightening creams as well as in some traditional medicines.
Some European delegates had sought to begin laying the groundwork for a global
protocol on mercury. But Bush administration officials, who have opposed such
wide-reaching approaches to a range of environmental issues, had argued that it
would take too long and be too costly to pursue such a global convention.
Instead, the American officials pressed for public awareness programs to spread
the word of the risks of
mercury. Such efforts would be aimed at especially vulnerable groups, like
pregnant women and people living in areas with small-scale gold and silver
mining operations, where mercury is a particular threat.
"We acknowledge that the case has been made for action," said an American
official involved in the negotiations. "But instead of negotiating for years and
spending millions of dollars on a global convention, we want quick action."
European negotiators successfully pushed for language leaving open the
possibility of a global convention in the future. The issue will be revisited at
a follow-up meeting in South Korea in 2005. The Europeans also wanted the
effects of other heavy metals, including lead and cadmium, to be reviewed.
"No single country can resolve the mercury problem on its own," said Michael
Bender, director of the Mercury Policy Project, an organization working to focus
attention on the problem. "There are alternatives for mercury uses, but there is
no alternative to global cooperation."
The data on global exposure to mercury remains incomplete. Many developing
countries also are far less apt to notify their populations about the risks of
mercury, like the dangers of too much seafood for pregnant women.
The United States is far ahead of many other countries when it comes to
awareness of mercury's risks. The Food and Drug Administration and 41 states
warn consumers to limit their intake of certain fish - or avoid eating them
altogether - because of their mercury levels. Ten states advise pregnant women
and children to limit consumption of canned tuna, the most heavily consumed fish
in the United States.
Data from the Centers for Disease Control indicates that one in 12 women of
childbearing age in the United States have unsafe mercury levels, translating
into more than 300,000 children born each year at risk of exposure to mercury.
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/02/10/international/
africa/10NAIR.html?ex=10465
14559&ei=1&en=b589ff0a8bddd65e
Pink ladies: mercury poisoning in twin girls
Department of Pediatrics Hospital for Sick Children Toronto, Ont.
Previously well,
developmentally normal 20-month-old twin girls presented with
weakness, anorexia, a papular rash and increasingly swollen, red and
painful hands and feet of 1 month's duration. They had no history of
fever, conjunctivitis, lymphadenopathy or oral changes characteristic
of Kawasaki disease. The children appeared irritable and unwell and
were diaphoretic but afebrile. Both had tachycardia, and one had an
elevated blood pressure of 130/90 mm Hg (95th percentile for age
108/62 mm Hg). Both children had reduced muscle power and diminished
reflexes. Their palms and soles were erythematous and indurated with
desquamation, judged to be acrodynia (
).
|
|
Mercury toxicity was suspected, and further questionning revealed that the infants had been given a mercury-containing "teething powder" from India once or twice a week over the 4 preceding months. The girls' blood mercury levels were 176 and 209 (normally < 18) µmol/L. Chelation therapy with 2,3-dimercaptosuccinic acid was administered through nasogastric tubes. Before admission the twins had regressed developmentally and were unable to feed orally, sit or walk. Over the 8 weeks in hospital they showed some minor neurocognitive improvements, but their long-term prognosis is uncertain.
Mercury exists in inorganic and organic forms. Organic mercury has recently received attention because of the accumulation of methylmercury in some predatory fish and the use of thimerosal as a preservative in some vaccines. A type of inorganic mercury known as calomel ("sweet mercury") was once commonly used to treat many ailments, including yellow fever, typhus and syphilis. Until the recognition of their toxicity in the 1940s, calomel-based teething powders caused a scourge of mercury poisoning called "pink disease" or acrodynia among infants and children.
Acrodynia is characterized by a dusky pink discolouration, swelling, paresthesia and desquamation of the hands and feet. Symptoms of catecholamine excess such as sweating and hypertension occur because mercury blocks the degradation pathway of catecholamines. Other manifestations of mercury toxicity include renal dysfunction, peripheral neuropathy and neuropsychiatric symptoms (e.g., emotional lability, memory impairment and insomnia). Although calomel-containing compounds are banned in North America, they are still used in other parts of the world such as Southeast Asia, and calomel can also be found in various alternative medicine products.
Clinical presentations suggestive of pheochromocytoma (e.g., excessive sweating, tachycardia and hypertension) or of Kawasaki disease but not meeting the full criteria should also prompt consideration of mercury toxicity. Although rash, oral mucosa and extremity changes are features of both Kawasaki disease and mercury toxicity, patients with the latter do not have a fever. Rash and extremity changes are not features of pheochromocytoma. The peeling of the skin on the extremities seen in cases of Kawasaki disease often occurs 1–3 weeks after presentation, as opposed to occurring concurrently with the rash and other findings in cases of mercury poisoning. Mercury poisoning is confirmed by measuring levels in blood, urine or hair samples.,
The most important step in the management of mercury poisoning is eliminating the source of exposure. The effectiveness of chelation therapy in reversing symptoms is not entirely clear. Our case stresses the potential harm of mercury. It reminds us to think of a toxic exposure when family members present with the same unusual constellation of symptoms. It also highlights the common misconception that all alternative medicines are safe and benign.
Michael Weinstein Stacey Bernstein Department of Pediatrics Hospital for Sick Children Toronto, Ont.
References
Wooltorton E. Facts on
mercury and fish consumption. CMAJ 2002;167(8):897.
Exposure to thimersal in vaccines used in Canadian infant immunization programs, with respect to risk of neurodevelopmental disorders. Can Commun Dis Rep 2002;28(9):69-80.[Medline]
Ozuah PO. Mercury poisoning. Curr Probl Pediatr 2000;30(3):91-9.[Medline]
Dally A. The rise and fall of pink disease. Soc Hist Med 1997;10(2):291-304.[Medline]
Chopra A, Doiphode VV. Ayurvedic medicine: core concept, therapeutic principles, and current relevance. Med Clin North Am 2002;86(1):75-89.[Medline]
Han RK, Sinclair B,
Newman A, Silverman ED, Taylor GW, Walsh P, et al. Recognition and management
of Kawasaki disease. CMAJ 2000; 162 (6): 807-12.
Weir E. Methylmercury
poisoning [letter]. CMAJ 2001;165(9):1194.
Ruedy J. Methylmercury
poisoning [letter]. CMAJ 2001;165(9):1193-4.
Baum C. Treatment of mercury intoxication. Curr Opin Pediatr 1999;11:265-8.[Medline]
American Academy of Pediatrics. Counseling families who choose complementary and alternative medicine for their child with chronic illness or disability. Pediatrics 2001;107(3):598-601.
Mercury Poisoning – A Human Tragedy
by Patricia D'Itri and Frank D'Itri
1977 - John Wiley & Sons
Quicksilver
Can you hear the tortured screams yet?
Do you see the twisted limbs?
Does it frighten you completely?
Then you’re ready to begin.
A sideshow aftermath
from eating pink-dyed grain
or fleshy, beaded greyshine fish
from Sacred Mother waters.
The numbers grow
by family:
Minamata mothers, Kenora fathers,
Alamogordo’s son,
Dark-eyed Iraqian daughters.
Do the victims’ acrobatic
poses merit your surprise?
Then avoid the daily papers
and avert your T.V. eyes.
Forget the dark warnings
until your tragedy arrives.
––By Judith Ecker
- Green Party MP Sue Kedgley said today the
imminent removal of mercury from vaccines highlights the need for research into
the side-effects of vaccines. See... More vaccine research needed as mercury
withdrawn [1] in the Parliament wire.
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PA0008/S00578.htm
More vaccine research needed as mercury withdrawn
Wednesday, 30 August 2000, 2:10 pm
Press Release: Green Party
30 August 2000
More vaccine research needed as mercury withdrawn
Green Party MP Sue Kedgley said today the imminent removal of mercury from
vaccines highlights the need for research into the side-effects of vaccines.
Ms Kedgley said urgent research is needed to establish whether toxic substances
such as formaldehyde, routinely used in vaccinations administered to babies and
young children, pose any health risks.
The phasing out of mercury comes 14 months after the European Agency for the
Evaluation of all Medicinal Products (EAEMP) put out a world-wide health alert
recommending a switch to mercury-free vaccines for infants and toddlers as a
precautionary measure 'in the shortest possible time-frame'.
The Ministry of Health said in response to written questions from Ms Kedgley
that mercury has been used as a preservative in 23 different vaccines.
Until this month's phase-out, the childhood vaccination programme exposed
toddlers to a cumulative dose of more than 200 micrograms of mercury - more than
the safety level for a single adult dose.
All new vaccines will be thiomersal (mercury) free from the end of this month,
but one remaining vaccine in the childhood vaccination series does contain
mercury and will continue to be used until stocks run out. Ms Kedgley said she
had been unable to get a straight answer from the Government on when that would
be.
Ms Kedgley said today she was concerned that questions to the government have
also revealed that formaldehyde, a known animal carcinogen, and aluminium are
also routinely used in vaccines.
"I am concerned at the use of such substances in childhood vaccinations and
would like to see urgent research into any health risks posed by traces of
formaldehyde and aluminium in vaccines," she said.
Formaldehyde exposure even at very low doses has been linked with neurological
and immune system damage while aluminium has been linked with Alzheimer's
disease.
A copy of written questions (and replies) on vaccines from Sue Kedgley to the
Minister of Health are available on request.
Sue Kedgley MP: 04 470 6728 or 025 270 9088 Gina Dempster, Press secretary: 04
470 6723 or 021 1265 289
Copyright (c) Scoop Media
[1] - http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PA0008/S00578.htm
U.N.: Global Warming May Worsen Mercury Pollution
Mon February 3, 2003 09:53 AM ET
NAIROBI, Kenya (Reuters) - Mercury pollution must be tackled before global
warming exacerbates its noxious effects, the United Nations warned Monday it its
first report into the worldwide dangers posed by the heavy metal. The U.N.
Environment Program (UNEP) said activities from gold mining to burning coal in
power stations had tripled mercury levels in the air since pre-industrial times.
Mercury works its way into the food chain, with women and children most at risk
from poisoning, which can cause brain and nerve damage resulting in impaired
coordination, blurred vision, tremors, irritability and memory loss.
"Mercury levels have to be reduced and we want governments to start to take
steps to do this immediately," UNEP Executive Director Klaus Toepfer told
reporters at a conference of environment ministers in the Kenyan capital
Nairobi.
"Things could get worse in the coming years, as increases in temperature also
appear to help the spread of the mercury."
UNEP's first report into the global impact of mercury pollution said more than
1,500 tons of the hazardous substance is pumped into the skies every year by
power stations, with Asia and then Africa the worst culprits.
Small-scale mining, where mercury is used to help extract gold and silver from
ores, is another main source of the pollution, releasing about 400-500 tons of
mercury each year.
UNEP said a U.S. study found about one in 12 women there had mercury levels in
their bodies above those deemed safe by national authorities.
Scientists predict that as a result, up to 300,000 babies in the United States
could be at risk of brain damage with possible impacts from learning
difficulties to impaired nervous systems.
Mercury poisoning also threatens animals such as otters, minx, osprey, eagles
and some whales which feed on fish, which scientists say are readily
contaminated by mercury pollution.
UNEP hopes up to 100 environment ministers will attend the five-day conference
at its Nairobi headquarters, which opened on Monday, to discuss how to implement
resolutions from the Johannesburg World Summit on Sustainable Development in
September.
THE FULL REPORT CAN BE FOUND AT www.unep.org
http://www.globeandmail.com/servlet/ArticleNews/
PEstory/TGAM/20030204/UMERCO
O/Health/health/health_temp/4/4/8/
Mercury a global problem, UN says
Pollutant may already have caused learning problems and impaired nervous
systems in millions of children worldwide
By MARTIN MITTELSTAEDT
ENVIRONMENT REPORTER
Tuesday, February 4, 2003 – Print Edition, Page A8
The world's environment is being contaminated by alarming amounts of
mercury, a devastating nerve poison that is building up in many fish species
and among people who consume them, says a new report from the United
Nations.
The UN report expressed concern that mercury exposure could be causing brain
damage in humans, particularly among infants who are most susceptible to
mental impairments from the heavy metal.
It also concluded that mercury is a "major threat" to the world's fishing
industry, an important component of the food supply and the main way people
are exposed to the pollutant.
"The available data indicate that mercury is present all over the globe,
especially in fish, in concentrations that adversely affect human beings and
wildlife," the report concluded.
It said predatory aquatic animals higher up on the food chain -- pike, king
mackerel, walleye, and large tuna, as well as seals and toothed whales --
have the highest mercury levels. It said canned tuna is generally made from
smaller fish, and has lower levels of the metal.
The international body said millions of children may already be suffering
ailments -- ranging from learning difficulties to impaired nervous
systems -- due to dietary mercury.
The biggest source of mercury emissions is from coal-burning power plants
and waste incinerators, which together account for about 70 per cent of
man-made emissions, according to the report, which was released yesterday.
But the UN said people are also being exposed through the amalgam used to
repair dental cavities, mining activities where mercury is used to extract
gold, some vaccines, drugs, and even some contact lens solutions.
Although mercury discharges in some countries are declining -- the UN cited
Canada's cut to six tonnes a year from 30 tonnes between 1990 and 2000 --
emissions remain high and are growing in Asia because of increased energy
usage as countries there industrialize.
Once emitted into the atmosphere, mercury knows no boundaries, and can move
thousands of kilometres on air currents to other continents, where it is
deposited in precipitation and then enters the aquatic food chain.
Even though Canada has cut its pollution, half the mercury falling on North
America comes from outside the continent, according to the report.
As an element, mercury can't be destroyed, and concentrations continue to
build up in the environment.
Human activity has tripled the level of mercury in the environment,
according to the report.
The report "shows that the global environmental threat to humans and
wildlife has not receded despite reductions in mercury discharges,
particularly in developed countries," said Klaus Toepher, executive director
of the UN's environment program.
The study was requested by UN members and is being presented this week to an
environment ministers meeting of the global body.
It will be used to recommend steps to reduce emissions.
Mercury emissions by continent
The following numbers are estimates of global atmospheric mercury releases
in 1995 (in tonnes/year).
North America: 210
Europe: 250
Asia: 1,070
Australia/Oceania: 100
Africa: 210
South America: 60
Our opinion.....
Mercury poisoning has a huge array of symptoms including fibromyalgia, chronic
fatigue, breathing problems, skin problems, autism, alzheimers, and many more.
Be aware that symptoms can overlap into numerous conditions, e.g., intestional
disorders. There is much wrong and incomplete information in the general
literature, be cautious and search for information widely. Many health
professionals are trained with misinformation/disinformation. There are numerous
misinformation/disinformation sources promulgated by governments and the
pharmaceutical industry...... SunToads
Search words: dental, autism, elemental mercury, mercury poisoning, vaccines.
Search words not directly related to mercury but having similar "mysterious"
symptoms: root canals, cavitations, osteonecrosis, (NICO) Neuralgia Inducing
Cavitational Osteonecrosis, osteomyelitis
http://dspace.dial.pipex.com/town/road/qg29/t3psym.html
http://www.xs4all.nl/~stgvisie/AMALGAM/EN/SCIENCE/links.html
http://www.mercurypoisoningfyi.com/mercury_poisoning_and_autism.html
http://www.cdc.gov/epo/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/00014464.htm
http://www.eytonsearth.org/mercurytoxicity.html One reported treatment
http://www.zip.com.au/~rgammal/MercuryPoisoningSymptoms.htm
http://www.state.hi.us/health/about/press/2001/01-07merc0.html
http://www.hgtech.com/HSE/mercury.htm
http://tlredwood.home.mindspring.com/mercurypoison.htm
http://www.fda.gov/cdrh/consumer/amalgams.html FDA is claiming mercury toxicity
is an allergy. Clever.
http://www.dentalwatch.org/hg/cdcfacts.html CDC is claiming mercury toxicity is
an allergy. Clever.
http://www.909shot.com Mercury in vaccines
www.unep.org An honest report on Global Mercury Assessment by the UN Environment
Programme. Open this...
http://www.chem.unep.ch/mercury/Report/final-report-download.htm
http://www.vaccines.net/ and www.whale.to/vaccines.html and www.thinktwice.com
Mercury in vaccines
*********
Root canals, cavitations, osteonecrosis, (NICO) Neuralgia Inducing Cavitational
Osteonecrosis, osteomyelitis:
http://www.holisticmed.com/dental/root.html
http://www.drshankland.com/nico.html
PUBLIC HEALTH
In Scotland, Parents Have Safer Vaccine For Kids - But If They Don't Ask for it,
they will receive the cheaper jab containing mercury.
[By Fraser Nelson.]
http://www.thescotsman.co.uk/scotland.cfm?id=151072003
Doctors have been told to come clean about Infanrix, the safer whooping cough
jab available on the NHS - but only if directly challenged about it by parents.
The compromise means that parents who ask no questions will have their children
injected with the cheaper DTwP jab laced with ethyl mercury - a substance
ordered out of US medicine on health grounds. The deal was met with political
outrage yesterday as Scotland’s opposition parties accused the Scottish
Executive of skirting around its duty to give parents the full facts about
vaccination options before going ahead.
Dr Andrew Fraser, Scotland’s deputy chief medical officer, has written an
"urgent message" to Scottish medical specialists alerting them to fears around
thimerosal, a controversial vaccine preservative 50 per cent composed of
mercury. The substance is contained in DTwP, the £10-a-shot jab from France
which protects against diphtheria, tetanus and pertussis, or whooping cough,
routinely given to all babies aged two, three and four months. Its rival is
Infanrix, a UK vaccine available on the NHS to the few parents who know to ask
for it by name. It is almost twice the price because it comes without the
so-called "junk cells" suspected of giving children fever after injection. It is
also made without thimerosal - and is the type of vaccine routinely used in the
United States, Canada, Japan, Australia and South Korea.
"Parents are entitled to know if thimerosal is contained in the vaccine
available to them," Dr Fraser’s letter said. "They should be aware of the reason
for this - ethyl mercury is an essential component of the most
effective vaccine available to protect children." The Executive explained that
this "entitlement" only extends to parents who ask if they have an alternative.
Those who do not will be given the mercury vaccine. "The DTwP is recommended,
because it is more effective. So that is the one which is given. If parents were
to ask a question, for whatever reason, they would be told everything - about
the choice, the side-effects, whatever they wanted to know."
The Scotsman revealed yesterday that babies injected with the cheaper DTwP
vaccine are ten times as likely to suffer side effects ranging from fever to
periods of unusual crying lasting more than an hour. In a Holyrood debate
yesterday, Frank McAveety, Scotland’s deputy health minister, admitted that
Infanrix does have "lower levels of side effects" - but said it was less
effective.
EPA says 8% of women have mercury in bodies
that could imperil babies
WASHINGTON (Feb. 24) -- About 8 percent of American women of childbearing age
have concentrations of mercury in their bodies that could put their unborn
children at risk of adverse health effects, according to a report released Jan.
24 by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Humans receive most of their
mercury contamination by eating fish contaminated by emissions from coal-fired
power plants and waste incinerators. This is the first time the federal
government has reported on mercury contamination in women of childbearing age,
so the EPA cannot compare the numbers to previous years.
President Bush has said his proposed Clear Skies initiative would reduce mercury
emissions by about 70 percent. Environmental groups recently had criticized the
agency for not releasing the report earlier.
The report is available on the Internet at www.epa.gov/envirohealth/children.
ENN News Story
Mercury threat to kids up, delayed report warns, says WSJ
Friday, February 21, 2003
By Reuters
NEW YORK - An environmental report warning that emissions of mercury by
coal-fired power plants and other industrial sources poses an increasing health
danger to young children has been delayed for nine months, the Wall Street
Journal reported Thursday. The Environmental Protection Agency report is to be
released soon, officials told the Journal, after being subjected to an unusual
level of scrutiny by other federal agencies, including the White House's Office
of Science and Technology Policy.
People familiar with the final report, originally due last May, told the
newspaper the study finds that mercury poses a serious health problem for
children. A partial draft, titled "America's Children and the Environment,"
notes that states increasingly are issuing warnings about dangerous mercury
levels in fish, the article said. It says there is mounting evidence that
mercury is collecting in the blood of women of child-bearing age.
Michael Magner, an analyst for the Public Education Center, a nonprofit,
pro-environment research group, provided the draft copy of the report, dated in
October, the newspaper said. The report notes that children are more exposed and
vulnerable to mercury and other environmental pollutants because they play
outside, and for their size they drink more water, eat more food, and breathe
more air than adults do, according to the article. When the final report will be
released remains unclear, the Journal said.
'Most children' would have received Thimerosal
http://www.canada.com/health/story.html?id=%7
B58F69675-3864-44CD-BF8D-C98E13
D9B420%7D
Neal Hall
Vancouver Sun
Wednesday, February 26, 2003
Thimerosal is no longer used in routine vaccines for infants in Canada and the
U.S., but at one time almost every child in B.C. received a vaccination that
used the compound as a preservative. "About 95 per cent of children received
it," said Dr. John Blatherwick, chief medical health officer for the Vancouver
Coastal Health Authority.
Beginning in the 1970s, he said, every child who received a
mumps/measles/rubella (MMR) shot was exposed to Thimerosal. "Most of the
vaccines at one time or another had Thimerosal in them," Blatherwick said, and
it is still used in MMR shots for children in Grade 6. "It was a very good
preservative," he said, adding that scientific research has not drawn a clear
link that the benefits of using vaccines containing Thimerosal outweighed the
risks. "The over-all benefits of the vaccines was so overwhelming that it would
be malpractice not to give them," Blatherwick said.
He suggested that the two lawsuits filed this week -- the first in B.C. to
claim a causal link between Thimerosal and autism -- will have a hard time
proving the cause and effect. "The world literature says that's not true," he
said, referring to the allegation that Thimerosal can be linked to causing
autism. But Vancouver lawyer David Klein, who is representing the children and
their parents in the lawsuits filed this week, maintains the jury is still out
on the issue. "The science is still emerging," the lawyer said. "The science is
not definitive."
He said the rates of autism have increased dramatically over the last 10 years
and only in recent years have scientists looked at the possible effects of
Thimerosal. "Our position in this lawsuit is that different children have
different levels of susceptibility," Klein said That is, not every child who
received vaccines with Thimerosal would suffer neurological damage or symptoms
of autism. Klein estimated that potentially hundreds of children could join the
class-action lawsuits, which are similar to two filed in Ontario last year and
more than 50 filed in the U.S.
"It may be in the thousands," Klein said of the potential size of the action,
which has yet to be certified by a judge. The class action defines potential
members as children born on or after Jan. 1, 1980 who received vaccines
containing Thimerosal at the age of two years or younger. The three brands of
hepatitis B vaccines distributed in Canada were Heptavax and Recombivax, made
and distributed by the drug company Merck Frosst Canada, and Engerix B, which
was made and distributed by GlaxoSmithKline Inc.
The other drug company named in the lawsuits is Aventis Pasteur, which used to
be known as Connaught Laboratories. It changed its name after it was bought by
Aventis in 1999, the lawsuit says.
Connaught sold and distributed the vaccines Diphtheria/whole cell
Pertussis/Tetanus (DPT), Tetanus/diphtheria absorbed (Td) and Diphtheria Tetanus
toxoids pediatric (DT).
Letter From Mercury Researchers to Sen.
Hillary Clinton
"Thimerosal in Childhood Vaccines, Neurodevelopment Disorders, and Heart Disease
in the United Staed"
by Mark R Geier, MD., PhD and David Geier Journal Of American Physicians and
Surgeons AAPS
Spring 2003 Volume 8 Number 1
[Thanks to Paul Shapiro.]
http://www.jpands.org/vol8no1/geier.pdf
Dear Senator Hillary Clinton:
We understand that you have been given a copy of our recently published
paper in the Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons implicating thimerosal
as having caused neurodevelpmental disorders in children. Dr. Mark Geier has
testified before the Institute of Medicine of the United States_ National
Academy of Sciences on four occasions regarding vaccine policy, as well as
before the U.S. House of Representatives Committee on Government Reform and has
been accepted as an expert witness on vaccines in Federal, State, Canadian, and
English Courts. He is board certified physician licensed to practice medicine in
Maryland and Virginia. He has worked at the National Institutes of Health for 10
ten years and has been a professor at the Johns Hopkins University and at the
Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences.
He has published over 70 scientific articles, several of which have
received national and international press coverage. David Geier is currently a
graduate student at the National Institutes of Health, and has been the
president of MedCon, Inc for the past 4 years providing consultation in cases
involving vaccines. He has recently authored over 30 scientific articles on
vaccine safety, efficacy and policy. We have been told that you seek our help in
determining what should be done with regard to childhood neurodevelopmental
disorders and vaccines as it applies to the National Vaccine Injury Compensation
Program (NVCIP), and contemplated legislation to improve the Program.
We hope the following will be of help to you in your work on this matter:
In the United States, a tragic and massive autism epidemic is currently
underway. The peer-reviewed scientific/medical literature, (including a recent
publication in The Journal of the American Medical Association), indicates that
the prevalence of autism was approximately 1 per 2,500 children in the
mid-1980s, while by the mid-1990s the prevalence of autism reached as high as 1
per 300 children, and some now have found that the prevalence of autism in U.S.
children may be as high as approximately 1 per 150 children. These statistics
are even more troubling considering that autism has been reported in the
scientific/medical literature to effect males at least 5 times higher than
females, therefore, presently, autism may effect as many as 1 in 30 male
children.
It also must be kept in mind that autism is
only one of the most severe manifestations of autistic spectrum disorders, which
also manifests in other neurodevelopmental disorders such as speech disorders,
attention
deficit syndrome, developmental delays, etc. For example, the 2001 U.S.
Department of Education statistics showed in children born in 1983 there were a
total of 7,801 cases of speech or language impairment. Among children born in
1994, this number had risen to 211,984 cases (an approximately 30-fold
increase). In children born in 1983, there were a total of 2,100 cases of
autism. Among children born in 1994, this number had risen to 8,325 cases (an
approximately 4-fold increase).
Eli Lilly who has just come out with a new drug (Strattera) for the
treatment of autistic spectrum disorders has estimated its drug will be of use
to 5 to 7% of the current U.S. childhood population! It is ironic to note that
this is the same Eli Lilly Company who makes thimerosal, the mercury
preservative found in childhood vaccines, that is the apparent cause of the
majority of childhood autistic spectrum disorders in the first place. In order
to determine the annual number of neurodevelopmental disorders there were in the
United States, we analyzed the United States Department of Education data from
their 2001 Report. This data provides a breakdown on the total number of
children in each age group from 6 to 22 years old in U.S. Public Schools that
have various childhood disorders. In order to determine the number of children
with neurodevelopmental disorders in U.S.
Public Schools, we analyzed the total number of children with speech or
language impairments (speech disorders) and autism. We also believe that those
with developmental delays may also provide useful information on children with
neurodevelopmental disorders in U.S. Public Schools, but at the present time
this is a new category and limited reporting among children 6 to 9 years-old has
occurred. In analyzing the U.S. Department of Education data, we analyzed the
prevalence of neurodevelopmental disorders within in
each childhood cohort analyzed (i.e. children 6 years-old in this report that
was tabulated during the 1999-2000 school year were assumed to be born in the
1994 birth cohort). The numbers of neurodevelopmental disorders in this report
are as follows for the following birth years:
1989
Autism = 5,223 cases Speech Disorders = 72,250 cases
1990
Autism = 5,864 cases Speech Disorders = 110,737 cases
1991
Autism = 7,020 cases Speech Disorders = 157,790 cases
Developmental Delay = 1,027 cases
1992
Autism = 7,838 cases Speech Disorders = 191,674 cases
Developmental Delay = 3,103 cases
1993
Autism = 8,769 cases Speech Disorders = 213,747 cases
Developmental Delay = 5,153 cases
1994
Autism = 8,325 cases Speech Disorders = 211,984 cases
Developmental Delay = 10,021 cases
This data shows that there has been a remarkable rise in the prevalence of
neurodevelopmental disorders among children born to cohorts since 1989 and even
before that. This data also illustrates the fact that
children diagnosed with neurodevelopmental disorders require a significant
period post-vaccination to be diagnosed with neurodevelopmental disorders.
Therefore, data regarding the more current prevalence of
neurodevelopmental disorders is not available, but in order to estimate more
current projections of the prevalence of neurodevelopmental disorders in U.S.
children, we assumed that the prevalence of neurodevelopmental disorders did not
increase since the 1994 birth cohort, (this is almost certainly an
underestimate). The projected data would be as follows for those that may have
had their three-year statute of limitations run before the National Vaccine
Injury Compensation Act:
1995
Autism = 8,325 cases Speech Disorders = 211,984 cases
Developmental Delay = 10,021 cases
1996
Autism = 8,325 cases Speech Disorders = 211,984 cases
Developmental Delay = 10,021 cases
1997
Autism = 8,325 cases Speech Disorders = 211,984 cases
Developmental Delay = 10,021 cases
1998
Autism = 8,325 cases Speech Disorders = 211,984 cases
Developmental Delay = 10,021 cases
1999
Autism = 8,325 cases Speech Disorders = 211,984 cases
Developmental Delay = 10,021 cases
2000
Autism = 8,325 cases Speech Disorders = 211,984 cases
Developmental Delay = 10,021 cases
Total Cases Excluded From the NVCIP (1989 through 2000)
Autism = 92,989 cases Speech Disorders = 2,230,086 cases
Developmental Delay = 79,430 cases
Overall = 2,402,505 cases
Our assumptions as to the prevalence of neurodevelopmental disorders in
children are fairly reasonable because the amount of mercury that children have
received from thimerosal has at least stayed the same, and perhaps even
increased. The amount of mercury that children receive from thimerosal
contained in childhood vaccines is of importance to this issue because we have
had accepted for publication three peer-reviewed scientific/medical publications
showing a direct overall and dose-response relationship between the amount of
mercury from thimerosal children received and the incidence ofneurodevelopmental
disorders and we have several more studies on the subject in various states of
submission or preparation. We have concluded in our studies that a causal
relationship exists between mercury from thimerosal in childhood vaccines and
neurodevelopmental disorders.
We have also had a peer-reviewed paper accepted for publication which
showed that the MMR live virus vaccine may have also contributed to the ongoing
epidemic of autism. Our best estimates are that the thimerosal contributed to
about 75% of the cases of neurodevelpmental disorders while the MMR contributed
to about 15%. The remaining 10% of the cases were related to mercury in Rhogam,
a shot given to Rh-negative women, and to other sources of neurotoxicity.
In 1999, the American Academy of Pediatrics recommended that thimerosal be
removed from all childhood vaccines. In 2001, the Institute of Medicine also
recommended that all childhood vaccines be made free of thimerosal and they
stated that only a few doses of childhood vaccine containing mercury
preservative remained on physician_s shelves. At a hearing in December of 2002,
before Congressman Burton_s House Committee on Government Reform, government
officials testified that thimerosal had been
removed from all childhood vaccines. Unfortunately, this is not the case.
A review of the 2003 Physician's Desk Reference shows that three
manufactures of childhood vaccines still are being made with full doses of
thimerosal. These are as follows: Diphtheria-Tetanus-acellular-Pertussis (DTaP)
manufactured by Aventis-Pasteur in multi-dose vials contains 25 micrograms of
mercury, Haemophilus-influenza-Type b (HibTITTER) in multi-dose vials
manufactured by Wyeth contains 25 micrograms of mercury, and pediatric hepatitis
B vaccine manufactured by Merck contains 12.5 micrograms of mercury. These
vaccines represent approximately half of the childhood vaccines currently
available for use in the United States.
Additionally, influenza vaccines while not officially part of the
childhood vaccine schedule are being recommended for most children. Influenza
vaccines contain 25 micrograms of mercury preservative. Incidentally, the fact
that influenza vaccine is not formally part of the childhood vaccination
schedule prevents those children who have severe adverse reactions from the
vaccine from being able to seek compensation under the Vaccine Compensation
Program. Also, Tetanus-diphtheria (Td) vaccine that is recommended for
administration to children 7 years-old and older also still contains 25
micrograms of mercury.
It is our position that all children who have autistic spectrum disorders
due to immunizations should be allowed to seek compensation both from the
Vaccine Compensation Program and, if they so elect, from civil
court remedies as well. We think it is totally unfair that these innocent
children should be prevented from seeking either or both remedies because the
public and physicians only recently have begun to become aware that these
children were damage from the thimerosal in childhood vaccines. We think that
the current three year stature of limitations should be waived to allow these
innocent victims to be allowed to seek both governmental and civil remedies for
the debilitating disorder from which they currently suffer, from no-fault of
their own. We also feel that the government should be required to conduct an
effective publicity campaign aimed at physicians and parents so that the
families of all victims are made aware of the remedies available to them.
It is obvious from the relatively small number of thimerosal cases
currently filed before the Vaccine Compensation Program, (around 2000-3000
cases) as compared to the much larger number of children who may be eligible for
such compensation, (around 25,000 cases, from the data shown above for autism
alone in the past three years) that most who are eligible even under the
currently restrictive statute of limitations, (three years from the discovery of
the injury), are unaware of the fact that they are eligible under the program.
Finally, we plead with all involved authorities to remove mercury from all
vaccines immediately. The current epidemic of autism may well be the greatest
iatrogenic epidemic in history. The damage already done to our society is
already in the trillions of dollars. The damage of the 9/11 terrorist attacks,
and that of the AIDS epidemic pale when compared to the current epidemic of
autism. All of us alive will have to bear its effects both in the lifetime care
of the damaged children and the loss of what they otherwise might have
contributed to our society.
We are very familiar with the National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program
having served as expert witnesses and consultants in approximately 100 cases
before the program. We have done a lot of work with Congressman Burton_s
Committee on these matters. If we can be of any further help to you in this
critical matter, we would be happy to talk to or meet with you or your staff.
We appreciate your efforts on behalf of our children in this important matter
and we look forward to the opportunity to be of further help to you.
Sincerely, Mark R. Geier, MD, Ph.D. David A. Geier
http://www.canada.com/vancouver/news/story.asp?id=B6B13179-6CF7-4F55-B4F4-AE
19F75A1F90
Vaccine prompts class-action lawsuit
Two families claim preservative Thimerosal caused autism in their children
Neal Hall
Vancouver Sun
Wednesday, February 26, 2003
Niko Soursos of Richmond was born a perfectly healthy boy almost three years
ago. He achieved every developmental milestone expected of normally developing
children physically, neurologically and socially, says his father, Elias
Soursos. But after receiving three mandatory shots of the hepatitis B vaccine
by the time he was eight months old, Niko began displaying signs of neurological
damage, becoming more distant, and losing language skills.
Niko was diagnosed with autism last year after his second birthday. His father,
a 35-year-old investment adviser with Canaccord Capital, began researching the
possible causes of autism a few weeks after his son was diagnosed. "Doctors used
to say this is genetic," the Soursos said Tuesday. He now believes his son's
neurological damage was caused by Thimerosal, an organic mercury compound used
as a preservative in child vaccines. Two years ago, it was phased out for infant
vaccines in Canada. It has also been phased out in the U.S. for infant vaccines.
Soursos says Thimerosal was used in hepatitis B vaccines his son received as
part of Richmond's mandatory inoculation program for children. This week,
Soursos was one of two parents who filed separate class-action lawsuits against
several drug companies, claiming their sons suffered neurological damage after
receiving vaccinations containing Thimerosal. Soursos is suing drug companies
Merck Frosst Canada and GlaxoSmithKline Inc., which made and distributed the
vaccines.
He is seeking damages for his son's autism therapy that costs $3,500 a month,
part of which is covered by a $1,600-a-month government grant. His lawsuit
claims the drug companies failed to warn of the risks associated with Thimerosal
in vaccines. "The defendants failed to communicate the dangerous nature of the
vaccines to the public and must be held accountable for their negligence,"
Vancouver lawyer David Klein said Tuesday. Klein is representing the Soursos and
the plaintiff in the other class-action lawsuit, Jaqueline Chamberlain of Sooke,
whose 10-year-old son Aaron also suffers from autism.
"It may be too late for Aaron and Niko but Thimerosal has been taken out of all
routine vaccines for infants in Canada," Klein said. The lawsuits claim the drug
companies should have known of the neurotoxic effects of the mercury contained
in Thimerosal, which had been used as a preservative and anti-biological agent
since the 1930s. "Mercury is one of the most toxic elements on earth," the
lawsuits claim. "Mercury poisoning is well documented in medical literature."
Infants are more susceptible than adults to the toxic effects of mercury because
mercury interferes with infants' developing neurological systems, the lawsuits
say.
The lawsuits allege that the drug companies developed, tested, manufactured,
licensed, distributed, marketed, supplied and/or sold the vaccines with the
knowledge that they would be injected into infants. Chamberlain's lawsuit claims
her infant son Aaron suffered neurological damage after receiving two doses of
the DPT vaccine containing Thimerosal, which is manufactured by Aventis Pasteur
Limited. The DPT vaccine, which was phased out in 1994, was used against
diphtheria, whole cell Pertussis (whooping cough) and tetanus. Like Niko, Aaron
was born perfectly healthy and demonstrated social, language, cognitive,
behavioural and physical skills appropriate for his age, the lawsuit says.
But before his second birthday, after receiving the DPT vaccine, he became
unresponsive, withdrawn, slow in speech development, developed repetitive
behaviours and an obsessive-compulsive disorder. Aaron was diagnosed with autism
at age five. He still has limited language and social skills, the legal action
claims.
Autism: a Novel Form of Mercury Poisoning
[This research paper is a keystone document in the heavy metal theory of autism.
The strong comparison of the symptoms of autism to the symptoms of mercury
poisioning is almost surreal and disturbing in its implication. The abstract of
this study appeared in the June 20, 2000 FEAT Daily
Newsletter.]
S. Bernard, B.A., A. Enayati, M.S.M.E., L. Redwood, M.S.N., H. Roger, B.A., T.
Binstock
Sallie Bernard, ARC Research, 14 Commerce Drive, Cranford, NJ 07901 USA,
908.276.6300, fax 908.276.1301
Summary Autism is a syndrome characterized by impairments in social relatedness
and communication, repetitive behaviors, abnormal movements, and sensory
dysfunction. Recent epidemiological studies suggest that autism may affect 1 in
150 U. S. children. Exposure to mercury can cause immune, sensory, neurological,
motor, and behavioral dysfunctions similar to traits defining or associated with
autism, and the similarities extend to neuroanatomy, neurotransmitters, and
biochemistry. Thimerosal, a preservative added to many vaccines, has become a
major source of mercury in children who, within their first two years, may have
received a quantity of mercury that exceeds safety guidelines. A review of
medical literature and U.S. government data suggests that (i) many cases of
idiopathic autism are induced by early mercury exposure from thimerosal; (ii)
this type of autism represents an unrecognized mercurial syndrome; and (iii)
genetic and non-genetic factors establish a predisposition whereby thimerosal's
adverse effects occur only in some children
INTRODUCTION
Autistic Spectrum Disorder (ASD) is a neurodevelopmental syndrome with onset
prior to age 36 months. Diagnostic criteria consist of impairments in sociality
and communication plus repetitive and stereotypic behaviors (1). Traits strongly
associated with autism include movement disorders and sensory dysfunctions (2).
Although autism may be apparent soon after birth, most autistic children
experience at least several months, even a year or more of normal development --
followed by regression, defined as loss of function or failure to progress
(2,3,4) The neurotoxicity of mercury (Hg) has long been recognized (5). Primary
data derive from victims of contaminated fish (Japan - Minamata Disease) or
grain (Iraq, Guatemala, Russia); from acrodynia (Pink Disease) induced by Hg in
teething powders; and from individual instances of mercury poisoning (HgP), many
occurring in occupational settings (e.g., Mad Hatter's Disease). Animal and in
vitro studies also provide insights into the mechanisms of Hg toxicity. More
recently, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the American Academy of
Pediatrics (AAP) have determined that the typical amount of Hg injected into
infants and toddlers via childhood immunizations has exceeded government safety
guidelines on an individual (6) and cumulative vaccine basis (7). The mercury in
vaccines derives from
thimerosal (TMS), a preservative which is 49.6% ethylmercury (eHg) (7) Past
cases of HgP have presented with much inter-individual variation, depending on
the dose, type of mercury, method of administration, duration of exposure, and
individual sensitivity. Thus, while commonalities exist across the various
instances of HgP, each set of variables has given rise to a different disease
manifestation (8,9,10,11). It is hypothesized that the regressive form of autism
represents another form of mercury poisoning, based on a thorough correspondence
between autistic and HgP traits and physiological abnormalities, as well as on
the known exposure to mercury
through vaccines. Furthermore, other phenomena are consistent with a causal
Hg-ASD relationship. These include (a) symptom onset shortly after immunization;
(b) ASD prevalence increases corresponding to vaccination increases; (c) similar
sex ratios of affected individuals; (d) a high heritability rate for autism
paralleling a genetic predisposition to Hg sensitivity at low doses; and (e)
parental reports of autistic children with elevated Hg
TRAIT COMPARISON
ASD manifests a constellation of symptoms with much inter-individual variation
(3,4). A comparison of traits defining, nearly universal to, or commonly found
in autism with those known to arise from mercury poisoning is given in Table I.
The characteristics defining or strongly associated with autism are also more
fully described Autism has been conceived primarily as a psychiatric condition;
and two of its three diagnostic criteria are based upon the observable traits of
(a) impairments in sociality, most commonly social withdrawal or aloofness, and
(b) a variety of perseverative or stereotypic behaviors and the need for
sameness, which strongly resemble obsessive-compulsive tendencies. Differential
diagnosis may include childhood schizophrenia, depression, obsessive-compulsive
disorder (OCD), anxiety disorder, and other neuroses. Related behaviors commonly
found in ASD individuals are irrational fears, poor eye contact, aggressive
behaviors, temper tantrums, irritability, and inexplicable changes in mood
(1,2,12-17). Mercury poisoning, when
undetected, is often initially diagnosed as a psychiatric disorder (18).
Commonly occurring symptoms include (a) "extreme shyness," indifference to
others, active avoidance of others, or “a desire to be alone”; (b) depression,
“lack of interest” and “mental confusion;” (c) irritability, aggression, and
tantrums in children and adults; (d) anxiety and fearfulness; and (e) emotional
lability. Neuroses, including schizoid and obsessive-compulsive traits, problems
in inhibition of perseveration, and stereotyped behaviors, have been reported in
a number of cases; and lack of eye contact was observed in one 12 year old girl
with mercury vapor poisoning (18-35)
The third diagnostic criterion for ASD is impairment in communication (1).
Historically, about half of those with classic autism failed to develop
meaningful speech (2), and articulation difficulties are common (3). Higher
functioning individuals may have language fluency but still show semantic and
pragmatic errors (3,36). In many cases of ASD, verbal IQ is lower than
performance IQ (3). Similarly, mercury-exposed children and adults show a marked
difficulty with speech (9,19,37). In milder cases scores on language tests may
be lower than those of unexposed controls (31,38). Iraqi children who were
postnatally poisoned developed articulation problems, from slow, slurred word
production to an inability to generate meaningful speech; while Iraqi babies
exposed prenatally either failed to develop language or presented with severe
language deficits in childhood (23,24,39). Workers with Mad Hatter's disease had
word retrieval and articulation difficulties (21) Nearly all cases of ASD and
HgP involve disorders of physical movement (2,30,40). Clumsiness or lack of
coordination has been described in many higher functioning ASD individuals (41).
Infants and toddlers later diagnosed with autism may fail to crawl properly or
may fall over while sitting or standing; and the movement disturbances typically
occur on the right side of the body (42). Problems with intentional movement and
imitation are common in ASD, as are a variety of unusual stereotypic behaviors
such as toe walking, rocking, abnormal postures, choreiform movements, spinning;
and hand flapping (2,3,43,44). Noteworthy because of similarities to autism are
reports in Hg literature of (a) children in Iraq and Japan who were unable to
stand, sit, or crawl (34,39); (b) Minamata disease patients whose movement
disturbances were localized to one side of the body, and a girl exposed to Hg
vapor who tended to fall to the right (18,34); (c) flapping motions in an infant
poisoned from contaminated pork (37) and in a man injected with thimerosal (27);
(d) choreiform movements in mercury vapor intoxication (19); (e) toe walking in
a moderately poisoned Minamata child (34); (f) poor coordination and clumsiness
among victims of acrodynia (45); (g) rocking among infants with acrodynia (11);
and (h) unusual postures observed in both acrodynia and mercury vapor poisoning
(11,31). The presence of flapping motions in both diseases is of interest
because it is such an unusual behavior that it has been recommended as a
diagnostic marker for autism (46) Virtually all ASD subjects show a variety of
sensory abnormalities (2). Auditory deficits are present in a minority of
individuals and can range from mild to profound hearing loss (2,47). Over- or
under-reaction to
sound is nearly universal (2,48), and deficits in language comprehension are
often present (3). Pain sensitivity or insensitivity is common, as is a general
aversion to touch; abnormal sensation in the extremities and mouth may also be
present and has been detected even in toddlers under 12 months old (2,49). There
may be a variety of visual disturbances, including sensitivity to light
(2,50,51,52). As in autism, sensory issues are reported in virtually all
instances of Hg toxicity (40). HgP can lead to mild to profound hearing loss
(40); speech discrimination is especially impaired (9,34,). Iraqi babies exposed
prenatally showed exaggerated reaction to noise (23), while in acrodynia,
patients reported noise sensitivity (45). Abnormal sensation in the extremities
and mouth is the most common sensory disturbance (25,28). Acrodynia sufferers
and prenatally exposed Iraqi babies exhibited excessive pain when bumping limbs
and an aversion to touch (23,24,45,53). A range of visual problems has been
reported, including photophobia (18,23,34)
COMPARISON OF BIOLOGICAL ABNORMALITIES
The biological abnormalities commonly found in autism are listed in Table II,
along with the corresponding pathologies arising from mercury exposure.
Especially noteworthy similarities are described Autism is a neurodevelopmental
disorder which has been characterized as "a disorder of neuronal organization,
that is, the development of the dentritic tree, synaptogenesis, and the
development of the complex connectivity within and between brain regions" (54).
Depressed expression of neural cell adhesion molecules (NCAMs), which are
critical during brain development for proper synaptic structuring, has been
found in one study of autism (55). Organic mercury, which readily crosses the
blood-brain barrier, preferentially targets nerve cells and nerve fibers (56);
primates accumulate the highest Hg-levels in the brain relative to other organs
(40). Furthermore, although most cells respond to mercurial injury by modulating
levels of glutathione (GSH), metallothionein, hemoxygenase, and other stress
proteins, neurons tend to be “markedly deficient in these responses” and thus
are less able to remove Hg and more prone to Hg-induced injury (56). In the
developing brain, mercury interferes with neuronal migration, depresses cell
division, disrupts microtubule function, and reduces NCAMs (28, 57-59) While
damage has been observed in a number of brain areas in autism, many nuclei and
functions are spared (36). HgP’s damage is similarly selective (40). Numerous
studies link autism with neuronal atypicalities within the amygdala, hippocampi,
basal ganglia, the Purkinje and granule cells of the cerebellum, brainstem,
basal ganglia, and cerebral cortex (36,60-69). Each of these areas can be
affected by HgP (10,34,40,70-73). Migration of Hg, including eHg, into the
amygdala is particularly noteworthy, because in primates this brain region has
neurons specific for eye contact (74) and it is implicated in autism and in
social behaviors (65,66,75) Autistic brains show neurotransmitter irregularities
which are virtually identical to those arising from Hg exposure: both high or
low serotonin and dopamine, depending on the subjects studied; elevated
epinephrine and norepinephrine in plasma and brain; elevated glutamate; and
acetylcholine deficiency in hippocampus (2,21,76-83) Gillberg and Coleman (2)
estimate that 35-45% of autistics eventually develop epilepsy. A recent MEG
study reported epileptiform activity in 82% of 50 regressive autistic children;
in another study, half the autistic children expressed abnormal EEG activity
during sleep (84). Autistic EEG abnormalities tend to be non-specific and have a
variety of patterns (85). Unusual epileptiform activity has been found in a
number of mercury poisoning cases (18,27,34,86-88). Early mHg exposure enhances
tendencies toward epileptiform activity with a reduced level of
seizure-discharge amplitude (89), a finding consistent with the subtlety of
seizures in many autism spectrum children (84,85). The fact that Hg increases
extracellular glutamate would also contribute to epileptiform activity (90) Some
autistic children show a low capacity to oxidize sulfur compounds and low levels
of sulfate (91,92). These findings may be linked with HgP because (a) Hg
preferentially binds to sulfhydryl molecules (-SH) such as cysteine and GSH,
thereby impairing various cellular functions (40), and (b) mercury can
irreversibly block the sulfate transporter NaSi cotransporter NaSi-1, present in
kidneys and intestines, thus reducing sulfate absorption (93). Besides low
sulfate, many autistics have low GSH levels, abnormal GSH-peroxidase activity
within erythrocytes, and decreased hepatic ability to detoxify xenobiotics
(91,94,95). GSH participates in cellular detoxification of heavy metals (96);
hepatic GSH is a primary substrate for organic-Hg clearance from the human (40);
and intraneuronal GSH participates in various protective responses against Hg in
the CNS (56). By preferentially binding with GSH, preventing absorption of
sulfate, or inhibiting the enzymes of glutathione metabolism (97), Hg might
diminish GSH bioavailability. Low GSH can also derive from chronic infection
(98,99), which would be more likely in the presence of immune impairments
arising from mercury (100). Furthermore, mercury disrupts purine and pyrimidine
metabolism (97,10). Altered purine or pyrimidine metabolism can induce autistic
features and classical autism (2,101,102), suggesting another mechanism by which
Hg can contribute to autistic traits Autistics are more likely to have
allergies, asthma, selective IgA deficiency (sIgAd), enhanced expression of
HLA-DR antigen, and an absence of interleukin-2 receptors, as well as familial
autoimmunity and a variety of autoimmune phenomena. These include elevated serum
IgG and ANA titers, IgM and IgG brain antibodies, and myelin basic protein (MBP)
antibodies (103-110). Similarly, atypical responses to Hg have been ascribed to
allergic or autoimmune reactions (8), and genetic predisposition to such
reactions may explain why Hg sensitivity varies so widely by individual
(88,111). Children who developed acrodynia were more likely to have asthma and
other allergies (11); IgG brain autoantibodies, MBP, and ANA have been found in
HgP subjects (18,111,112); and mice genetically prone to develop autoimmune
diseases "are highly susceptible to mercury-induced immunopathological
alterations" even at the lowest doses (113).
Additionally, many autistics have reduced natural killer cell (NK) function, as
well as immune-cell subsets shifted in a Th2 direction and increased urine
neopterin levels, indicating immune system activiation (103,114-116). Depending
upon genetic predisposition, Hg can induce immune activation, an expansion of
Th2 subsets, and decreased NK activity (117-120)
POPULATION CHARACTERISTICS
In most affected children, autistic symptoms emerge gradually, although there
are cases of sudden onset (3). The earliest abnormalities have been detected in
4 month olds and consist of subtle movement disturbances; subtle motor-sensory
disturbances have been observed in 9 month olds (49). More overt speech and
hearing difficulties become noticeable to parents and pediatricians between 12
and 18 months (2). TMS vaccines have been given in repeated intervals starting
from infancy and continuing until 12 to 18 months. While HgP symptoms, may arise
suddenly in especially sensitive individuals (11), usually there is a
preclinical "silent stage" in which subtle neurological changes are occuring
(121) and then a gradual emergence of symptoms. The first symptoms are typically
sensory- and motor-related, which are followed by speech and hearing deficits,
and finally the full array of HgP characteristics (40). Thus, both the timing
and nature of symptom emergence in ASD are fully consistent with a vaccinal Hg
etiology. This parallel is reinforced by parental reports of excessive amounts
of mercury in urine or hair from younger autistic children, as well as some
improvement in symptoms with standard chelation therapy (122) The discovery and
rise in prevalence of ASD mirrors the introduction and spread of TMS in
vaccines. Autism was first described in 1943 among children born in the 1930s
(123). Thimerosal was first introduced into vaccines in the 1930s (7). In
studies conducted prior to 1970, autism prevalence was estimated, at 1 in 2000;
in studies from 1970 to 1990 it averaged 1 in 1000 (124). This was a period of
increased vaccination rates of the TMS-containing DPT vaccines among children in
the developed world. In the early 1990s, the prevalence of autism was found to
be 1 in 500 (125), and in 2000 the CDC found 1 in 150 children affected in one
community, which was consistent with reports from other areas in the country
(126). In the late 1980s and early 1990s, two new TMS vaccines, the HIB and
Hepatitis B, were added to the recommended schedule (7) Nearly all US children
are immunized, yet only a small proportion develop autism. A pertinent
characteristic of mercury is the great variability in its effects by individual,
so that at the same exposure level, some will be affected severely while others
will be asymptomatic (9,11,28). An example is acrodynia, which arose in the
early 20th Century from mercury in teething powders and afflicted only 1 in
500-1000 children given the same low dose (28). Studies in mice as well as
humans indicate that susceptibility to Hg effects arises from genetic status, in
some cases including a propensity to autoimmune disorders (113,34,40). ASD
exhibits a strong genetic component, with high concordance in monozygotic twins
and a higher than expected incidence among siblings (4); autism is also more
prevalent in families with autoimmune disorders (106) Additionally, autism is
more prevalent among boys than girls, with the ratio estimated at 4:1 (2).
Mercury studies in mice and humans consistently report greater effects on males
than females, except for kidney damage (57). At high doses, both sexes are
affected equally; at low doses only males are affected (38,40,127)
DISCUSSION
We have shown that every major characteristic of autism has been exhibited in at
least several cases of documented mercury poisoning. Recently, the FDA and AAP
have revealed that the amount of mercury given to infants from vaccinations has
exceeded safety levels. The timing of mercury administration via vaccines
coincides with the onset of autistic symptoms. Parental reports of autistic
children with measurable mercury levels in hair and urine indicate a history of
mercury exposure. Thus the standard primary criteria for a diagnosis of mercury
poisoning - observable symptoms, known exposure at the time of symptom onset,
and detectable levels in biologic samples (11,31) - have been met in autism. As
such, mercury toxicity may be a significant etiological factor in at least some
cases of regressive autism. Further, each known form of HgP in the past has
resulted in a unique variation of mercurialism - e.g., Minamata disease,
acrodynia, Mad Hatter’s disease - none of which has been autism, suggesting that
the Hg source which may be involved in ASD has not yet been characterized; given
that most infants receive eHg via vaccines, and given that the effect on infants
of eHg in vaccines has never been studied (129), vaccinal thimerosal should be
considered a probable source. It is also possible that vaccinal eHg may be
additive to a prenatal mercury load derived from maternal amalgams, immune
globulin injections, or fish consumption, and environmental sources
CONCLUSION
The history of acrodynia illustrates that a severe disorder, afflicting a small
but significant percentage of children, can arise from a seemingly benign
application of low doses of mercury. This review establishes the likelihood that
Hg may likewise be etiologically significant in ASD, with the Hg derived from
thimerosal in vaccines rather than teething powders. Due to the extensive
parallels between autism and HgP, the likelihood of a causal relationship is
great. Given this possibility, TMS should be removed from all childhood
vaccines, and the mechanisms of Hg toxicity in autism should be thoroughly
investigated. With perhaps 1 in 150 children now diagnosed with ASD, development
of HgP-related treatments, such as chelation, would prove beneficial for this
large and seemingly growing population.
For references, go to http://www.autism.com/ari/mercury.html
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/2931565.stm
Baby food mercury concern
Parents are being reassured about mercury levels in baby foods despite reports
suggesting high levels have been found. A recent analysis of foods found a
quarter of samples contained mercury, which on average was double that when baby
food was last analysed three years ago.
But experts say it is not yet possible to say if these levels are too high.
Breastfeeding mothers and pregnant women have already been warned to limit their
intake of fish such as shark, swordfish and tuna because of the risk of damaging
the baby's nervous system as it develops. But the Food Standards Agency said
these restrictions did not apply to baby foods. The Committee on Toxicity in
Foods, which advises the agency, will look at the survey results and issue its
recommendations next week. Factors such as whether it uses European or much
lower American recommendations on mercury levels will affect its
recommendations.
A spokeswoman for the FSA told BBC News Online the concern over mercury levels
was linked to fears it could affect the development of the baby's nervous system
while it was in the womb or being breastfed, rather than when the baby was old
enough to eat baby food She said the COT recommendations would look at how much
mercury-containing food babies eat. She added parents would not be able to
eradicate mercury from their children's diet. "Mercury is a contaminant. No one
can stop it getting into food.
"The COT will need to assess whether babies young enough to be eating baby food
are a high-risk group. "Then they will need to look at what measure, and what
calculation could be used to measure levels of consumption." All these factors
will influence the COT's decision, she said. Eating fish is regarded as the main
source of mercury exposure. But only seven of the 180 samples of baby foods
examined contained fish. The COT will also consider whether levels of zinc,
nickel and arsenic in babies' food are safe.
Hazardous Waste Is Shipped From India to U.S.
Recycling Plant
May 7, 2003
By SARITHA RAI
BANGALORE, India, May 5 - In what environmental activists in India are hailing
as a major victory, tons of hazardous waste from an abandoned thermometer
factory owned by India's largest consumer products company, Hindustan Lever
Ltd., is heading to a recycling plant in the United States for safe disposal.
About 300 tons of mercury-contaminated material and waste from the thermometer
plant in Kodaikanal town, in India's southern state of Tamil Nadu, will be
shipped to the United States.
A ship carrying the material is expected to dock in New York on May 29. The
waste shipment is headed to Bethlehem Apparatus Company, in Hellertown, Pa., the
world's largest mercury recycling facility. Ameer Shahul, the corporate campaign
coordinator for Greenpeace India, termed the shipment "reverse dumping,"
referring to a reversal of earlier instances in which hazardous material has
been shipped from the developed world to poorer countries. Prolonged protests
from environmental activists led to the closing of the Hindustan Lever plant two
years ago. Hindustan Lever is a subsidiary of Unilever.
"We have forced the company to send back hazardous material from a poor country
like India, an event that doesn't happen too often," said V. R. Rajagopal
Dorairajah, a member of Palani Hills Conservation Council, one of the
conservation groups involved in the dispute. "This is a big win for us." Mercury
is a heavy metal that is very toxic even in small doses. Exposure to mercury can
lead to damage of the brain,
spinal cord, kidneys and liver.
India has no recycling facilities for mercury-contaminated material. On
Wednesday, the ship carrying several containers of contaminants from the plant,
including waste glass tainted with mercury, effluent sludge, thermometers and
metallic mercury, will leave Tuticorin port, about 200 miles south of the city
of Madras in southeastern India. Greenpeace activists who joined local
environmental groups to campaign against the plant are closely monitoring the
hazardous cargo.
Hindustan Lever confirmed the shipment. The waste was transported by road to the
southern port under police supervision during daylight hours, the company said.
The thermometer factory was acquired by Hindustan Lever from Pond's India Ltd.,
a cosmetics maker. Pond's moved the factory to India from the United States
after the plant owned there by its parent, Chesebrough-Pond's, had been
dismantled. The mercury for the thermometers was imported, primarily from the
United States, and finished thermometers were exported to markets in the United
States and Europe.
The thermometer plant operated for nearly two decades in Kodaikanal, a popular
summer resort dating back to the colonial period. Hindustan Lever said it was
taking action to remediate contaminated soil according to stringent
international regulations. It is currently seeking approval of its remediation
plan by the Tamil Nadu pollution control board before it starts theprocess, the
company said. Environmental activists have charged that mercury vapor released
from the factory has impaired the health of the workers and community, a charge
that Hindustan Lever vehemently denies.
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/05/07/international/asia/
07INDI.html?ex=1053316
722&ei=1&en=26d5598f56e2a60d
MERCURY & ENDOCRINE SYSTEM
NOTE: thimerosal = sodium ethylmercurithiosalicylate = merthiolate
Mercury compounds have long been known to be anti-thyroid agents.
The detrimental effects of mercury compounds upon thyroid hormone synthesis have
been documented in humans (Ellingson et al, 2000; Barregard et al, 1994, etc) as
well as animal (Watanabe, 2001; Sin et al, 1990; Ghosh & Bhattacharya, 1992;
Kabuto, 1991, 1986; etc.)
Mercury, being a selenium antagonist, interferes with glutathione, a
selenoenzyme essential for peripheral thyroid hormone conversion (T4 to T3).
In rat livers, the effects of merthiolate upon thyroid hormone conversion are
identical to those of propylthiouracil (PTU) (Hoffken et al, 1978), an
anti-thyroid medication which - by the way - is also an established carcinogen.
It is well-established that thimerosal is a sulfhydryl reagent, which is
contained in glutathione, cysteine, etc. (Elferink & de Koster, 1998; Philippe,
1995).
Experimental studies in rodents show that methylmercury specifically alters the
metabolism of selenium in fetal/neonatal brain. In animals, significant
alterations of the activities of selenoenzymes such as glutathione peroxidase
and iodothyronine deiodinases by prenatal methylmercury exposure are seen,
producing hypothyroidism-like conditions in the offspring. (Watanabe, 2001).
Studies on workers exposed to methylmercury also have shown significant thryoid
hormone disturbances, particularly as it relates to hormone conversion (Free T4
to FreeT3). A higher amount of reverse triiodothyronine (rT3) and an elevated
FreeT4/Free T3 ratio was found in exposed workers, a sure sign of disturbance of
disturbance in peripheral tissue. The serum free T3 was inversely associated
with cumulative methylmercury exposure(Barregard et al, 1994). These findings
have also been verified in other workers (Ellingsen et al, 2000).
When rats were given an injection of methylmercury chloride at doses thought too
small to cause any of the typical neurological defects associated with
methylmercury compounds, thyroxine synthesis was directly inhibited, while PRL
synthesis/release (CNS) were stimulated (Kabuto, 1991), indicating a
hypothalamus/pituitary-related action.
Bellabarba & Tremblay (1973) showed how thimerosal interfered with TBG and the
binding of thyroid hormones. TBG, which is short for thyroxine-binding-globulin,
was first recognized to serve as the major thyroid hormone transport protein in
serum in 1952. It also binds T3 and reverseT3(rT3). Since TBG binds 75% of serum
T4 and T3, quantitative and qualitative abnormalities of this protein have most
profound effects on the total iodothyronine levels in serum (Refetoff, 2001).
When TSH tests are taken as indicator of thyroid function, this type of
biochemical hypothyroidism would not show, as TSH levels are typically reported
"normal" in subjects exosed to methylmercury (McGregor & Mason, 1992; Barregard
et al,1994).
Unfortunately the TSH is still the only test most people can get, IF they can
convince their doctor to even order one.
The NRC estimated that over 60,000 children are born per year in the U.S. who
are at risk for neurodevelopmental effects from methyl mercury. If we are truly
concerned about methylmercury poisoning in our children WHY in the world are
there no proper thyroid tests being done which could show the hormone
dysfunction, and thus appropriate treatment be considered?
REFERENCES:
Barregard L, Lindstedt G, Schutz A, Sallsten G - "Endocrine function in mercury
exposed chloralkali workers" Occup Environ Med 51(8):536-40 (1994)
www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/htbin-post/Entrez/query?uid= 7951778&form=6&db=m&Dopt=r
· "The serum free T4 concentration and the ratio free T4/free T3 were slightly,
but significantly, higher in the subgroups with the highest exposure, and the
serum free T3 was inversely associated with cumulative Hg exposure. This
indicates a possible inhibitory effect of mercury on 5'-deiodinases, which are
responsible for the conversion of T4 to the active hormone T3."
Bellabarba D, Tremblay R - "Effect of sodium ethylmercurithiosalicylate
(thimerosal) on serum binding of thyroid hormones" Can J Physiol Pharmacol
51:156-159 (1973)
· "A discussion of the interference of sodium ethylmercurithiosalicylate
(thimerosal, merthiolate) with the binding of thyroid hormones to serum proteins
is presented. Dialysis studies showed that this compound added to serum in
concentrations varying from 90 to 360 mg./100 ml., caused an increase of the
dialyzable or free fraction of thyroxine (T4) and triiodothyronine (T3). The
increase was higher for the free T4 (3.8 to 18-fold) than for the free T3
fraction (2.3 to 5-fold). Electrophoretic studies on the distribution of tracer
amounts of labeled T4 among the serum binding proteins revealed that the
inhibitory effect of sodium ethylmercurithiosalicylate was exerted mainly on
thyroxine binding globulin (TBG). In the presence of this compound (180 mg./100
ml. of serum) the percentage of tracer T4 bound to TB TBG was reduced from 53%
to 9%. These findings were also confirmed by examining the binding of tracer
amounts of labeled T4 and T3 in a serum diluted in barbital buffer, which
inhibits the hormonal binding to thyroxine binding prealbumin and albumin."
================
Bleau H, Daniel C, Chevalier G, Van Tra H, Hontella A - "Effects of acute
exposure to mercury chloride and methylmercury on plasma cortisol, T3, T4,
glucose and liver glycogen in rainbow trout (Oncorhynchus mykiss)." Aquatic
Toxicology (Amsterdam) 34(3):221-235 (1996)
· "Exposure to both mercurial compounds significantly increased plasma cortisol,
plasma thyroxine (T4) and plasma glucose levels. Similar trends were observed in
plasma triiodothyronine (T3) levels. A decrease in liver glycogen reserves was
detected after 1 week of exposure to 6 mug/l CH3HgCl. Our results indicate that
both mercurial compounds stimulate the pituitary-interrenal and the
pituitary-thyroid axis and modify the carbohydrate metabolism in juvenile
rainbow trout, and that the organic mercury CH3Hg+ is a more potent chemical
stressor than the inorganic Hg2+."
Ellingsen DG, Efskind J, Haug E, Thomassen Y, Martinsen I, Gaarder PI - "Effects
of low mercury vapour exposure on the thyroid function in chloralkali workers" J
Appl Toxicol 20(6):483-9 (2000)
www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/htbin-post/Entrez/query?uid=11180271&form=6&db=m&Dopt=r
· "The median serum concentration of reverse triiodothyronine (rT3) was
statistically significantly higher in the exposed subjects compared with the
referents (268 pmol l (-1) and range 161-422 vs 240 pmol l(-1) and range
129-352; P = 0.009). The difference between the exposed subjects and the
referents was most pronounced in the highest exposed sub-groups. The free
thyroxine (T4)/free T3 ratio was also higher in the highest exposed subgroups
compared with the referents. The median serum concentration of tumour necrosis
factor alpha (TNF-alpha) was lower in the exposed subjects (7.3 pg ml(-1) and
range 4.4-69.7 vs 8.0 pg ml(-1) and range 6.0-34.6; P = 0.004). Exposed subjects
with the lowest urinary iodine (<67.8 nmol mmol(-1) Cr) had higher serum
concentrations of reverse T 3 and a higher free T4/free T3 ratio than the other
subjects, suggesting that a low concentration of iodine in urine may be a risk
factor for increased serum concentrations of reverse T3 and the free T4/free T3
ratio in subjects exposed occupationally to mercury vapour. "
Ghosh N, Bhattacharya S - "Thyrotoxicity of the chlorides of cadmium and mercury
in rabbit" Biomed Environ Sci 5(3):236-40 (1992)
Goldman M, Bubak P, Meiberger H - "Comparative effects of environmental
pollutants: mercury, lead, and DDT on thyroid uptake of radioiodine and thyroid
secretion rate in male Sprague-Dawley rats" Proc S Dak Acad Sci 51: 263 (1972)
· "Long term dietary ingestion of mercuric chloride (100 mg/kg) for 2-3 months
or 1% lead acetate for 1 yr decreased thyroidal (SUP)131I uptake 24 hr after
injection of radioiodide and reduced the rate of thyroidal (SUP)131I release.
These indices of thyroid function were more marked in those animals ingesting
lead acetate. Removing the mercury supplement from the diet of one group of rats
and testing the (SUP)131I release rates again three months later showed that the
mercury ingestion had some permanent effects on thyroid function. Repeated daily
dosing with mercuric chloride (10 mg/kg) by stomach tube for 5-7 days
accelerated thyroidal (SUP)131I release."
Hoffken B, Kodding R, Von Zur Muhlen A, Hehrmann T, Juppner H, Hesch RD -
"Regulation of thyroid hormone metabolism in rat liver fractions" Biochim
Biophys Acta 539(1):114-24 (1978)
www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/htbin-post/Entrez/query?uid= 23865&form=6&db=m&Dopt=r
· "The nature of the conversion of thyroxine (T4) to triiodothyronine (T3) and
reverse triiodothyronine (rT3) was investigated in rat liver homogenate and
microsomes. A 6-fold rise of T3 and 2.5-fold rise of rT3 levels determined by
specific radioimmunoassays was observed over 6 h after the addition of T4. An
enzymic process is suggested that converts T4 to T3 and rT3. For T3 the optimal
pH is 6 and for rT3, 9.5. The converting activity for both T3 and rT3 is
temperature dependent and can be suppressed by heat, H2O2, merthiolate and by
5-propyl-2-thiouracil. rT3 and to a lesser degree iodide, were able to inhibit
the production of T3 in a dose related fashion. Therefore the pH dependency, rT3
and iodide may regulate the availability of T3 or rT3 depending on the metabolic
requirements of thyroid hormones."
Kabuto M - "Acute endocrine effects of a single administration of methylmercury
chloride (MMC) in rats" Endocrinol Jpn 33(5):683-90 (1986)
www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/htbin-post/Entrez/query?uid= 3030712&form=6&db=m&Dopt=r
· "The acute effects of methylmercury chloride (MMC) on the endocrine functions
were investigated with doses too small to cause any typical neurological
dysfunctions. The hormones included PRL, LH, TSH, ACTH, corticosterone (Bk),
testosterone (TLI), total thyroxine (T4) and free thyroxine (free T4). The
changes in serum hormone levels from 1 hour through 10 days after a single
injection of MMC (12 mg/kg s.c.) (Exp. 1), and dose-response relationships
between MMC doses (2 to 16 mg/kg s.c.) and the serum hormone levels at 25 hours
after MMC injection (Exp. 2) were examined. The acute effects revealed, which
were all reversible, are summarized as follows; MMC might directly inhibit
thyroxine synthesis; MMC could affect only stimulatively the pituitary-adrenal
axis and PRL synthesis/release, the primary action site for which may be the
CNS; and the effects of the pituitary-gonadal axis were inconsistent and,
therefore, this axis seems to be relatively resistant to MMC. On the other hand,
the responses of PRL and TSH to TRH loading, which were examined for both groups
in Exp. 3, suggested that MMC could not affect the metabolizing activity for
serum PRL and TSH. The hormone levels of the MMC group enhanced by TRH recovered
very rapidly as in the control group. Thus, these acute and reversible endocrine
effects seem to indicate relatively earlier development of possible chronic and
irreversible effects on the endocrine functions when exposed to methylmercury
chronically, and these should be examined further."
Kabuto M - "Chronic effects of methylmercury on the urinary excretion of
catecholamines and their responses to hypoglycemic stress" Arch Toxicol
65(2):164-7 (1991) www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/htbin-post/Entrez/query?uid=
2059158&form=6&db=m&Dopt=r
· rats ........"All serum TSH and total and free T4 baseline levels showed
slight increases, and the thyroid gland weights in the MMC group were slightly
heavier. These findings suggest a rather hyperthyroid state after the initial
acute phase suppression, as suggested by the previous examinations. Thus, these
findings suggest long-lasting effects of methylmercury administration,
especially on renal DA synthesis. Baseline urinary excretion of NE and thyroid
function could also be affected for a long time".
Karpathios T, Zervoudakis A, Theodoridis C, Vlachos P, Apostolopoulou E,
Fretzayas A - "Merrcury Vapor Poisoning associtaed with hyperthyrodism in a
child" Acta Paediatr Scand 80(5)551-552 (1991)
Kolenic J, Palcakova D, Benicky L, Kolenicova M - "The frequency of
auto-antibody occurrence in occupational risk (mercury)" Prac Lek 45(2):75-77
(1993)
· "The authors examined antibodies in serum by indirect immunofluorescent method
in 35 persons working in the risk of metal mercury vapours and in 33 persons of
a control group. Cryostatic sections from human kidneys, liver and thyroid gland
served as antigenic substrates. There was a significantly more frequent
occurrence of antibodies against basal membrane of glomeruli (54%) as compared
with 9% positivity if the control group (P < 0.01). The occurrence of antibodies
against vessels (65%) was also significantly higher than in the controls (27%)
as well as antibodies against smooth muscle (50% against 9% in the controls).
The findings indicate alteration of immune system in persons working in the risk
of metal mercury vapours."
McGregor AJ, Mason HJ - "Occupational mercury vapour exposure and testicular,
pituitary and thyroid endocrine function" Hum Exp Toxicol 10(3):199-203 (1991)
www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/htbin-post/Entrez/query?uid= 1678950&form=6&db=m&Dopt=r
Sher ES, Xu Xm, Adams PM, Craft CM, Stein SA -"The effects of thyroid hormone
level and action in developing brain: Are these targets for the actions of
polychlorinated biphenyls and dioxins?" Toxicology and Industrial Health
14(1-2):121-158 (1998)
Refetoff S - Thyroid Hormone Serum Transport: Structure, prioperties and genes
and Transcriptional Regulation" Thyroid Manager, Chapter 3 (2001)
www.thyroidmanager.org/Chapter3/3a-frame.htm
Sin YM, Teh WF, Wong MK, Reddy PK - "Effect of Mercury on Glutathione and
Thyroid Hormones" Bulletin of Environmental Contamination and Toxicology
44(4):616-622 (1990)
· "A decrease of both circulating thyroid hormones T3 and T4 in the HgCl2
treated mice suggests that the deposited mercury had exerted its effect not only
on the liver but also possibly on the thyroid and other organs. A similar
decrease was found in the circulating T3 in HgS treated mice."
Watanabe C - "Selenium deficiency and brain functions: the significance for
methylmercury toxicity" Nippon Eiseigaku Zasshi 55(4):581-9 (2001)
www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/htbin-post/Entrez/query?uid= 11265129&form=6&db=m&Dopt=r
http://boston.com/dailynews/132/economy/_FDA_CDC_Bumbling_at_the_ExpenP.shtml
FDA & CDC Bumbling at the Expense of Mercury-Poisoned Children
P.R.Newswire, 5/12/2003 16:32
New Government Report Concludes Some Children Received Toxic Mercury That
Exceeded EPA Limit Many Times Over The Truth is Unfolding as Public Learns of
Thousands of Children That Received Unnecessary Exposure to Mercury While FDA
and CDC Allowed it to Continue.
WASHINGTON, May 12 /PRNewswire/ --
The Federal Drug and Food Administration and Centers for Disease Control both
get a big "F" in protecting children from the hazards of mercury poisoning. The
House Government Reform Committee released a report this week that concluded the
FDA and CDC failed in their duty to be vigilant as new vaccines containing the
mercury-based preservative Thimerosal were approved and added to the
immunization schedule.
When the Hepatitis B and Haemophilus Influenzae Type b (Hib) vaccines were added
to the recommended schedule of childhood immunizations in the early 1990's, the
cumulative amount of ethylmercury to which children were exposed nearly tripled.
Meanwhile during the last decade, autism (symptoms of which are markedly similar
to mercury poisoning) in the U.S. has grown to epidemic proportions-some
estimates are between 10% and 17% per year.
"This breaks my heart," says Laura Bono, parent of a child originally
misdiagnosed with autism and now diagnosed with mercury poisoning. "I followed
the law and vaccinated my child thinking the government vaccination program had
done all their homework. I found out that my son received 125 micrograms of
ethylmercury during his first 16 months. That is 144 times the EPA allowable
limit for his average weight during that time. In my opinion, this is criminal."
The Government report states, "The CDC's failure to state a preference for
Thimerosal-free vaccines in 2000 and again in 2001 was an abdication of their
responsibility. As a result, many children received vaccines containing
Thimerosal when Thimerosal-free alternatives were available."
The Committee also found that, "The actions taken by the HHS to remove
Thimerosal from vaccines in 1999 were not sufficiently aggressive. As a result,
Thimerosal remained in some vaccines for an additional two years." Lori McIlwain
parent of a three-year-old with heavy metal toxicity and numerous
neurodevelopmental problems said, "This means that my child and thousands of
other children continued to be poisoned even after the government knew the risks
and the consequences."
Despite the reputation that mercury is an extremely toxic substance, the report
states that, "The FDA has never required manufacturers to conduct adequate
safety testing on Thimerosal and ethylmercury compounds." A coalition of parents
and advocacy groups are outraged that the government could have prevented
additional exposure -- many wonder why lawmakers haven't taken notice.
Ironically, FDA has repeatedly warned pregnant women not to eat large amounts of
fish so as to avoid toxic mercury, yet it continued to approve vaccines
containing increasingly large doses of mercury.
The committee report also suggests there is inadequate research regarding
ethylmercury neurotoxicity and nephrotoxicity, and the relationship between
autism and the use of mercury-containing vaccines. It states that to-date,
"Studies conducted or funded by the CDC that purportedly dispute any correlation
between autism and vaccine injury have been of poor design, under- powered, and
fatally flawed. The CDC's rush to support and promote such research is
reflective of a philosophical conflict in looking fairly at emerging theories
and clinical data related to adverse reactions from vaccinations."
Although the report is clearly shocking to the general public, parents with
autistic children that were exposed to hazardous levels of mercury through their
childhood vaccines aren't surprised at all. "We have followed this controversy
for a long time," said Bono. "We knew we had a normal child before vaccinations
and now we have a mercury-poisoned child showing all the behavioral signs of
autism. At bigger issue now is, 'What is the government going to do about it?'
Thousands of families like the Bonos were not aware mercury was in the vaccines
and missed the three-year statute of limitations to file a claim in the National
Vaccine Injury Compensation Program. These families will not receive any
compensation to help with their children's medical needs and are prevented under
the NVICP law to file a civil claim against the pharmaceutical companies. The
parents are angry that their children have been poisoned and now have no civil
rights under the current NVICP.
Proposals put forth in the Senate now by Senator Judd Gregg and Senator Bill
Frist will further protect vaccine manufacturers and bar recovery for many of
these injured children.
Need a local angle to this story? Call us for the name of a family near you
whose child has mercury poisoning from vaccines. For more information about the
autism-mercury connection, visit
www.factsformedia.com,
www.momsonamissionforautism.org,
www.autismautoimmunityproject.com
www.autismautoimmunityproject.com.
Contact:
Laura Bono, The Right to Fight Mercury Damage Campaign,
(919)403-9443
Lyn Redwood, Safe Minds
(404) 932-1786
SOURCE The Autism Autoimmunity Project
Maine Governor Signs Bills to Protect
Health, Reduce Pollution (NRCM
Press Release 5/29)
Maine Governor John Baldacci has signed three bills to protect public health
and the environment from mercury and lead pollution. The three bills signed by
the Governor include: LD 697, an Act to Require the Installation of Dental
Amalgam Separator Systems in Dental Offices, that will remove 98% of the
mercury in wastewater discharges that results from dental work on mercury
fillings; LD 743, an Act to Develop a Plan for Cathode Ray Tube (CRTs)
Disposal, that bans the disposal of CRTs from computer monitors and televisions
in landfills and incinerators by January 1, 2006 and that requires a plan by
January 30, 2004 to collect and recycle CRTs; and LD 1159, an Act to Reduce
Mercury Use in Measuring Devices and Switches, that bans the sale of many
mercury-containing products, such as mercury fever thermometers and residential
mercury thermostats, by July 1, 2006 and requires a plan to improve collection
and recycling of old mercury thermostats. Maine is one of the first four states
in the country to require dentists to install separators to reduce mercury
discharges into the sewer systems that empty into rivers and bays. The disposal
of CRTs, which each contain four to eight pounds of lead, poses environmental
health hazards. "Reducing mercury and lead in the environment will help prevent
learning disabilities in our children," said Sandra Cort, immediate past
president of the Learning Disabilities Association of Maine.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=
PubMed&list_uids=12869046&dopt=Abstract
Australas J Dermatol. 2003 Aug;44(3):199-202. Related Articles,Links
Wells' syndrome following thiomersal-containing vaccinations.
Koh KJ, Warren L, Moore L, James C, Thompson GN.
Departments of Dermatology, Histopathology and General Medicine, Women's and
Children's Hospital, North Adelaide and Adelaide Pathology Partners, Adelaide,
South Australia, Australia.
A 3(1/2)-year-old boy presented on three occasions with painful, itchy,
oedematous plaques on his limbs. On two occasions he had received hepatitis B
vaccination 11-13 days previously, and on the third occasion received triple
antigen (DTP) vaccination 10 days earlier. Skin biopsy revealed a prominent
infiltrate of eosinophils involving the entire thickness of the dermis. In
addition there were prominent 'flame figures' consisting of eosinophilic
necrotic collagen surrounded by granular basophilic debris. The clinical and
histological pictures were consistent with Wells' syndrome. The eruption settled
on the second and third occasions with 0.1% mometasone furoate cream. Subsequent
patch testing showed 2+ reaction to preservative thiomersal at 96 hours. This is
the first description of Wells' syndrome with typical clinical and
histopathological features associated with thiomersal in two different vaccines.
PMID: 12869046 [PubMed - in process]
http://releases.usnewswire.com/GetRelease.asp?id=120-06262003
U.S. Newswire - Released today, an expert committee of the World Health
Organization recommended a new human exposure standard for methylmercury that
is nearly twice as stringent as the existing world health exposure standard.
The Mercury Policy Project, a global mercury nonprofit group, applauded the
recommendation and urged the US FDA-and national health agencies around the
world-to revise their standards, even before the WHO finalizes the new
recommendations.
"The new WHO recommendations are more
reflective of the latest science on methlymercury exposure risks. While fish
is a good source of protein, we urge caution when consuming predatory fish
with higher mercury levels," said Michael Bender, of the Mercury Policy
Project and representative of the Ban Mercury Working Group, a coalition of 28
groups around the world working on mercury issues.
The Joint FAO/WHO Expert Committee on
Food Additives recommended that the Provisional Tolerable Weekly Intake (PTWI)
for methylmercury be cut in half. Meanwhile, the FDA's allowable daily intake,
the amount of methylmercury that can be consumed daily over the lifespan
without producing appreciable harm, is weaker by a factor of 2 (around 0.2 ug/kd/day
for WHO versus 0.4 ug/kg/day for FDA.) "While WHO appears to be moving in the
right direction, FDA continues to lag behind with an outdated and indefensible
standard, allowing millions of pregnant moms and kids to unnecessarily be
exposed to methylmercury at unsafe levels," said Bender. "We urge FDA to stop
protecting the fishing industry and to start protecting sensitive
populations."
Methylmercury-the organic form mercury assumes in fish-is a potent neurotoxin that poses the greatest risk to the developing fetus, infants, and young children. According to the Centers for disease Control, one in 12 women of childbearing age in the U.S. has unsafe mercury levels, translating to over 300,000 babies born at risk.
Most mercury pollution comes from the
burning of fossil fuels in the coal-fired power plants, waste disposal,
industrial processes and mining. Mercury levels in the environment have
increased 3-5 fold in the past century. Since 1996, fish has surpassed beef
and poultry as the most common source of protein in the world. In February
2003, the UN Governing Council found that there were sufficient adverse
impacts from global mercury pollution to warrant international action.
More information: JECFA meeting
summary:
http://www.mercurypolicy.org/new/documents/2WHOcommentsFINAL060303.pdf
http://www.the-scientist.com/yr2003/aug/research2_030825.html
Researching the Channel Change
Investigators tune in to channelopathies as the root cause for various
disorders |
By
Mike May
Courtesy of Roderick MacKinnon, Rockefeller University
Playing gatekeeper to human health, channel proteins penetrate all cell
membranes. In the nervous system, armies of channels open and close in precise
order to create action potentials, the brief membrane depolarizations that act
as the primary form of electrical signaling in animals. These action potentials
prove so enduring, functioning properly even in extreme experimental
preparations, that investigators might consider ion channels infallible. But,
they are not. An acquired channelopathy is a nonhereditary breakdown in a
channel's function. "Acquired channelopathies arise from multiple causes at any
developmental stage," says Jeffrey L. Noebels, Department of Neurology at Baylor
College of Medicine, Houston. They develop in autoimmune diseases, such as
Rasmussen encephalitis, in which antibodies cause seizures by binding to
glutamate receptors. Many toxins also generate acquired channelopathies. An
improperly prepared meal of puffer fish serves up tetrodotoxin, which blocks
voltage-gated sodium channels. In some cases, environmental assaults even
trigger changes in gene expression, which causes channelopathies that may
produce other detrimental symptoms. Despite the wide range of causes and
deleterious effects, relatively few scientists study acquired channelopathies. A
search on the term channelopathies on the National Institutes of Health's Web
site for Computer Retrieval of Information on Scientific Projects, which tracks
federally funded research awards, turns up 15 grants, but only two address
acquired channelopathies. Though it seems there is more interest in genetic
channel defects, recent research shows that the manner in which an otherwise
healthy ion channel breaks down can reveal clues to its normal operation and,
possibly, to its repair. FLIP IT ON AND OFF A nerve injury can flip a
maladaptive switch in gene expression. Stephen G. Waxman, chairman of neurology
at Yale University School of Medicine, and his colleagues cut a rat's sciatic
nerve and then recorded action potentials. The injured nerve generated abnormal,
repetitive bursts of activity that came from using an inappropriate mixture of
sodium channels.1 In sensory neurons in the dorsal root ganglia of the spinal
cord, peripheral nerve injury appears to turn off some sodium-channel genes,
including the gene for the sensory neuron-specific (SNS) channel, Nav1.8, and
turn on others, including the gene for the Nav1.3 channel. As a result, the
neurons spontaneously fire bursts of action potentials, which can cause pain.
Indeed, nerves in biopsy samples from patients who have chronic pain show
similar repetitive firing. "I think it's fair to say that we've established, in
a very solid way, that an acquired transcriptional channelopathy contributes to
the generation of pain after injury to the nervous system," says Waxman, who is
also director of the Neuroscience
Research Center at the VA Hospital in West Haven, Conn. Waxman has investigated
other forms of nerve damage, such as the loss of myelin that occurs in multiple
sclerosis (MS). Myelin, an electrical insulator, surrounds axons and speeds
action potentials. In a genetic model of demyelination, the taiep mouse, the
Waxman team found proteins for SNS sodium channels in Purkinje cells of the
cerebellum, which is responsible for coordination and motor control and usually
lacks these channels. The team also found SNS sodium channels in Purkinje cells
in the CREAE (chronic-relapsing experimental allergic encephalomyelitis)mouse,
another animal model for MS. The researchers even found that channel in what
Waxman calls "very well preserved brain tissue from human autopsies of patients
with well-characterized MS." Moreover, his group showed that inserting SNS
channels (using a gene gun) into Purkinje cells causes abnormal firing.
© 2003 Oxford University Press
TRANSGENIC HEARTS: Remodeling in eight-week-old TNF a transgenic mice (a-TG)
appears as a distortion in the architecture of ventricular cardiomyocytes versus
wild type. ATP-sensitive potassium (KATP) channels may play a role. (EMBO J
, 22:1732-42, 2003
Nonetheless, Waxman says, "The transcriptional channelopathy associated with MS
is not yet fully accepted." He stresses the conventional view that MS is a
demyelinating disease in which axons degenerate, but it could be more, too.
"It's as if, in addition to demyelination and axonal injury, the cerebellar
Purkinje cells are mistuned," Waxman concludes.
HEAVY METALS AND STRESS Transcriptional imbalances extend beyond peripheral
nerve damage or sodium channels. Noebels and his colleagues showed that subtypes
of calcium channels become upregulated in a variety of brain injuries.2 The
impact of those changes, however, remains unknown. In contrast, some toxins
directly attack channels. For example, a variety of evidence indicates that
mercury reduces hearing at essentially all frequencies.3 To see how that might
occur, Ernest J. Moore, Jr. and his research team at Northwestern University's
Feinberg School of Medicine and the Karolinska Institutet in Stockholm studied
the KCNQ family of potassium channels in the outer hair cells of guinea pigs. In
this voltage-gated channel, mercury blocked currents in and out of the cells.
"We found that there was a slight decrease in a current that is carried by the
KCNQ4/5 potassium channel," says Moore. He suspects that the mercury ions block
the potassium channel directly, like a cork in a bottle. The cork may
make a somewhat sloppy fit, because no level of mercury completely abolished the
current. Yet, Moore could not completely reverse the mercury blockage even after
20 to 30 minutes of washing. Moore says the condition builds chronically. "If
you're exposed to mercury over long periods of time, then you're going to see
more of an effect."
Reprinted with permission from the National Academy of Sciences.
KNOCKOUT CHANNEL: Kir6.2 knockouts do not have the requisite subunits to form
ATP-sensitive Potassium (KATP) channels. This may account for contraction bands
(arrows) observed in Kir6.2-KO but not wild-type (WT) mouse myocardium. (
Proc Natl Acad Sci, 99;13278-83, 2003.)
What heavy metal is to the ears, stress is to the heart. Stress comprises a
common chronic condition, ranging from relatively mundane psychological factors
such as the pressure to get the grass mowed, to more dangerous events such as
ignoring a red light during rush hour. Stress can cause the heart to tick faster
and pump harder, engaging ATP-sensitive potassium (KATP) channels. Made from a
Kir6.2 pore-forming subunit, these channels are normally closed. During
cardiac stress, KATP channels open, letting potassium flow out of the cells. As
a result, action potentials in heart muscle decrease in length, which lets in
less calcium, thus saving energy and reducing the danger of calcium overload.
Denice Hodgson of the Mayo Clinic says, "We believe that the KATP channel allows
the heart to meet increased demand, but it limits the response of the heart so
that it doesn't actually injure itself."
To better understand these channels, scientists in Andre
Terzic's laboratory at the Mayo Clinic investigated Kir6.2 knockout mice.4
Terzic says, "Our laboratory focuses on identifying molecular mechanisms of
cardioprotection and stress adaptation." On treadmill tests, wild-type mice
outworked knockouts by threefold, according to an overall measurement of effort.
The knockouts also showed stress-induced calcium overload, as indicated by
myocardial contraction bands found in heart muscle. Additionally, 70% of the
knockouts died suddenly during treadmill-generated stress, but all the wild
types survived. To see how KATP channels might participate in heart disease,
Terzic's lab overexpressed tumor necrosis factor-necrosis factor-a(TNFa) to
induce heart failure; he then compared the mice to wild types. Patch-clamp
techniques showed no differences in the intrinsic properties of the KATP
channels between the two groups. Nevertheless, when Hodgson applied a
mitochondrial uncoupler, which simulates a lack of oxygen, the wild-type cells
opened KATP channels fourfold more than the ones from mice overexpressing TNF a
and reduced the duration of cardiac action potentials, thereby diminishing signs
of cellular injury during stress. So even in diseased hearts, drug therapy could
possibly turn KATP channels back on and prevent further heart damage. For
molecules involved in such important life processes, aberrations in channels are
understudied, some say. Randall Stewart, program director for channels,
synapses, and circuits at the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and
Stroke, sums up the field in one word, "Underrepresented." He adds that at a
recent channelopathy workshop, "I realized that we did not have anyone speak
about acquired channelopathies." Nevertheless, some scientists continue to
gather information that shows how these channel troubles arise. In addition to
learning about heart disease and the maintenance of the cell, new findings could
contribute to the growing neuroscience field. Baylor's Noebels says, "The more
we learn about acquired channelopathies, the closer we move toward the neurology
of the future--the clinical management of ion-channel gene expression." Mike May
(mikemay@mindspring.com)
is a freelance writer in Madison, Ind. References . S.G. Waxman, "Acquired
channelopathies in nerve injury and MS," Neurology, 56:1621-7, 2001.
2. R.E. Westenbroek et al., "Upregulation of L-type Ca2+ channels in reactive
astrocytes after brain injury, hypomyelination, and ischemia," J
Neurosci,18:2321-34, 1998.
3. G.-H. Liang et al., "Mercury (Hg2+) suppression of potassium currents of
outer hair cells," Neurotoxicol Teratol, 25:349-59, May 2003.
4. L.V. Zingman et al., "Kir6.2 is required for adaptation to stress," ProcNatl
Acad Sci, 99:13278-83, 2002.
5. D.M. Hodgson et al., "Cellular remodeling in heart failure disrupts KATP
channel-dependent stress tolerance," EMBO J, 22:1732-42, April 15, 2003.
'Baby Hair' Study Shows Autistic Children Have Altered
Response to Mercury; Reduced Excretion of Toxic Metal May Explain Autism Link
Mon Aug 25, 2:02 PM ET
To: National Desk, Health Reporter
Contact: Mark Blaxill of Safe Minds, 617-492-3412
CAMBRIDGE, Mass., Aug. 25 /U.S. Newswire/ -- A study published this month in the
International Journal of Toxicology, the official journal of the American
College of Toxicology, provides the strongest clinical evidence to date
supporting the theory that mercury exposure is tied to autism.
The study, co-authored by Mark Blaxill, a director of Safe Minds, suggests a
biological mechanism for the hypothesis first advanced by Safe Minds that autism
is a form of mercury poisoning and that exposure to the mercury-based
preservative thimerosal in vaccines has likely caused neurological damage to
thousands of children.
Blaxill, along with co-investigators Amy Holmes, MD and Boyd Haley, PhD,
assessed mercury exposure levels among 94 autistic children and 45 normally
developing controls. They found higher pre- and postnatal exposures in the
autistic group. Then they took a novel approach to measuring mercury
distribution in the study subjects during infancy: they collected the first lock
of baby hair that had been taken years earlier from each child to determine its
mercury content. In a result that appears surprising at first, they found that
the autistic hair mercury levels were only a fraction of the controls'.
"Our findings might seem counter-intuitive," says Blaxill, "but if you take into
account the higher exposures of the autistic children, you quickly see that
these reduced hair levels suggest that less mercury was being excreted by these
babies. This is because mercury must be in the blood in order to be taken up by
the hair follicle, and mercury must be in the blood in order to be eliminated
from the body. If it's not in the hair, then it is not in the blood. And if it's
not in the blood to be eliminated, more mercury is retained and available to
cause neurological damage in infants who subsequently develop autism."
One finding of the study that will be sure to draw attention is the relatively
high levels of mercury in the hair of normal infants. These levels appear to be
a direct result of the number of mercury-containing amalgam fillings in the
mother, as well as the mother's fish consumption, during pregnancy. Many popular
fish species contain high levels of mercury. These results appear consistent
with the notion that mercury levels in women of child-bearing age are already
dangerously high. Thimerosal-containing infant vaccines can then push vulnerable
children over the edge.
"This study provides the clearest proof we have seen so far," said Sallie
Bernard, executive director of Safe Minds, "that small differences in mercury
exposure and detoxification ability can drive huge differences in the brain
development of small children. Recent studies sponsored by vaccine health
officials that have attempted to reassure parents about the safety of so-called
"low dose" mercury exposures from vaccines have completely failed to assess
individual sensitivity to this neurotoxin. It only takes one child in 100 to
have reduced excretion capacity and you can have an epidemic of neurological
disease on your hands."
Safe Minds renews its call for action based on this latest report. The group
calls for the following measures.
-- The NIH must implement and fund the Institute of Medicine (news - web
sites)'s research recommendations on thimerosal, mercury and neuro-developmental
disorders, including autism.
-- The CDC must be removed from any supervisory role in vaccine safety research.
Such research should be undertaken by independent researchers without ties to
the CDC or to vaccine manufacturers.
-- The Food and Drug Administration (news - web sites) (FDA) should issue an
immediate recall of all thimerosal-containing vaccines. The FDA and the World
Health Organization (news - web sites) should require the immediate production
of thimerosal-free formulations and the investments in sterile production
required to make these vaccines safe.
-- The Bush administration should hold a summit on the autism epidemic and
encourage large-scale investigation into the environmental causes of autism, a
public health crisis that dwarfs the threats from infectious diseases like SARS
(news - web sites) and the West Nile virus (news - web sites).
-- The CDC should make available its internal data from vaccine safety records
to independent researchers in order to investigate the likely role of thimerosal
in causing neurodevelopmental disorders in children exposed to
thimerosal-containing vaccines.
Safe Minds (Sensible Action For Ending Mercury Induced Neurological Disorders)
is a non-profit parents organization founded to investigate the continuing risks
to infants and children of exposure to mercury from medical products, including
thimerosal in vaccines. Its Web site is http://www.safeminds.org.
http://www.usnewswire.com/
-0-
/B) 2003 U.S. Newswire 202-347-2770/
Web Site: ScienceDaily Magazine
Page URL: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/1999/09/990909080318.htm
Original Source: American Chemical Society
Date Posted: 1999-09-09
Researchers say they have found the first evidence that mercury can circumvent the blood-brain barrier that usually prevents such toxins from entering the brain. Their studies were with brown and rainbow trout - two of the most popular species for anglers and fish consumers - but may have implications for humans and other species as well, they say. The study was carried out by researchers at Canada's Maurice Lamontagne Institute and the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences and is published in the October 1 issue of Environmental Science and Technology, a peer-reviewed publication of the American Chemical Society, the world's largest scientific society.
The researchers found that mercury dissolved in lake and river water can enter the nerves that connect water-exposed sensory receptors (for odor, taste, vibration and touch) to the fishes' brains. It can go directly to the brain, they say, circumventing the blood-brain barrier, a nearly impermeable membrane that prevents most toxins from reaching the brain. They also say this is the first study concerning mercury levels in fish brains (as opposed to levels accumulated in other body areas) and the first time it has been established that mercury can enter fish brains through sensory receptors and their connected nerves.
Mercury's toxic effects on fish and human brains are well established. Fish depend on their nervous systems to find food, communicate, migrate, orient themselves and recognize predators. Dissolved mercury usually is taken in by fish through their gills and dispersed by blood as it circulates through the body. In most cases, little mercury accumulates in the brain, which is protected by the blood-brain barrier. However, mercury that does accumulate, having passed through the bloodstream or through nerves, is concentrated in specific sites connected to primary sensory nerves critical to the function of the nervous system.
"Considering the importance of complex behavior in the life of fish, and the well-known deleterious effects of mercury upon the nervous system, the toxicological significance of this uptake route needs to be assessed," said Claude Rouleau, Ph.D., a research scientist at Environment Canada's National Water Research Institute and the study's primary investigator (Rouleau did the work at the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, Uppsala, and completed it for publication while at the Maurice Lamontagne Institute-Department of Fisheries and Oceans Canada, in Mont-Joli, Quebec). "The accumulation of mercury or other toxic chemicals in the brain via water-exposed nerve terminals may result in an alteration of these functions and jeopardize fish survival. We believe that uptake of metals such as mercury and the subsequent transport along sensory nerves is a process common to all fish species, and in this respect, it is possible that other toxins (such as pesticides) also could reach fish brains in this way and this is a subject worthy of further study."
Rouleau also said that while chemicals in the brains of such fish may not have direct human implications (people generally don't eat fish brains), the survival of these species does affect humans. "However, the fact that mercury is transported along fish nerves can be extrapolated to humans, as nerve transport also occurs in mammals, including humans," said Rouleau. "Thus, mercury and other toxins could possibly accumulate in human brains via nerve transport." Earlier research has shown that manganese, cadmium and mercury can be taken through the nasal mucosa of rodents and transported to the brain through the olfactory nerves.
The study's other main investigator was Professor Hans Tjalve of the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences.
The accumulated mercury was located by whole-body autoradiography (used by the pharmaceutical industry to see how drugs are distributed throughout the body). Fish were exposed to radioactive mercury, frozen, then cut into very thin slices. The slices were exposed to X-ray film for varying amounts of time - a few weeks to a few months.
The film blackened only in areas where the radioactive metal was present. The method is particularly useful for obtaining information on fragile organs or tissues, such as fish brains.
Note: This story has been adapted from a news release issued by American Chemical Society.
by Richard Prior
Staff Writer
The parents have pictures of their son on his first birthday, pushing a tiny
handful of cake into his mouth.
Now, four and a half years later, he won’t touch cake.
One 4-year-old girl kept biting her lip until it bled.
Other children shriek unexpectedly.
Some had been learning new words and were figuring out how to string sentences
together. “Now you get a mumbling, or no response at all,” said Alan Pickert.
“You might get a word or two. They might say their name, and that’s it.”
Pickert, an attorney with Brown, Terrell, Hogan, claims at least 36 children in
Jacksonville are the victims of a “devastating one-two punch” of mercury
poisoning that will leave them incapacitated for life.
Punch one, Pickert said, came from a preservative used to prolong the shelf life
of vaccines. Punch two, he added, are the thousands of pounds of mercury
expelled over time from JEA’s fossil fuel-burning facilities, particularly at
the Northside Generating Station. Pickert has mailed, or is mailing, about two
dozen letters of intent to file complaints to officials with JEA and the City.
The letters are required to be sent six months in advance of potential filings.
No such letters have been sent to the pharmaceutical companies, he said,
“because it’s not required by the statute, and they know what they’ve been
doing.”
Repeated phone calls to the JEA offices were unanswered. Heather Murphy,
spokesperson for the mayor’s office, said the General Counsel’s Office should
respond to inquiries about the letters of intent. There was no reply to those
requests.
Pickert’s 36 clients, all between the ages of 4 and 7, began life as normal
infants, he said. They progressed normally until they were between 30 and 36
months old, when they began regressing, “By the time they’re 3 and a half, 4,
they’ve been diagnosed as fully autistic, or having gastrointestinal disease . .
. autoimmune disorder, or some other type of neurological injuries or mercury
poisoning,” he said. “That is from accumulative doses of the mercury, from the
vaccinations and from the fossil-burning facilities.”
In 1988, the autism rate in the United States was one in every 25,000 children,
Pickert said. By 2002, the rate was one in every 250.
“So the question is, what has happened to get us to that point?” he asked.
Studies and a series of investigations have pointed the finger at mercury, he
said. During the late 1980s, Pickert said, several “pharmaceutical giants,”
including E.I. Lily and Merck began shipping some of their vaccines in gallon
containers in addition to individual vials. “The physician could pop the top and
draw the vaccine out,” said Pickert. “It would be more convenient. “The only
problem is, once you unsealed it, how do you keep it fresh? So they added this
preservative called thimerosal. But thimerosal, unbelievably, is comprised of
49.6 percent mercury.”
A growing number of articles have been published, condemning the effects of
mercury on children. A study of 300 children conducted by Dr. Mark R. Geier
evaluated the “doses of mercury that children received from
thimerosal-containing vaccine, as part of the “routine U.S. childhood
immunization schedule.” “This study provides strong epidemiological evidence for
a link between increasing mercury from thimerosal-containing childhood vaccines
and neurodevelopment disorders and heart disease,” Geier wrote in the spring
2003 edition of the Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons.
The U.S. House Committee on Government Reform issued a report in May attacking
federal agencies for being negligent in not addressing the danger of thimerosal
in vaccines. “Upon a thorough review of the scientific literature and internal
documents from government and industry, the committee did in fact find evidence
that thimerosal posed a risk,” according to the Subcommittee on Human Rights and
Wellness. “Mercury is hazardous to humans. Its use in medicinal products is
undesirable, unnecessary and should be minimized or eliminated entirely,” the
report added. Although pharmaceutical companies have said they no longer use
thimerosal, Pickert said, none has issued a recall.
Pickert said he has recommended that parents ask pediatricians for vaccines from
individual vials.
According to a point source mercury emission report, JEA’s Northside facility
put 2,985 pounds of mercury in the air in 1997. The level was 289 pounds in
2000. Pickert doesn’t know how far the emissions’ reach is, but, “almost without
fail, a client can see a fossil-burning facility from their home. I’ve got some
clients who live right in the shadows of Northside.
“It’s a devastating one-two punch.” Pickert said his intention is not to shut
down JEA or force it to turn to alternative fuels.
“There are fossil-burning facilities throughout the U.S. that are not producing
these large quantities of mercury in the atmosphere,” he said. “If it can be
done at other facilities, it can be done here.” When parents are told to take
their children for scheduled vaccinations, they do it “because they assume
everybody is doing their job,” said Pickert. “Your pediatrician, the FDA, the
pharmaceutical giants. I dare you to find anybody who would hear, ‘I want to
inject your child with this vaccine, which, by the way, contains 50 percent
mercury,’ who would say, ‘OK.’ “What makes this sadder is the children were
normal. So the parents got a glimpse of what their child could be in life. And
now they’ve got a child who’s going to be injured for the rest of their life.”
Waste from old mines poisoning state's fish
Mother Loads of Mercury
[From the Sacramento Bee by Anne Chadwick Williams.]
http://www.sacbee.com/content/news/story/7629520p-8570113c.html
Abbott-Turkey Run Mine -- The Gold Rush spirit still lingers in the air of
this 130-year-old quicksilver mine, where prospectors once extracted mercury and
then hauled it to the Sierra for the processing of gold. But history isn't the
only thing that oozes from this abandoned Lake County mine. Every time it rains,
toxic mercury gushes from a mountain of spent
ore and dumps into nearby Cache Creek. From there it flows to the Sacramento
River, adding to the contamination that taints fish from the Sierra to the San
Francisco Bay.
One of an estimated 30,000 abandoned mines statewide, the Abbott-Turkey
Run mine is a mother lode of mercury.
It is hardly the only one. Across Northern California, thousands of mines,
creeks and reservoirs are polluted with mercury, a potent neurotoxin that
continues to bleed into the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, fouling the food chain
of
the West Coast's largest estuary.
State and federal authorities have known about the problem for decades,
but because of funding constraints and other priorities, they are just starting
to assess the possible risks to people and wildlife. High levels of mercury
have been found in bass and other sports fish. But health officials haven't
studied whether certain groups, particularly immigrants who get much of their
protein from fish they catch themselves, are consuming toxic amounts.
"Mercury is like the crazy aunt that California has kept in the closet all
these years," said Bill Jennings, head of the Deltakeeper environmental group.
"The gold miners probably had no idea of the legacy they were leaving behind.
Now, no one wants to acknowledge it exists." Used for centuries in mining and
other industries, mercury is not just a theoretical threat. In the mid-1900s,
fish laden with industrial mercury poisoned more than 10,000 people over several
years in Minamata Bay, Japan,
killing 46 and incapacitating hundreds. Toxicologists note that the fish
consumed in Minamata were far more
contaminated than anything found in California. Even so, experts say there are
enormous uncertainties over what constitutes a "safe level" of mercury, and what
could happen as mercury drains down into the Delta and beyond.
Some studies have shown that even commonplace levels of mercury in
fish can impair brain function in children and developing fetuses, according to Dr. Robert Brodberg, a
toxicologist with the California Environmental Protection
Agency. "There is a huge gray area where symptoms begin," said Brodberg. That's
why state and federal agencies urge women of childbearing age to curb their
consumption of certain fish, he said. Wary of the risks, state lawmakers
and regulators recently have cracked
down on minute amounts of mercury found in lamps, batteries and sewage effluent.
Attorney General Bill Lockyer has sued grocery stores that don't warn consumers
about mercury in seafood. Even crematoriums are being investigated for
releasing mercury -- contained in dental fillings -- from their smokestacks.
Despite these efforts, some scientists say California has yet to tackle its
largest source of mercury: the mining waste that lingers from the Gold Rush.
"The question is, how long do we wait before we start to remediate the
problem?" said Chris Foe, senior scientist for the Central Valley Regional Water
Control Board. In recent years, Foe and other scientists have launched several
important studies to assess mercury contamination in Northern California, but
cleanup efforts have been sporadic, he said. Part of the problem is the
vast scope of this toxic inheritance. Soon after gold was discovered at Sutter's
Mill in 1848, prospectors and mining
companies started digging mercury ore from about 240 mines statewide, mostly in
the coastal range. The ore was baked in primitive furnaces to render the liquid quicksilver.
Although some was shipped off to Asia, most of the mercury was carted to an
estimated 13,500 gold mines in the Sierra and other parts of the state. There,
it was poured into hand-hewn sluices and "stamp mills" to separate the gold from
the ore, according to Ron Churchill, a senior geologist for the
California Geological Survey.
Churchill estimates that, because of the crude methods, 8.5 million pounds
of mercury was "lost" to the environment during the Gold Rush, mostly in streams
of Northern California. Even today, divers can find nickel-size globules of
quicksilver on the
bottom of Sierra streams. "It seems to be ubiquitous in streams that were
subject to gold mining," said Rick Humphreys, a geologist with the State Water
Resources Control Board.
Although worrisome, such blobs of elemental mercury aren't the direct
cause of mercury-tainted fish. That's because the globules are in an inorganic
form that can't easily be taken up by plants and other organisms. As the
mercury moves downstream, however, natural bacteria convert it into an organic
form -- methylmercury -- that moves readily up the food chain.
"Methylation is a critical step in turning mercury into a human health risk,"
said Charles Alpers, a mercury specialist with the U.S. Geological Survey in
Sacramento. Often this transformation occurs in wetlands and reservoirs, he
said, where low-oxygen conditions breed the kind of bacteria that turn raw
mercury into its more dangerous cousin.
Since the early 1990s, scattershot testing has found high levels of
methylmercury in the Delta, the San Francisco Bay and seven lakes and creeks in
Northern California as well as in Lake Nacimiento in San Luis Obispo County.
Formal state advisories have been issued for all these waterways, but many are
not posted and anglers are not always aware of the possible risks.
On any given weekend, thousands of boaters and shoreline anglers converge
on the Delta, many fishing for striped bass. Although old-timers say they eat
little of their catch, the same is not true for newcomers. On a recent weekday,
Bob Lau could be found fishing at Brannan Island State Recreation Area near Rio
Vista. As a red sun rose over the Delta, Lau
baited his hook and set about trying to catch bass. Lau, a recent immigrant who
lives in the Bay Area, said he regularly
catches fish from the Delta and brings them home to his family. But he hadn't
heard about pollution warnings. "Mercury?" asked Lau in halting English. "I don't know what that is."
State health officials say they are working on education programs for anglers,
but to be effective, such efforts must cover a wide chunk of the state.
Preliminary tests also have found high levels of mercury in Lake Natoma
near Folsom, Far West Reservoir in Yuba County, and parts of the Yuba and
Feather rivers. One bass from the Feather had mercury levels of 4 parts per
million -- four times higher than the level considered safe by the U.S. Food and
Drug Administration. State authorities say, over time, they expect to find many
more places where people should either limit their consumption of fish, or avoid
it altogether.
"Frankly, there are a lot of places in the state, and even here locally,
that haven't been anywhere near to adequately monitored," said Brodberg, the
state EPA toxicologist. Critics say the problem is compounded by the fragmented
nature of the
many agencies that have responsibility over waterborne pollutants. In
California, the cleanup of mines falls under the jurisdiction of the federal EPA
and at least two state agencies. Cal-EPA sets health advisories on consumption
but depends on county health departments to post warning signs and educate
anglers.
Much of the ongoing research on mercury is being funded by a state-federal
consortium called Cal-Fed, which itself has come under fire for ignoring water
quality concerns in the Delta. In recent years, Cal-Fed has been buying
Delta farmland and starting to restore thousands of acres back into tidal
marshes, despite studies that show new wetlands could convert raw mercury into
methylmercury.
"Unfortunately, one of the things Cal-Fed has done, not intentionally, is
create marshes below major mercury sources -- in the Yolo Bypass, in the
Cosumnes River and below the Mount Diablo mine," said Foe. "That means we need
to reduce, to the maximum extent possible, the loads of mercury coming into the
system." It won't be an easy job. According to state officials, it probably would cost billions to clean up
just some of the 240 mercury mines in the Coastal Range alone. Some are spread
over hundreds of acres, with unmapped tunnels that continue to feed mercury to
creeks and natural springs.
One of these is the Abbott-Turkey Run mine near Clear Lake, which was
mined for a century, then abandoned in 1970. Scientists say it is the largest
single mercury polluter in the Cache Creek basin, which itself is the largest
source of mercury in the lower Sacramento River. On a recent Friday, Churchill,
the state geologist, paid a visit to the
orphaned mine. Walking uphill from Highway 20, Churchill passed a massive mound
of mining tailings that unleash mercury with every storm. Farther uphill, he
hiked into a weathered wood-and-metal shack, which houses a rusty, 60-foot-long
furnace where miners used to roast the ore. Churchill marveled at the
historic furnace, then grimaced when asked if
contractors could easily staunch pollution from the mine. "There's nothing cheap
about any of this," said Churchill, wiping his
brow. With several million dollars, he said, contractors possibly could build a
system of pipes and culverts to shunt rainwater away from the mine tailings.
New vegetation could be planted to staunch erosion, or ponds could be built to
intercept the runoff. "But you can't just fix a site and walk away from
it," said Churchill. "Who is going to do the maintenance? And who will pay for
it over the long
haul?" Even if California were flush with funds, state officials are unsure
whether they could clean up mines on private property without being tripped up
by liability problems.
In 1978, the East Bay Municipal Utility District sought state help in
controlling acid runoff from an abandoned mine it had acquired in Calaveras
County. EBMUD and the California Regional Water Quality Control Board built a
series of holding ponds at the Penn Mine, which reduced the toxic runoff but
didn't eliminate it. Environmentalists sued. The regional water board and
EBMUD lost. Then, the federal EPA ordered both parties to clean up the entire
site, even though
they weren't responsible for the original pollution. Since then, state and
local agencies have been leery of tackling
pollution from mines on private property. "They fear they will get stuck with
another lawsuit," said Humphreys, with the State Water Resources Control Board.
Unsure about their latitude in cleaning up mines, state and federal authorities
are weighing other approaches to counter this legacy of the Gold Rush.
Alpers and other USGS scientists are examining whether pumping oxygen into
reservoirs would reduce the methylation of mercury. Churchill is studying
whether a catchment basin near Woodland could be enlarged to intercept mercury
that regularly washes into the Yolo Bypass from the Cache Creek mines. Cal-Fed
has $17 million it can use as a down payment for such projects. "But if you look
at all the abandoned mines all over the watershed, $17 million won't go very
far," said Donna Podger, a mercury program manager for Cal-Fed.
Given the scope of the problem, and the limited funds, scientists and
regulators are wrestling with how to get the biggest "bang for the buck." Some
want an aggressive program of cleaning up mines. Others want to focus on the
sites where mercury is being converted into methylmercury. Still others suggest
the best strategy is simply to warn anglers that the fish they catch may be
tainted, since there is no easy engineering fix. Compounding this debate is the
question of what will happen in the
future. Will mercury contamination stay at current levels? Or will it intensify,
turning a lingering problem into a public health crisis? "We don't know what is going to happen over time," said Brodberg. "But it
is well known that mercury has these effects on the nervous system and brain
development. So we want less mercury in the environment. We don't want
more."
* *
What you need to know about mercury
What is methylmercury?
Methylmercury is an organic form of mercury easily taken up by
microorganisms and passed up the food chain from fish to people. Natural
processes in lakes and rivers convert mercury into methylmercury.
How does mercury get into the environment?
Some mercury is natural, coming from volcanoes and geothermal vents. In
the United States, coal-fired power plants are the largest human source. Mercury
falls into waterways and is converted into methylmercury. In California,
the largest source is leftover mercury from the Gold Rush.
What is the threat?
Methylmercury attacks the central nervous system. At high
enough levels, it can result in loss of
coordination, blurred vision, blindness and hearing and speech impairment.
It is especially dangerous for children and
developing fetuses.
How can I be exposed to methylmercury?
The main exposure is from eating fish that have built up the toxin. Fish
high on the food chain, such as swordfish, sharks and bass, tend to have the
highest levels. The Food and Drug Administration advises pregnant women and
women of childbearing age not to eat more than 12 ounces of store-bought fish
weekly and to avoid eating fish they catch themselves.
Is drinking water a threat?
No. Methylmercury levels in drinking water are extremely low.
Has anyone been poisoned by mercury-laden fish in California? Authorities have
found no cases of poisoning yet, but they haven't
launched a full investigation.
Where can I get more information?
The state Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment posts
advisories on mercury. The Web site is
www.oehha.ca.gov/fish/hg/.
Sources: U.S. Environmental Protection Agency; California Office of
Environmental Health Hazard Assessment
* * *
http://timesargus.nybor.com/Local/Story/76835.html
Mercury labeling expected to have national impact
January 3, 2004
--
The Associated Press
BURLINGTON - Manufacturers have started labeling fluorescent lamps to be sold in
Vermont as containing mercury to abide by Vermont's first-in-the-nation mercury
labeling law.
The move is expected to have a national impact.
Lamp makers who lost their battle last summer against the state's law have
submitted final, state-approved labeling plans and should be labeling the lamps
they manufacture for eventual sale, said Karen Busshart, mercury project
coordinator at the Vermont Department of Environmental Conservation.
"The plan they've submitted is certified and we believe they want to comply with
the law," Busshart said.
The 1998 law was designed, in part, to increase recycling of mercury-containing
products that are banned from state landfills.
Mercury makes its way into air and water, where it can accumulate in fish flesh
and pose health threats to people who eat the fish. Women of childbearing age
and children are most at risk.
The law was the first in the nation to require labels on products containing
mercury, including thermostats, switches, thermometers and fluorescent light
bulbs.
The labels will reach beyond Vermont because manufacturers are unable to sort
Vermont-bound products from those sold in other states.
The change hasn't been easy for manufacturers, said Peter Bleasby, director of
industry relations for Osram Sylvania, which has its headquarters in Danvers,
Mass.
"This was not a trivial exercise," Bleasby said of the labeling process, which
included changing the packaging on all of the company's fluorescent and other
mercury-containing lamp products. "We're looking at multimillion-dollar
exercises."
To comply with the law, lamp makers, such as Osram Sylvania, are including
labeling that features the chemical symbol for mercury, "Hg." Language that says
"contains mercury," is also included in the packaging, said Bleasby.
"Probably the first lamps and packaging came out in the middle of the year," he
said. Lamp packaging also will explain how to properly dispose of lamps and list
a Web site and toll-free number for more information on how to do so. The rules
say lamps manufactured after Nov. 30, 2003, must be labeled so they will be in
compliance for sale in Vermont.
GARDNERVILLE, Nevada (AP) -- A middle school will remain closed at least through
the end of the week as hazardous materials crews continued decontaminating it
after a student brought a quarter-cup of mercury to the school. Pau-Wa-Lu Middle
School, 50 miles south of Reno, was closed Tuesday after it was discovered that
the student brought the toxic metal to school and that
other children joined in playing with it.
Several students handled the mercury on the bus to school and the substance was
spilled in several areas on campus. About 60 children exposed to the
mercury were isolated from other classmates Tuesday and were given showers and
changes of clothes. State and federal environmental and health experts said
there's little risk the children will suffer any ill effects from the exposure.
Even so, local physicians were alerted to watch for symptoms of mercury
poisoning. Exposure to high levels of elemental mercury vapor can result in
nervous system damage, including tremors, and mood and personality alterations,
according
to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, which sent an emergency response
team to the site late Tuesday.
Officials said Wednesday it was unclear where or how the student obtained the
mercury, but he could face possible charges for reckless endangerment if it's
determined he was aware of the risks the mercury posed.
(does this mean we can charge our pediatrician with reckless
endangerment?)
http://msnbc.msn.com/id/4192679/
EPA doubles mercury risk in newborns
New estimate based on levels in umbilical cord blood
By Guy Gugliotta
Updated: 12:42 p.m. ET Feb. 06, 2004
WASHINGTON - A new government analysis nearly doubled the estimate of the
number of newborn children at risk for health problems because of unsafe
mercury levels in their blood. Environmental Protection Agency scientists
said yesterday that new research had shown that 630,000 U.S. newborns had
unsafe levels of mercury in their blood in 1999-2000.
('The key factor in the revised estimates is research showing
differences in mercury levels in the blood of pregnant women and their unborn
children. In a Jan. 26 presentation at EPA's National Forum on Contaminants
in Fish, in San Diego, EPA biochemist Kathryn R. Mahaffey said researchers in
the last few years had shown that mercury levels in a fetus's umbilical cord
blood are 70 percent higher than those in the mother's blood.
"We have long known that the effects of methyl mercury on the fetal nervous
system are more serious" than on adults, Mahaffey said in a telephone
interview yesterday. "But we did not routinely measure [umbilical] cord
blood. We had thought that the mother and the fetus had the same level."
Jane Houlihan, a vice president of the Environmental Working Group, noted
that the study "for the first time . . . calculated the number based on
children's blood levels, not mothers'. The EPA analysis is showing that even
if even if the mother is below the danger zone, she can give birth to a baby
that's over the limit."
Concerns, advisories
Mercury, a heavy metal, is a highly toxic substance that can seriously damage
neurological tissue. Poisoning can lead to learning disabilities, lower
intelligence and overall sluggishness. Fetuses, infants and young children
are especially vulnerable. Recent advisories from EPA and the Food and Drug
Administration have cautioned pregnant women on the dangers of eating tuna
and other large predatory fish and shellfish, whose tissues absorb elevated
levels of mercury.
EPA has said the largest U.S. sources of mercury contamination are coal-fired
power plants, whose annual atmospheric emissions contain 48 tons of mercury.
Much of it drifts into the ocean.
The Bush administration is proposing a new regulation requiring power plants
to cut mercury emissions 29 percent by 2007 and 70 percent by 2018.
Environmental advocates say the industry can achieve significantly deeper
reductions.
Study background
Mahaffey, a top scientist in EPA's Office of Prevention, Pesticides and Toxic
Substances, said she began developing her new estimates of the number of
infants at risk by studying research published last year from New Jersey and
Maine. The information helped her revise the formula used to extract data
from a survey conducted by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in
1999-2000 on mercury levels in pregnant women's blood.
The new formula showed that one out of six pregnant women had mercury levels
in their blood of at least 3.5 parts per billion, sufficient for levels in
the fetus to reach or surpass the EPA's safety threshold of 5.8 parts per
billion. In 1999-2000, the last year for which government data is available,
this meant that 630,000 children were at risk instead of the original
estimate of 320,000.
http://www.aap.org/policy/t109907.html
Organic Mercury Compounds
Sources
Organic compounds include methylmercury, ethylmercury, and phenylmercury. All
3 of these agents have been produced as industrial compounds, primarily as
biocides, and some have been marketed as pesticides. Organic mercury
compounds are also found in 2 once-common household antiseptics:
Mercurochrome (merbromin) and Merthiolate (thimerosal). Methylmercury is the
best known, because it is the predominant form of organic mercury found in
the environment. Generally, methylmercury in the environment is formed by
microorganisms from elemental mercury deposited from the air or discharged
into water from natural or human sources. Consumption of fish is the primary
route of exposure to organic mercury for children older than 1 year. The
methylmercury content of fish varies by species and size of fish and harvest
location. The top 10 commercial fish species (canned tuna, shrimp, pollock,
salmon, cod, catfish, clams, flatfish, crabs, and scallops), which represent
about 85% of the seafood market, contain a mean mercury level of
approximately 0.1 µg/g. Methylmercury has been used as a fungicide on seed
grains and is also an industrial waste. When grain accidentally treated with
a mercury fungicide was eaten by people in Iraq during a famine in the
1970s, mercury poisoning occurred in hundreds of people.18
Ethylmercury, in the form of thimerosal, was formerly used as a topical
antiseptic and has also been used as an effective preservative for killed
vaccines and other biological agents for medical therapy. Thimerosal contains
49.6% mercury by weight and is metabolized to ethylmercury and thiosalicylate.
Before fall 1999, there was 25 µg of mercury in each 0.5-mL dose of most
diphtheria and tetanus toxoids and acellular pertussis vaccines as well as
some Haemophilus influenzae type b, influenza, meningococcal, pneumococcal,
and rabies vaccines. In addition, there was 12.5 µg of mercury in each dose
of the hepatitis B vaccine. The reference doses* established by federal
agencies were between 0.1and 0.4 µg/kg/d.6,19 Assuming that the toxicity of
ethylmercury is similar to that of methylmercury, the exposure from a single
vaccination could potentially exceed federal guidelines for that day and,
with routine immunization, a cumulative dose of up to 75 µg of mercury by 3
months of age and 187.5 µg by 6 months of age could have been received. As a
precautionary measure, the Academy, along with the American Academy of Family
Physicians, the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, and the US
Public Health Service issued a joint
recommendation that thimerosal be removed from vaccines as quickly as
possible.2,20 Currently, all vaccines in the recommended childhood
immunization schedule do not contain thimerosal as a preservative.
In the United States, phenylmercury (phenylmercuric nitrate or acetate) was
used in latex paint as a pesticide (to prevent mildew growth on walls) and as
a paint preservative (to prevent paint discoloration from growth of
microorganisms). Phenylmercury and ethylmercury continue to be used as
bacteriostatic agents for various topical pharmacologic preparations.
Dimethylmercury, a form oforganic mercury used only in research laboratories,
is highly toxic, causing death after extremely small exposures.21,22
Thimerosal used to irrigate the external auditory canals in a child with
tympanostomy tubes has caused severe
mercury poisoning.23
Absorption, Metabolism, and Excretion
Most organic mercury compounds are readily absorbed by ingestion and
inhalation and through the skin, except for phenylmercury, which is not well
absorbed after ingestion or dermal contact. In general, organic mercury
compounds are lipid soluble, and 90% to 100% is absorbed from the
gastrointestinal tract. They appear in the lipid fraction of blood and brain
tissue. Organic mercury readily crosses the blood-brain barrier and also
crosses the placenta. Fetal blood mercury levels are equal to or higher than
maternal levels. Methylmercury appears in human milk. The mean half-life for
methylmercury in blood is 40 to 50 days (range: 20-70 days) for adults.3,24
Ninety percent of methylmercury is excreted through bile in feces.
Phenylmercury is rapidly metabolized. Its effects are similar to those of
mercury salts.
Toxicity
The toxicity of organic mercury compounds is dependent on specific compound,
route of exposure, dose, and age of the person at exposure. Organic mercury
compounds are most toxic in the CNS, though the kidneys and immune system may
also be affected.3,4,25 Generally, methylmercury and ethylmercury are more
toxic than phenylmercury, because they are metabolized more slowly in vivo.
Signs of toxicity from acute exposure progress from paresthesias and ataxia
to generalized weakness, visual and hearing impairment, and tremor and muscle
spasticity to coma and death.
In the developing brain, methylmercury is toxic to the cerebral and
cerebellar cortex, causing focal necrosis of neurons and destruction of glial
cells. Methylmercury is a known teratogen in the fetal brain; it interferes
with neuronal migration and the organization of brain nuclei and layering of
the cortical neurons. In the Minamata Bay disaster and the Iraq epidemic,
mothers who were asymptomatic or showed mild toxic effects gave birth to
severely affected infants. Typically, infants appeared normal at birth, but
psychomotor retardation, blindness, deafness, and seizures developed
throughout time.24
Because the fetus is more susceptible to the neurotoxic effects of
methylmercury, investigators have sought to identify subclinical effects
among children whose mothers' diets include large amounts of methylmercury
and whose levels are higher than are commonly seen in the United States.
There have been 3 extensive studies, including the Iraq seed grain cohort and
2 prospective
epidemiologic studies, 1 in the Seychelles and 1 in the Faroe Islands. The
Iraq study involved higher exposures and less sensitive measures of
neurodevelopmental outcome, compared with the other 2 studies. In that study,
motor retardation was seen in children whose mothers had hair mercury levels
in the range of 10 to 20 parts per million (ppm).18,24,26
Studies were conducted in the Faroe Islands and Seychelles to obtain a
prospective measure of mercury exposure to and toxicity in children. These 2
studies are providing important information for assessing the hazards of oral
methylmercury exposure to children. The Faroe Islands are located southeast
of Iceland in the Norwegian Sea. They are inhabited by a homogeneous and
isolated population of people who consume small amounts of fish (1-3 meals of
cod per week) and have episodic feasts of pilot whale. The fish have very low
mercury concentrations, but pilot whale meat has a mean content of
methylmercury of 1.9 ppm. The Faroe Islands study enrolled 700 mother and
infant pairs at birth and monitored mercury levels in mothers' hair and cord
blood, children's hair at 12 and 84 months of age, children's blood at 84
months of age, and neurodevelopmental measures of multifocal, domain-related
effects in children at 84 months of age.27 The Seychelles are equatorial
islands in the Indian Ocean inhabited by a stable, cohesive, and homogeneous
population of people who eat fish frequently (mean, 12 fish meals per week).
The fish have relatively low methylmercury concentrations (mean, < 0.3 ppm).
The Seychelles study enrolled 740 mother and infant pairs at birth and
monitored mercury levels in mothers' hair and in children's hair at 6, 19,
and 66 months of age as well as standardized measures of global
neurobehavioral function of children at these times.28
There are important similarities and differences between the 2 studies. Both
studies included a range of oral mercury exposures that are very relevant to
the US population. Mean mercury levels in mothers' hair were 6.8 ppm (range:
0.5-27 ppm) in the Seychelles and 4.3 ppm (range: 0.2-39.1 ppm) in the Faroe
Islands. There are no population-based data for the United States, but most
US population samples that have been analyzed fall below 1 ppm. The pattern
of methylmercury consumption is different, with the Seychelles pattern being
more constant and the Faroe Islands pattern being more episodic. Also, pilot
whales consumed in the Faroe Islands contain not only methylmercury but also
polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), which are known to have an adverse effect
on neurodevelopment of children.29 The Faroe Islands study included
measurements of PCB levels and controlled for PCBs as a potential confounding
variable in addition to variables controlled for in both studies.
Results from the Faroe Islands study suggested that exposure in utero to
mercury at lower levels is associated with subtle adverse effects on the
developing brain (highest mercury levels in hair and cord blood were 39.1 ppm
and 351 parts per billion, respectively). Memory, attention, and language
tests were inversely associated with higher methylmercury exposures in
children up to 7 years of age, even after controlling for PCB exposures.27
Motor function and visual spatial ability were less clearly associated with
methylmercury exposure. Adverse effects on development or IQ have not been
found in the Seychelles study at up to 66 months of age, although exposures
were in the same range as the Faroe Islands study.28
A workshop convened by the White House in 1998 found that the Seychelles and
Faroe Island studies were well-conducted prospective cohort studies that
included appropriate measures of exposure to methylmercury and sensitive
developmental endpoints.30 The workshop noted differences between findings in
the studies in that, to date in the Seychelles study, effects have not been
observed, whereas in the Faroe Islands study, effects have been observed at
the same dosage levels. There are a number of potential explanations
for this difference, including episodic versus continuous exposure, ethnic
differences in response to methylmercury, or lack of common endpoints in the
2 studies as well as other differences, for example, lifestyle, nutrient
intake, or contaminants found in seafood. Both studies measured and could
control for a number of important lifestyle factors (ie, smoking,
breastfeeding, alcohol use, and socioeconomic status). The Faroe Islands and
Seychelles studies are continuing to follow the children throughout time and
intend to provide a long-term developmental evaluation. In 1998, Congress
directed the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) to carry out a study of
methylmercury toxicity to provide recommendations on exposure limits.19 The
study was completed in June 2000 and concluded that, at this time, results of
the Faroe Islands study should be used to establish a reference dose for
mercury of 0.1 µg/kg/d.
One question that is raised by the difference in findings between the
Seychelles and Faroe Islands studies is whether bolus doses of methylmercury
administered during sensitive time periods are more likely to cause
neurodevelopmental damage than the same doses given cumulatively throughout a
time period of several months. This is an issue that needs to be further
evaluated in epidemiologic studies or toxicity experiments, because it cannot
be resolved within these 2 studies alone.
Ethylmercury, although it may have similar toxicity to methylmercury, has
been less studied. When vaccines containing thimerosal have been administered
in recommended doses, hypersensitivity has been noted.31 Very high exposures
to thimerosal-containing products—as components of intramuscular injections,
used for painting omphaloceles, as a preservative in -globulin
administered at high-doses or for a long period of time, or as intentionally
ingested—have resulted in toxicity, including acrodynia, chronic mercury
toxicity, renal failure, and neuropathy.32-36 In an assay of chronic effects
in rats, ethylmercury exposure resulted in renal and neurotoxicity in mature
rats similar to exposure to methylmercury.37 Follow-up studies in infants on
the neurodevelopmental toxicity of ethylmercury in vaccines were done by the
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) using data from the Vaccine
Safety Datalink project. The first study, which was based on the medical
records of 2 managed care organizations, indicated some correlation between
the amount of mercury received in vaccines and the reported diagnoses of
language delays, speech delays, attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder,
unspecified developmental delays, and tics. A subsequent study of the medical
records from a third managed care organization failed to find these
correlations. These 2 studies used data not collected to
evaluate these specific hypotheses and were not conclusive. Additional
studies are now in progress to further evaluate this issue.38 However,
although such postmarket studies can provide information about the occurrence
of frank
developmental delays, they would not be expected to detect small subclinical
alterations in cognitive function that were reported in the Faroe Islands
study.
Posted on Tue, Mar. 16, 2004
Mercury as Folk Potion Sickens Users, Pollutes New Jersey Waterways
By Lindy Washburn, The Record, Hackensack, N.J. Knight Ridder/Tribune
Business News
Mar. 14 - The voodoo priest sits in a room lighted by burning candles, where
masks and saints, liquor bottles, and a bowl of money are arranged on altars.
Azogue is a toxic and dangerous substance, he begins.
He explains its allures: It speeds the magical effects of spells cast for the
loveless, the luckless, and the sick, some believe. It is a talisman to the
gambler, a protector against the evil eye. Some sprinkle it in rooms, cars --
even baby cribs -- for protection.
Azogue is quicksilver -- mercury.
It is poison.
It is a poison that lowers children's academic performance and increases
their behavior problems. In Hudson County, it contaminated the air in one in
five apartment buildings surveyed for a recent study. So many people have
been exposed to it that health officials have detected it in the sewage
flowing into New York Harbor.
And it is widely available in the botanicas, or folk pharmacies, of Latino
and Caribbean communities in New Jersey, where a tiny glass bottle containing
up to 2 teaspoons usually sells for $3.
The voodoo priest stopped selling it three years ago. But elsewhere, "it
sells a lot, I'm telling you," says Felix Mota, the priest and owner of St.
Barbara Botanica in Passaic. "I used to order 10 or 12 dozen [vials], and it
would be gone in less than two or three months."
Some experts say the widespread use of mercury for folk medicine and ritual
among Hispanic and Haitian immigrants could end up costing millions of
dollars -- for the additional expense of educating affected children and
cleaning up hundreds of contaminated apartments. In Passaic City, Hudson
County, and New York City, the use of mercury is just beginning to come to
the attention of health officials.
"This is not an extremely common event," says Dr. Michael Gochfeld, the
principal investigator of the New Jersey study. "But it's not rare enough
that we can be complacent."
A 2002 study found that indoor air samples in almost one-fifth of the 67
Hudson County apartment buildings tested had elevated levels of mercury and
that nearly all of 22 Hudson County Santeria practitioners and botanica
employees used mercury. Priests of Santeria, a religion practiced by some
Cubans, and voodoo occasionally use mercury in rituals.
A follow-up study this year will systematically check the air inside
apartments and hallways.
The ramifications could be explosive.
Mercury is a potent toxin -- long-lasting, readily spread through droplets
and evaporation, and easily absorbed through the lungs. If inhaled on the
job, it is considered an occupational hazard for which evacuation and
hazardous materials cleanup are required.
In adults, mercury exposure can cause personality changes, tremors, and
damage to a person's lungs, kidneys, and stomach. In children, mercury vapors
easily pass into the brain and nervous system, causing permanent
developmental problems. Children may be slow to walk and talk, less
intelligent, and more susceptible to autism and attention deficit disorder.
In buildings, contamination can last for a decade, as the mercury slowly
evaporates. It is absorbed by porous surfaces: carpets, wood floors, even
concrete.
Most exposure in humans occurs through the diet, by consuming fish with high
levels of methylmercury, a mercury compound.
Arnold Wendroff, a medical sociologist who founded the Mercury Poisoning
Project in Brooklyn, says state, federal, and local officials have failed to
act on a problem that leads to millions of dollars in special-education costs
and will eventually require the evacuation and cleanup of hundreds of
apartments.
There is "a strong probability that large populations are exposed to
developmentally neurotoxic levels of mercury vapor in their dwellings," he
says.
Much of the exposure is to people who have no idea that previous tenants
sprinkled or spilled mercury inside, he says.
"Once you throw that mercury on the floor, it's going to stay there for a
decade," he says. "The metal is absorbed by porous surfaces, and can only be
removed by taking out carpet, wood flooring, and concrete to a thickness of
half an inch.
"No one really wants to address this issue," Wendroff says, "given the
enormity of the political and economic fallout."
The sale of mercury is legal as long as it is properly labeled as a hazardous
substance. Sales in northern New Jersey have been driven underground,
researchers say, because botanica owners think it is illegal or fear they
will be held responsible for spills or harmful consequences.
Still, mercury is readily available. "People buy it a lot!" Mota says.
Researchers say mercury is used in two ways: as part of an organized
religion, such as Santeria, Espiritismo, or voodoo, where priests imbue it
with spiritual power in certain rituals, or in cultural or superstitious
practices in which people believe it brings good luck.
"People buy it to put in candles -- candles for money, for love, to pray for
somebody," Mota says. He used to put a drop of mercury in perfume or bath
oils, to spread over the body for good luck, but he doesn't anymore.
"I tell people, 'Don't use it. It's so dangerous.'"
One woman Mota treated six or seven years ago had swallowed mercury at the
instruction of a santero, a Santeria priest, before she came to the United
States.
Mota says he was recently offered a 10-pound jar of mercury, but he didn't
want to repackage it himself. As a practicing voodoo priest and initiated
santero, he's too busy with private consultations and tarot readings for his
patients. Besides, "Where would I do it? Here? At home where my kids are?"
In a 1996 survey by Montefiore Medical Center of 38 botanicas in the Bronx,
researchers found that the stores sold a minimum of 25,000 vials a year,
nearly half a ton annually in that borough alone.
Urine testing of children who lived in that area found that five of 100
tested had elevated mercury levels -- a percentage similar to the occurrence
of lead poisoning in the same population. The Centers for Disease Control and
Prevention is following up this year with a larger study, of 250 children
living in northern Manhattan and Brooklyn.
A study of pollution in New York Harbor by the New York Academy of Sciences
estimated that mercury from cultural and religious practices totaled about
400 kilograms, or 880 pounds, a year. That equals the amount produced by
coal-fired power plants, which rank nationally as the largest unregulated
source of mercury pollution.
Sewage coming from a neighborhood in northeastern Manhattan showed excessive
amounts of mercury, according to a new study by the New York City Department
of Environmental Protection. Inhaled mercury is usually excreted through
urine and feces.
New Jersey's study of botanicas and apartment buildings was initiated at the
recommendation of Wendroff, who alerted the state Task Force on Mercury in
2001 about the widespread use of mercury among certain ethnic groups.
Wendroff, a former junior high school science teacher in Brooklyn, remembers
the day in 1990 when his interest in the subject began.
"I was teaching a chemistry lesson on mercury, and I asked the kids if they
knew what it was used for," he says. "I expected them to say thermometers.
One of the kids says, 'My mother uses it in Santeria.'"
The boy explained that she sprinkled it on the floor "to keep away the brujas,"
or witches. The boy knew the botanica where she bought it, and agreed to
bring some to school. Two days later, the boy showed up with a capsule.
Wendroff subsequently realized that the boy showed some signs of mercury
poisoning.
Occupational exposure to mercury -- among hatters in 19th century London, for
example -- causes a syndrome called erethism, characterized by anorexia,
irritability, short-term memory loss, and dislike of being observed. "This
kid had all four of them," Wendroff says. "He would put his head on his desk
and invert his loose-leaf notebook over it."
The New Jersey study employed a Santeria priest from New Mexico to interview
practitioners in Hudson County. He reported:
A Colombian santera "lamented the fact that it's now more difficult to sell
mercury ... [She] says that mercury made up an important part of her sales in
the past. She has sold mercury to other Colombians, Mexicans, Cubans, and
North Americans. She keeps it in her house rather than the botanica and
prefers to sell larger quantities as opposed to capsules."
In another shop, owned by a Cuban and Puerto Rican couple, "Mercury capsules
are very cheap in this botanica ($1.50). Their logic is that people won't
report them if they get a bargain."
A Dominican santera "uses elemental mercury and red, yellow, and blue
precipitados [mercury oxides] in secret Santeria rituals." She told the
researcher that "elemental mercury could be sprinkled for good luck or could
be placed in a water goblet [with water and camphor]."
Those interviewed "were unaware of the hazards of mercury," the report says.
They knew it was "bad to touch or play with, [but] no one knew about the
dangers of mercury vapors or the possible effects of long term exposure. The
only 'hazard' they mentioned was the legal trouble they thought you could get
into if you were caught with mercury."
The study also found mercury vapor was "significantly elevated" in 17 percent
of the apartment buildings tested, says Alan Stern, a co-author and head of
the state Department of Environmental Protection's risk analysis bureau. The
study didn't identify a cause. It may be due to cultural use or something as
simple as breaking a thermometer, he says.
Other studies have suggested that local laws be enacted to require that
dwellings be tested for mercury -- and buyers or tenants informed of the
results -- when they are sold, much as some states require radon or lead
testing.
Routine testing of children's mercury levels, as they are currently tested
for lead, may be a good idea in some locales, researchers say.
"We want to protect people's health, and that's the bottom line," Stern says.
The goal "is to convince people that this is not a smart and healthy thing to
do. If we do this in a clumsy way and drive this underground, then we're not
going to be helping anybody."
--Staff Writers Monsy Alvarado and Alex Nussbaum contributed to this article.
MERCURY POLLUTION: Every lake and stream in New Jersey is tainted with
mercury, forcing the state to warn people to limit the amount of fish they
eat. Cutting mercury pollution from power plants, the main source of the
contamination, has sparked a heated debate in Washington. How fish become
tainted:
1. Coal-fired power plants release mercury (Hg) into the air.
2. Mercury can be carried hundreds of miles before falling to earth and
settling in the sediment of lakes, rivers, ponds, and oceans.
3. Bacteria in the sediments then convert it to methylmercury, which can be
absorbed in the tissue of living things.
4. Plankton ingest the bacteria. Insects and small fish eat the plankton. The
mercury increases in concentration as it works its way up the food chain.
5. Large predator fish such as bass, walleye, tuna, and swordfish can have
levels of mercury one million times higher than the surrounding water.
6. More than 2 million lakes and 500,000 miles of rivers in the nation are
tainted with mercury, and people are told to limit the consumption of certain
fish from those waters.
7. Cooking or cleaning fish does not reduce mercury contamination.
8. Children born to mothers who have high mercury levels are slower to walk
and talk and can suffer learning disabilities. The federal government
estimates that 630,000 babies born every year in the United States may be at
risk. In adults, mercury may increase the risk of heart attack and
infertility and cause memory and concentration problems.
Sources: National Wildlife Federation, New Jersey Department of Environmental
Protection; U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
To see more of The Record, or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.NorthJersey.com.
© 2004, The Record, Hackensack, N.J. Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune
Business News.
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/business/national
/8203046.htm?template=contentModules/printstory.jsp
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
© 2004 KRT Wire and wire service sources. All Rights Reserved.
http://www.miami.com
School Choice Offers Flexibility for an Autistic Child
Written By: M. Royce Van Tassell
Published In: School Reform News
Publication Date: March 1, 2004
Publisher: The Heartland Institute
Some children aren't ready for public schools, and public schools
aren't ready for some children. Carson Smith is one of those children.
Three years ago, Carson was like most two-year-olds: He liked to put things
into his mouth. And like most moms, his mother Cheryl was always alarmed at
what he was putting into his mouth. When Carson bit and broke a
mercury thermometer, she was terrified. She rushed him to the hospital in
Sandy, Utah, where doctors showed her x-ray images of the mercury Carson had
swallowed. Unfortunately, there was nothing they could do. The mercury would
pass. All Cheryl could do was wait.
Two weeks into the waiting, the shoe dropped. Carson went from
babbling to mute. He couldn't make noise. He couldn't talk. His social skills
disappeared. He wouldn't sit still. He threw uncontrollable temper tantrums.
He wouldn't even acknowledge when his mom or dad called him, no matter how
stern--or loving--they were. The doctors diagnosed him with pervasive
developmental disorder, a mild form of autism. Cheryl enrolled
him in the Jordan Valley School, a public preschool
serving special-needs children. Although Jordan Valley helps many students,
the school couldn't provide the intensive interventions Carson needed. Staff
recommended Cheryl try the Carmen B. Pingree School, a private school
specializing in autistic students. After observing Carson for a few hours,
Pingree diagnosed him with full-blown autism.
Cheryl enrolled Carson at Pingree, where he has since made a great
improvement. Starting with simple tasks--like having to sit down and hold his
toes still for three seconds--Carson has progressed to the point where he can
now sometimes "attend"--sit still and look at the person talking to him--for
a minute or more. He has learned to use the Picture Exchange
Communications System to tell people what he wants. If he wants a Tootsie
Roll, for example, he finds his picture book and shows Cheryl the appropriate
page.
In addition, Pingree provides training for Cheryl and her family in
how to communicate with Carson and how to cope with the challenges he faces.
But Pingree's services don't come cheap. To support the school's
student-teacher ratio of 2:1, Pingree tuition is $21,000 per year. While
Carson was in preschool, the state paid his tuition. Now that he is five and
in kindergarten, it doesn't. Cheryl and her husband Frank managed to scrape
together enough for the first year's tuition, but they don't know how they're
going to come up with $21,000 every year. Some families have taken out second
mortgages to find the money for the tuition.
At Cheryl's prompting, her local legislator, Rep. J. Morgan Philpot,
toured the Pingree school and met with Carson. Moved by her love, Carson's
needs, and Pingree's ability to meet those needs, Philpot called from the
school to ask legislative staff to look for a way to help students like
Carson.
Philpot is now sponsoring the Carson Smith Special Needs Scholarship
Bill, a measure based on Florida's McKay Scholarship Program, where parents
can direct their child's special education funds to a private school. Cheryl
is the bill's biggest cheerleader.
"Right now, he is like wet cement," she says of her son. "With the
right care now, while he's young, he may be able to someday go into a regular
public school. He may be able to ride the bus, to hold a job." Without the
early intervention he's getting at Pingree, though, he will harden, and never
become a contributing member of society.
The NAA Team
National Autism Association
Phone: 877-NAA-AUTISM
Email: NAA@nationalautism.org
http://nationalautismassociation.org/
Mercury Contamination Forces
Closing Of D.C. School.
Saturday, October 11, 2003 8:49
Copyright © 2003 AP Online
This story was published Friday, October 10th, 2003
By DERRILL HOLLY, Associated Press
WASHINGTON (AP) - Mercury contamination at a District of Columbia
high school has pushed more than 1,000 students to other buildings -
and some other people out of their homes.
Eight days after elemental mercury was removed from an unlocked
classroom at Ballou High School, environmental technicians on Friday
were still testing and decontaminating the school and several homes
tainted with the potentially toxic substance.
No one has shown any physical symptoms, said Dr. Michael S.A.
Richardson, chief medical officer of the D.C. Health Department.
Of 48 homes checked, seven have shown indications of potentially
unsafe mercury vapors. They will undergo the same type of
decontamination as the school. Although some families have opted to
remain in their homes, 28 people have moved into hotels at city
expense.
"The mayor is considering declaring a public health emergency," said
Tony Bullock, a spokesman for Mayor Anthony A. Williams.
At the school, mercury was spattered across walls, poured down
drains, and thrown on people, winding up in the hair of some
students. A student who admitted removing the mercury from the
unlocked classroom sold some of it to another student for a dollar.
That second student took it by bus to a 17-unit apartment building,
which was later evacuated.
© 2003 Tri-City Herald, Associated Press & Other Wire Services.
Ballou Student, 16, Charged With Theft In Removal
of Mercury From Chemistry
Lab
By David A. Fahrenthold
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, October 28, 2003; Page B02
A 16-year-old student at Ballou Senior High School was arrested
yesterday and charged with stealing mercury from a chemistry lab, a
theft that triggered a month-long cleanup effort and cost the city
$1 million, D.C.
police said. The student, whose name was not released because he is
a juvenile, was arrested at 2:15 p.m. and charged with theft of
property worth more than $250. He is to appear in D.C. Superior
Court today, authorities said.
D.C. Police Chief Charles H. Ramsey said the student took the
mercury from the lab, which was supposed to be locked. The mercury,
perhaps as much as a cupful, was handled by several students, some
of whom threw it at one another, authorities have said. The
potentially poisonous liquid metal eventually spread from the
Southeast Washington school to a Metrobus and several homes and
apartment buildings. Ballou's 1,300 students have been taking
classes at other locations, and 69 people were displaced from
contaminated homes.
In the first days after the mercury was stolen, school officials and
police played down the criminal aspect of the incident while they
tried to identify all the students exposed. Principal Art Bridges at
one point said any student involved "will get a stern talking-to"
but would not be suspended. However, Ramsey said, officials in the
city's Office of the Corporation Counsel, which prosecutes
juveniles, decided to charge the youth after being presented with
the results of an investigation by the police department's
Environmental Crimes Unit.
Ramsey said that police also had looked into the roles played by
another student, who allegedly took the mercury onto a Metrobus, and
a teacher responsible for leaving the science classroom unlocked.
But prosecutors
declined to seek charges against those two, he said. Peter Lavallee,
a spokesman for the Office of the Corporation Counsel, said he did
not know about those cases. School officials said they believe their
contractors have cleaned up the mercury inside Ballou but are
awaiting results of air testing that will show whether mercury vapor
is present.
The Health Department will review the results from the air testing
to determine whether it's safe to reopen the school. As of last
night, Briant Coleman, a health department spokesman, said the
results had not come in. Staff writers Manny Fernandez and Justin
Blum contributed to this report.
© 2003 The Washington Post Company
http://www.abcnews.go.com/wire/US/ap20031103_26.html
Study Eyes Kids Problems, Mercury Link
Government Study Finds Little Evidence Linking Children's Problems
to Mercury in Vaccines
The Associated Press
CHICAGO Nov. 3 — Government researchers say they found little
evidence of a link between vaccinations and developmental problems
in a study of more than 140,000 U.S. children. The report didn't
satisfy vaccine critics, who claimed the study's initial results
showed a stronger connection but were watered down. They also noted
that the study's lead author now works for a vaccine maker. The
study, published Monday in the December issue of Pediatrics, is one
of the latest attempts to determine whether older vaccines with the
mercury-containing preservative thimerosal led to nervous-system
problems such as autism, as some vocal critics contend.
In one group of children studied, routine vaccines in infancy
appeared to slightly increase the risk for tics. In another group, a
slight association was seen with language delays but not tics. A
third group showed no associations with any disorder. In all, more
than 140,000 children were studied and no link was found with any
other disorders, including autism, said co-researcher Dr. Frank
DeStefano of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Many
previous studies of vaccines containing the preservative thimerosal
also failed to find strong evidence of any link. The new results are
reassuring, DeStefano said, and more definitive answers are expected
from in-person examinations the CDC is giving some of the study
participants.
But Dr. Mark Geier, a geneticist who has worked as a consultant on
parents' lawsuits against vaccine makers, said the researchers' own
earlier analysis of the study results found strong links between
vaccines and such problems and that the published results attempt to
conceal those findings. He claimed the final analysis "is
intentional fraud." DeStefano acknowledged that the early results
suggested stronger links with some disorders, though not autism, but
denied that there had been pressure or a cover-up. He said the final
data reflect a more thorough recent analysis. The study's lead
author, former CDC researcher Dr. Thomas Verstraeten, now works for
vaccine maker GlaxoSmithKline in Belgium, and Geier said that
connection may have influenced how the research was reported.
Verstraeten, who left the CDC in July 2001, did not respond to an
e-mail request seeking a response, and company spokeswoman Nancy
Pekarek said he did not wish to discuss the results. She provided a
written statement in which Verstraeten indicated that since leaving
the CDC he has worked only as an adviser as the study was finalized
and prepared for publication. The researchers analyzed data from
three health maintenance
organizations on children born between 1992 and 1999 and tracked for
several years. Information was gathered on several
neurodevelopmental disorders, including autism, attention deficit
disorders, stammering and emotional disturbances.
While the researchers were beginning to examine their results,
public health officials were beginning to publicly address concerns
about the use of thimerosal in childhood vaccines. Mercury in high
doses has been linked with neurodevelopmental problems. Parents and
others worried about potentially dangerous overexposure to
thimerosal because of the increasing number of vaccines recommended
in childhood. Vaccine makers have since phased out use of thimerosal
as a preservative in childhood vaccines used in the United States,
though
trace amounts remain in some vaccines. It is still used as a
preservative elsewhere, especially in developing countries, said Dr.
Thomas Saari, a member of the American Academy of Pediatrics'
infections diseases committee and a pediatrics professor at the
University of Wisconsin in Madison.
Vaccine expert Dr. Neal Halsey of Johns Hopkins University said the
study shows that if there is any association between older vaccines
and mild disorders, "it must be relatively small." "A major health
risk should have shown up in a consistent pattern in all three of
the HMOs," Halsey said. Still, he said the findings might have been
different if the researchers had done a separate analysis by gender,
since boys are much more susceptible to mercury exposure than girls.
The fight against toxic
mercury in the global environment
Friday, August 16, 2002
By Jim Motavalli, E/The Environmental Magazine
The late singer-songwriter Laura Nyro loved to eat tuna fish. An avid
environmentalist, she was shocked to hear that her favorite food was
contaminated with the toxic heavy metal mercury, and she expressed her anger
in a song. "I'm young enough, I'm old enough in the city machine / Where
industries fill the fish full of mercury (it's tax free)."
Nyro was right to worry about the fish and right about industrial mercury
use. Forty states have issued advisories about eating fish that may have high
levels of mercury in their tissues. As recently as July 2001, Massachusetts
public health officials warned young women and children under 12 to stop
eating "most" fish caught in state rivers and lakes and to avoid certain
seafood. Tuna was on the list, as was swordfish.
Mercury is a persistent heavy metal that accumulates in water and in the
tissues of humans, fish, and animals. It was declared a hazardous air
pollutant by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in 1971. According to
the federal Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry, long-term human
exposure to mercury in either organic or inorganic form "can permanently
damage the brain, kidneys, and developing fetuses." A potent neurotoxin,
mercury is slowly being phased out of many commercial uses, including
consumer thermometers, but it is still used in many industrial processes and
is in such products as fluorescent lights, home and appliance thermostats,
and even toys.
Ask most people about mercury in the environment and they're apt to think of
broken thermometers. But the truth is that industry, in the form of
coal-fired power plants (like the so-called "Sooty Six" in Connecticut),
electric arc furnaces (which melt and recycle the steel from old cars), and
municipal waste incinerators are the major sources. Mercury also gets into
the environment in pharmaceutical products and through ritual religious uses,
especially in Latin American Santeria. Mercury sells for less than $2 a pound
on the wholesale market, and even when it is "recycled," it may still end up
in the environment.
Progress is being made to end some of mercury's more visible uses, but the
campaign is far from over. Five states have laws that either put some
restrictions on mercury use, sale, or disposal or require labeling of
products containing it. Similar bills are pending in 15 state legislatures.
"Despite state and local bans, thousands of retailers still sell mercury
thermometers to consumers who aren't aware of the risks," said Felice Stadler,
policy coordinator of the National Wildlife Federation's Clean the Rain
campaign.
"Just one-seventieth of a teaspoon of atmospheric mercury can contaminate a
20-acre lake for a year," said Michael Bender, executive director of the
Vermont-based Mercury Policy Project. "We have to take mercury permanently
out of commerce. It's not that difficult to containerize it and store it
indefinitely. An ideal solution would be the kind of "producer
responsibility" laws they have in Europe, which make companies responsible
for their waste."
U.S. Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) has proposed legislation that would create
a task force to address the mercury problem on a national scale. Under her
bill, the Mercury Reduction and Disposal Act, S.351, the sale of thermometers
containing the metal would be banned nationally, and the mercury inside them
would be stockpiled and treated similarly to nuclear waste. Stadler said,
"Enacting a nationwide ban on sales is an essential safety net to protect
Americans."
In response to a campaign led by Health Care Without Harm (HCWH), five
drugstore chains, including CVS, Rite-Aid, Walgreens, Wal-Mart, and Eckerd,
have agreed to stop selling mercury thermometers. These companies represent
71 percent of chain pharmacies, but mercury thermometers are still on sale at
Kroger, Medicine Shoppe, Publix, and Fred's stores. "It's appalling that
there are retailers that continue to sell potentially dangerous mercury
devices to their customers, especially when safe alternatives exist in the
marketplace," said Jamie Harvie, mercury coordinator of HCWH. Eight states
and a number of cities have banned or restricted the sale of mercury
thermometers, and 600 hospitals and clinics have agreed to get mercury out of
their waste streams.
But mercury thermometers are only one, very visible part of the problem.
Because mercury has many uses and applications, the movement to get it out of
the atmosphere must take a multipronged approach. Some of the campaigns have
made more headway than others, but all have acquired a new urgency as the
dangers of mercury become better known.
FISH FILLED WITH MERCURY
According to a 2001 Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) study,
one in ten American women of childbearing age is at risk for having a baby
born with neurological problems due to in-utero mercury exposure.
Statistically, that means 375,000 babies are at risk every year. And nearly 6
million women who might be considering having a child already have mercury
levels above EPA safety levels.
As recounted in Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, the CDC study was
based on a national survey of mercury in blood and hair, while previous
studies were estimates based on per-capita fish consumption. "New studies
show that far more women are at risk of exposure to methyl mercury than
previously thought," said Caroline Smith DeWaal, director of food safety at
the Center for Science in the Public Interest. She urges the Food and Drug
Administration (FDA) to monitor commercial seafood and to remove unsafe fish
from the market.
A federal General Accounting Office (GAO) report, commissioned by Senator Tom
Harkin (D-IA) in 1999, concludes that the FDA has failed in its efforts to
protect the public from mercury-tainted seafood. The report faults the FDA's
Hazard Analysis Critical Point regulations for not providing proper guidance
to the fishing industry about safeguarding the public. A joint report by the
Mercury Policy Project and California Communities Against Toxics in 2000
charged that the FDA had stopped mercury monitoring for tuna, shark, and
swordfish, despite the fact that the FDA's previous testing found more than
one part per million (considered the "action level") of mercury in more than
half the swordfish it evaluated. Some 33 percent of shark tissue studied by
the FDA was found to exceed the action level for mercury, as was 4 percent of
tuna. The FDA has been studying the effects of mercury in fish tissue for 10
years without reaching any conclusions.
"The GAO report shows that mercury pollution threatens both sportfish and
seafood," said Eric Uram of the Sierra Club's Midwestern office. "Consumers
need to watch what fish they eat, no matter where it comes from: the
restaurant, store, lake, or seashore."
A 2001 study that looked specifically at the New England states gave them a
mixed report card for their efforts to reduce mercury levels in the
environment and warn the public about the risks. The New England Zero Mercury
Campaign praised the states for developing health-based advisories about
mercury in fish, but it urged them to do more to "effectively communicate
these health warnings to women who may become pregnant and families with
young children….Strategically targeted and culturally sensitive outreach and
education is needed to prevent dangerous mercury exposure from fish,
especially from commonly eaten seafood."
Prenatal mercury exposure, said the New England report, "can hurt children's
ability to remember, pay attention, talk, draw, run, and play and increase
the number of children who have trouble keeping up in school or require
special education, according to the National Academy of Sciences." According
to Dr. Ted Schettler of Physicians for Social Responsibility, "Relatively
small amounts of contaminated fish eaten often, or larger amounts eaten
occasionally, can harm developing fetal brains during windows of
vulnerability. The fetus is extremely sensitive to mercury."
SWITCHING OFF AUTO MERCURY
What do the high-intensity headlights, antilock brake systems, global
positioning screens, and trunk- or hood-mounted light switches on your car
have in common? They all may contain highly toxic mercury.
The Clean Car Campaign, a coalition of several environmental groups, is
trying to persuade the auto industry to not only stop all uses of mercury but
also to take responsibility for the heavy metal already installed in hundreds
of millions of on-the-road vehicles. The industry has agreed to phase out
most uses of mercury switches by the end of the 2001 model year, but it is
not surprisingly balking at the monumental effort needed to remove existing
switches, many of which it says would prove difficult to locate. (In the film
Lethal Weapon, actors Mel Gibson and Danny Glover marvel at the exotic
mercury switch used to set off a bomb, but in reality mercury switches are
nearly ubiquitous in our society.)
According to the Mercury Policy Project's Bender, the auto industry installed
10 tons of mercury in car switches in 1995, although that amount was
dramatically reduced by the 2001 model year. Mercury light switches are now
used in only a few Ford and General Motors vehicles. Most European and
Japanese auto manufacturers stopped installing mercury convenience light
switches in the mid-1990s. But even as the switches are being phased out,
many domestic and foreign companies are equipping their cars with headlights,
brake components, and navigational systems containing mercury.
The EPA, in a report to Congress in 1997, estimated that 158 tons of the
metal are released into the atmosphere annually from human-made sources in
the United States. "The auto industry is not the major source, but it's
definitely a significant source," said Bender, who points to coal-fired power
plants and waste combustors as the prime culprits nationally for mercury
release.
Charles Griffith, the auto project director of Michigan's Ecology Center, a
member of the Clean Car Campaign, says that the mercury in auto switches is
released into the atmosphere when steel recovered from scrapped automobiles
is melted down in electric arc furnaces (EAFs). A study produced jointly by
the Ecology Center, the Buffalo-based Great Lakes United and the University
of Tennessee Center for Clean Products and Clean Technologies, estimates that
15.6 metric tons of mercury are released annually by EAFs, more than all
other manufacturing sources combined.
Bob Kainz, a senior manager for pollution prevention and life cycle programs
at DaimlerChrysler, says that only two of the company's products, the Jeep
Cherokee and Wrangler, still have mercury switches in their ABS brake
systems, and that both models will be free of the heavy metal when they're
redesigned over the next few years.
"There are better ways of handling this problem than going after the
carmakers," Kainz said. "Eighty-seven percent of the mercury going out into
the atmosphere is coming from utility boilers, waste combustors, coal-fired
power plants, cement plants, and medical incinerators." Kainz added that
DaimlerChrysler's records do not consistently identify which cars or trucks
actually have mercury switches, making any systematic recall and removal
difficult.
The auto industry, through such trade groups as the Alliance of Automobile
Manufacturers and the Association of International Automobile Manufacturers,
has lobbied against the laws, arguing that it is phasing out mercury on its
own. Greg Dana, vice president for environmental affairs of the Alliance of
Automobile Manufacturers, says that General Motors, Ford, and DaimlerChrysler
began removing mercury from their products in 1995 under an agreement with
the state of Michigan. The mercury switches in existing cars should be
removed when the car is at the end of its life, he said. "The recyclers are
already taking out the gasoline, oil, and air-conditioner refrigerant," Dana
said. "It's a simple add-on for them to rip out the mercury switches."
The auto trade groups support legislation requiring recyclers to remove the
switches as part of the dismantling process, but this has produced a fierce
reaction from junkyard operators and scrap steel dealers. Both the Automotive
Recyclers Association (ARA) and the Institute of Scrap Recycling Industries
say they have little financial incentive to take on the task, with each
switch containing only a gram of the metal and mercury trading at less than
$2 a pound.
According to ARA Vice President Bill Steinkuller, "The auto manufacturers
engineered the vehicles to include mercury switches, produced the product,
and profited from it. From our point of view, it defies logic that they now
want to deny any responsibility for the mercury and put the onus on the
dismantlers."
The auto industry and the recyclers are fighting a war of words over mercury,
but there is some chance of reconciliation. "We're not trying to pick a fight
with the manufacturers," Steinkuller said. "If we get beyond the rhetoric, we
can probably get together and handle this problem." Unfortunately, ARA's
proposed solution — in which the carmakers foot the bill for a nationwide
program of mercury collection and storage — is precisely the kind of
high-cost program the auto industry is trying to avoid.
CHEWING ON MERCURY
Anita Vasquez Tibau was a young college dance major 20 years ago when she
suddenly found herself unable to breathe. "I could hardly walk," she told Dr.
L.A. McKeown in an article for WebMD Medical News. "I couldn't do anything. I
was using my inhaler every half hour." These problems plagued Tibau for 20
years until, in 2000, a blood test showed she was highly sensitive to
mercury. After Tibau had a dentist remove all 13 of her mercury fillings, her
health improved dramatically. She no longer uses any asthma medicine, and she
reports much higher energy levels and an increased attention span.
The American Dental Association (ADA) reports that 76 percent of dentists use
dental amalgam — a mixture of metals, including silver, dissolved with
mercury. The ADA denies that there are any safety problems with dental
amalgam. "Studies have failed to find any link between amalgam restorations
and any medical disorder," the association said. But it concedes that "a very
small number of people" are allergic to the fillings. "Fewer than 100 cases
have ever been reported," said the ADA. "Symptoms of amalgam allergy are very
similar to a typical skin allergy."
The ADA defended its position in court last year after Consumers for Dental
Choice sued the ADA and the California Dental Association, claiming that both
groups were misleading the public about the mercury content of what they call
"silver fillings." But the ADA said it has never tried to hide the mercury
connection.
A paper prepared by Consumers for Dental Choice and DAMS, another antiamalgam
advocacy group, charges that every amalgam filling releases 10 micrograms of
mercury into the body daily, which is two-thirds of the excretable mercury
level. The report also charges that mercury can cross the placental barrier
into the tissue of a developing fetus, and it implicates the metal in kidney
impairment, loss of immune function, antibiotic resistance, and lowered
fertility.
Boyd Haley, chairman of the chemistry department at the University of
Kentucky, has been an expert witness before Congress on the mercury issue.
"They place this stuff in people's mouths, and it's toxic before it goes in,
and it's toxic when it is placed in your tooth, so how does it suddenly
become safe?" he asked. Many dentists, under pressure on the mercury issue,
have switched to alternatives. According to Richard Epstein, a
Connecticut-based dentist, "While I believe that the studies disparaging
silver amalgam are seriously flawed, the alternatives are effective enough to
warrant switching. I now use gold and composite materials."
Dentists have also been under fire for releasing unused amalgam into the
waste stream, where it can enter the aquatic food chain. Some have invested
in disposable amalgam traps, which catch the metal before it goes down the
drain. Recaptured amalgam can be shipped to groups like Dental Recycling
North America, which recovers 90 to 95 percent of the mercury in the
fillings.
Congresswoman Diane Watson (D-Calif.) introduced legislation last year that
would ban all mercury-based dental amalgam in five years. The New York State
Dental Association has fought a proposed bill that would, among other things,
require dentists to use mercury containment traps, file an annual amalgam
report, and no longer use the fillings for pregnant or under-15-year-old
patients. The association claims the legislation is "misguided" and "would
detrimentally alter the practice of dentistry."
FROM THE SMOKESTACK
According to the National Academy of Sciences (NAS), dirty power plants,
especially those that burn coal, are the single largest source of mercury
emissions, resulting in an estimated 40 tons a year. Eighty-five percent of
all mercury pollution in the United States is released either by coal plants
or municipal and medical waste incinerators burning mercury-tainted trash.
Only the incinerator emissions are regulated.
In 2000, a NAS report urged that mercury releases from power plants be
drastically curtailed. Before leaving office, the Clinton Administration
announced that it would develop new, stricter standards, to be proposed in
2003 and finalized in 2004. Then-EPA Administrator Carol Browner noted, "The
greatest source of mercury emissions is power plants, and they have never
been required to control these emissions before now." Upon taking office, the
Bush Administration signaled that it might reverse campaign promises about
power plant carbon dioxide and mercury emissions. The move came after heavy
industry pressure from the Utility Air Regulatory Group, which represents 50
large power plants.
Environmentalists loudly protested the administration's proposed reversal.
"Countless studies have documented that mercury emissions from U.S. sources,
including coal-fired electric utilities, contaminate lakes and streams, the
fish within those water bodies, and the people and wildlife who eat the
fish," said National Wildlife Federation senior scientist Mike Murray.
In April 2001, the Bush Administration again changed course, attempting to
quash an Edison Electric Institute lawsuit aimed at the Clinton-era mercury
rules. Environmentalists were cautiously optimistic, but the eventual course
the EPA will take is still far from clear.
In model legislation created by the Mercury Policy Project, coal-burning
electric utilities would be required to reduce their mercury releases 95
percent by 2008, but the Bush Administration is very unlikely to impose such
a standard. Groundbreaking legislation is much more likely from the states,
including Vermont, which passed the Mercury Reduction Act in 1998. That bill
requires manufacturers of "mercury-added" products to label them as such when
sold to the public. The legislation also banned trash disposal of products
containing mercury.
Vermont's bill prompted a lawsuit by fluorescent lamp manufacturers, who
claimed an undue financial burden and argued that their First Amendment right
not to disclose information had been violated. The lawsuit was later thrown
out by two federal appeals courts.
Several other states intend to model legislation on Vermont's law. In 2001,
Massachusetts unveiled strict new final standards for power plant emissions,
becoming the first state in the nation to regulate mercury releases. The
state's power plants will be required to phase in 50 to 75 percent nitrogen
oxide and sulfur dioxide emission reductions by 2008. "From a national
perspective, this mandatory reduction of four major pollutants from the
state's oldest and dirtiest power plants is a very important precedent," said
Cindy Luppi, organizing director of Clean Water Action.
One final irony is that U.S. campaigners may be very successful in removing
mercury from domestic commerce, only to see the deadly neurotoxin "recycled"
to ready buyers overseas. That was exactly the case last year, when
HoltraChem, a mercury-based chlor-alkali plant in Maine, shut down. Some 130
tons of mercury were sold to a broker, which resold it for use in India.
Madhumita Dutta, coordinator of the Indian group Toxics Link, calls this kind
of transaction "toxic trade." Vehement protests in both India and the United
States succeeded in at least temporarily stopping the deal, but there is an
estimated 3.5 million to 5 million pounds of mercury on-site at 11 other
American chlor-alkali plants.
Jim Motavalli is editor of E/The Environmental Magazine.
Copyright 2002, E/The Environmental Magazine
All Rights Reserved
 |
http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/opinion/orl-edpfarago
21032104mar21,1,6384691.story?coll=orl-opinion-headlines
By Alan Farago
Special to the Sentinel
March 21, 2004
You have to wonder about the Bush White House and its poor handling of
mercury-pollution rules that put the unborn at special risk.
The Environmental Protection Agency is reacting badly to data that its
brand-spanking-new rule for reducing mercury pollution, calling for a 70
percent reduction in mercury pollution by power utilities, may not be
achieved as promised in 2018, a date many experts say is already too far in
the future, but only by 2025 or longer.
In a New York Times story, an EPA spokesperson defensively suggested
cleaner skies would indeed be ahead, because, "the agency's models did not
build in the assumption that mercury controls will become cheaper, and so
more appealing to the utilities, as time passes."
Don't worry, America; when technology is cheaper, sometime in the future,
government and industry will protect you from being poisoned.
Curbing mercury pollution is a problem for an administration that never saw
an environmental regulation it did not want to cut in half. That is why rules
that smudge dates on compliance is the next best thing to outright gutting of
the law.
For instance, in Florida last year Gov. Jeb Bush, the president's brother,
went along with the sugar industry by voiding a hard line of 2006 to stop its
pollution of the Everglades -- the foundation of the $8 billion Everglades
restoration plan --fudging the specifics so thoroughly that environmentalists
named Bush's new law, "The Everglades Whenever Act." Federal agencies, whose
staff were predisposed to object, were meek as lambs.
Now, the Bush White House appears to be backtracking from the
mercury-emission rule just released and written largely by the electric
utility industry at the insistence of the White House, in what the EPA deftly
mislabeled an "interagency process."
Perhaps news finally filtered to the president's desk that the EPA's own
scientists doubled the risk estimate of fetuses exposed to mercury. Mercury
accumulates in fetuses in concentrations far higher than mother's blood. The
National Institutes of Health are investigating the possible role of mercury
in sharp spikes in rates of autism and learning disabilities in children.
Today, one in six mothers and 600,000 children per year are at risk to be
born with elevated mercury levels. So whether you are Christian, Jew,
Buddhist or Muslim: the fetus of your child is likely to be ingesting
nutrients and also mercury at twice the rate previously predicted.
Which leads to a question of President Bush's staunch supporters: Why isn't
the religious right joining the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) and
Sierra Club to sue the federal government for failing, in its new mercury
rule, to account for "lost" mercury from chlorine plants, which spews more
mercury into the atmosphere every year than the entire power plant industry?
And a few other questions: If the religious right is really concerned about
the well-being of fetuses, why has it not focused on the manipulation of
science to benefit polluters, why has it not rooted from the White House
those ideologues putting the profits of industry ahead of the weakest, most
vulnerable, the least able to defend themselves; fetuses, infants, and the
young? Where are the protests and Sunday sermons?
The leaky reasoning in the Bush White House recalls the hypothesis of the
Roman Empire's undoing. It collapsed, not from the costs of supporting
far-flung armies, but from lead poisoning. The story goes, Emperor Nero
fiddled while Rome was burning because he and his imperial retinue were
maddened by lead. Incidentally, the Roman god associated with lead was
Saturn, who devoured his own children.
But who reads history in this White House? As for the religious right, it is
easier to march to the drumbeat of morality down a one-way street. Heaven
forbid there might be traffic coming the other way, in the form of soccer
moms, NASCAR dads and environmentalists who treasure the sanctity of life
above earthly pride and profit. For the Bush accountants, that math would be
bad news indeed.
Alan Farago writes frequently on the environment and politics. He lives in
Coral Gables.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2004/05/040531214618.htm
Source: University Of Cincinnati
Date: 2004-06-01
UC Engineering Researchers Find Mercury In Cicadas
Thinktwice before you eat one of Cincinnati's Brood-X cicadas. That's the
warning from researchers at the University of Cincinnati College of
Engineering, who have found surprising levels of mercury in these insects.
Because of the once-in-17-years cicada emergence throughout the Eastern
United States and media reports of various food dishes involving cicadas, Tim
Keener of UC's department of civil and environmental engineering department
and Soon-Jai Khang of UC's department of chemical and materials engineering
have measured
the mercury content of fully developed cicadas taken from three different
communities in Cincinnati.
"Our results indicate that there are measurable and, in some instances,
significant levels of mercury in thecicadas, with the majority of the
concentrations ranging from 0.02 -0.20 parts per million, but some at higher
levels," Keener
said. The higher levels, he said, approach those in fish that have earned
government warnings.
Keener and Khang are attempting to identify the source of the mercury to
determine if these concentration variations are natural to cicadas or if
man-made sources are contributing to the mercury levels. "We recommend that
humans, especially pregnant women and young children, limit the amount of
cicadas they eat as a result of these preliminary findings. We do not believe
that eating a small number of these insects will result in irreparable harm,
but mercury exposure may harm an unborn baby or young child's developing
nervous system," Keener said.
Mercury, 101
Ann Pike-Paris, MS, RNPediatr Nurs 30(2):150-153, 2004. © 2004 Jannetti
Publications, Inc.
Posted 05/20/2004
Introduction
October 3, 2003, The Washington Post -- Students steal a 250-milliliter
container of mercury from a science lab and spread it around the school and
grounds. As of October 28, 2003, the school has been shut down and
decontaminated,
five people showed some type of mercury exposure, more than 100 homes were
tested and found contaminated, families were told to leave with the clothes
on
their backs, city buses were cleaned due to mercury contamination, 1,300
students
were displaced and in temporary classrooms, and the cleanup and investigation
costs are in the millions and still climbing. As the community nurse, would
you know the health risks and could you assist students, parents, and
educators?
A growing number of health professionals recognize a lack of knowledge
regarding risks to children from environmental exposures. According to the
1995
Institute of Medicine (IOM) report, Nursing, Health and the Environment, the
majority of nurses today lack adequate basic preparation to recognize and
respond
to environmental health problems. Use the questions below as a starting point
to test your knowledge, the clinical information provided to increase it, and
the resources listed to guide you to more expert help.
Self-Assessment
Can you identify, assess, intervene, and educate a child and family that may
be dealing with the consequences of an environmental exposure?
How do you begin?
What do you include in a history?
Where do you look for support and professional help?
Are you armed with current knowledge to educate parents about potential or
existing risks in their home or workplace?
Are you able to ask the questions to get the answers you need?
What it Is
Mercury, a naturally occurring element in three forms (see Figure 1), can
produce different levels of toxicity depending upon route of exposure and
absorption. Historically, the most significant acute exposure occurred during
the
1970s in Iraq. Grain treated with an organic mercury fungicide was the source
of
contaminated bread. Adults experienced visual disturbances with some
subsequent blindness. Prenatal exposures resulted in children with
psychomotor
retardation manifesting in increased incidence of seizures and delays in
learning to
walk (Greater Boston Physicians for Social Responsibility [GBPSR], 2001).
Low-dose, methylmercury exposures have been studied in the Seychelle and
Faroe
Island populations. GBPSR (2001) found a significant correlation between
impairment in the areas of language, attention and memory with prenatal
mercury
exposure. During the 1950s in Japan, pregnant women in the Minamata Bay area
consumed
fish with high levels of methylmercury, resulting in at least 30 cases of
infantile cerebral palsy (American Academy of Pediatrics [APA], 2003), as
well as
deaths of over 100 people (Food and Drug Administration [FDA], 1994).
Elemental Mercury
Sources
Elemental mercury is found in ore, fossil fuels, mining, volcanoes, medical
waste incinerators (vapor); thermometers, barometers, dental amalgam
(liquid);
and fluorescent light bulbs, disk button batteries, thermostats, switches,
home remedies, and folk rituals from the Caribbean cultures.Absorption
Elemental mercury is absorbed as a liquid or vapor at room temperature.
Liquid is poorly absorbed (<0.1%) in the gastrointestinal tract and the skin;
vapor
is absorbed readily in the lungs and transported to the central nervous
system (CNS) and kidneys (Goldman & Shannon, 2001).Clinical Effects
At high concentrations, vapor causes acute necrotizing bronchitis and
pneumonitis. Chronic effects include a range of CNS symptoms from early ones
-- loss
of appetite, insomnia, forgetfulness, and mild tremor, to progressive tremor,
erethism seen as red palms, salivation, excessive sweating. It accumulates in
the kidneys producing protenuria or nephrotic syndrome (AAP, 2003). Exposure
to dental amalgam has caused much concern, but to date, the U.S. Public
Health
Service and the National Institutes of Health (NIH) have concluded that,
based
on current evidence, no health risk exists (AAP, 2003; Goldman & Shannon
2001).Diagnosis
Diagnosis is based on history, physical exam, and unexplained peripheral
neuropathy.TreatmentTreatment involves two steps: (1) Identify the source, and (2) End the
exposure. Severe exposure may be treated with chelation therapy and may
enhance
elimination; however, whether or not it decreases intoxication is unclear
(Goldman
& Shannon, 2001).
Inorganic Mercury
Sources
Inorganic mercury is found in mercury salts (combined with either chlorine,
sulfur, or oxygen). Currently banned in the United States, inorganic mercury
had been used in products such as calomel teething powders and skin
lighteners
(Goldman & Shannon, 2001), and fungicidal diaper rinse.Absorption
Although poorly absorbed (about 10%), if ingested, salts are very caustic.
Dermal application in animals has shown toxic effects (AAP, 2003).
Clinical
Effects
Ingestion, generally inadvertent or a suicidal gesture, results in
hemorrhage, gastrointestinal ulceration, and circulatory collapse. Infants
exposed to
teething powder, diaper rinse, or latex paint often developed acrodynia --
childhood mercury poisoning -- or pink disease, which is characterized by
painful
extremities, maculopapular rash, hypertension, peripheral neuropathy, and
renal
tubular dysfunction (AAP, 2003).Diagnosis
A 24-hour urine collection is the preferred means of diagnosis. If results
are >10-20 ug/L, excessive exposure is assumed. Caution: urinary mercury
concentration does not necessarily correlate with severity of toxic effects
or
chronicity if exposure has been intermittent or varying in intensity (AAP,
2003;
Goldman & Shannon, 2001).Treatment
Treatment involves two steps: (1) Identify the source, and (2) End the
exposure. Treatment by chelation therapy using Dimercarprol is most common.
It
remains uncertain whether or not toxic effects are reduced or recovery is
hastened.
Organic Mercury
Sources
Organic mercury is found in three compounds: methyl-, ethyl- and
phenylmercury. Methylmercury is the most toxic, formed by microorganisms from
elemental
mercury found in the environment via human or natural sources (Goldman &
Shannon, 2001). Incineration of mercury containing products is a key human
source.
Consuming fish is the primary route of exposure in children. Others sources
include fungicides, industrial waste, and breast milk. Ethylmercury, found in
thimerosal, was used as an antiseptic and preservative as in childhood
vaccinations as well as contact lens solution. Note: All currently
recommended
vaccinations in the U.S. are available thimerosal-free (AAP, 2003).
Phenylmercury was
formerly used in latex paint as a pesticide and preservative but has not been
available since 1991.Absorption
Due to being lipid soluble, organic mercury in its various forms is well
absorbed from the gastrointestinal tract by ingestion. Inhalation and dermal
absorption occur easily, as well. Phenylmercury is not well absorbed by skin
or
ingestion.
Clinical Effects
Route of exposure, dose, age, and compound all cause varying toxicity. Acute
toxicity signs include paesthesias to generalized weakness, visual and
hearing
impairment, tremor, muscle spasticity, coma, and death (Goldman & Shannon,
2001). Long-term exposure is much the same. These compounds target the CNS
with
methyl- and ethylmercury being more toxic than phenylmercury. Chronic fetal
exposure leads to symptoms showing after birth such as psychomotor
retardation,
blindness, deafness, seizure disorders, and cerebral palsy (AAP, 2003;
Goldman
& Shannon, 2001). The fetus and infant are known to be more at risk due rapid
brain development and mercury's neurotoxicant properties. Ethyl mercury has
caused hypersensitivity as well as generating concerns about triggering
autism
in infants after routine immunizations. The NAS has determined that no
significant causal relationship has yet been shown (AAP, 2003).Diagnosis
Due to blood concentration, blood mercury levels can be used. Hair sampling
may also be used but under strict clinical or research settings. Blood levels
of 5 ug/dL or greater is the toxic threshold. Treatment
Treatment involves two steps: (1) Identify the source, and (2) End the
exposure. Currently, no chelating agent is approved for use and Dimercaprol
may
increase the mercury concentration in the brain with methyl and ethylmercury
poisoning. With severed organic mercury poisoning, Succimer has been used (AAP,
2003).
A review of the routes of exposure/sources can be found in Table 1. Signs and
symptoms of exposure are summarized in Table 2.
Prevention
Prevention can be both individual and collective. Resources will be provided
to pursue the mechanics of some of these prevention strategies.
Replace Hg thermometers and sphygmomanometers in homes and medical settings.
About one gram of mercury can contaminate a 20-acre lake enough to cause
health advisories for fish present. Many municipalities have programs for
safe
disposal. Health Care Without Harm's web site, www.noharm.org can provide
assistance in planning and holding a mercury thermometer exchange program.
Also
consult your state Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).
Make families aware that new dental techniques decrease the chance of
spillage or exposure from amalgams.
If a spill occurs, never use a vacuum -- it vaporizes the mercury. Move the
mercury bead with paper into an airtight jar. Seek help from your
institution's
hazardous materials team, local fire department, or an environmental clean-up
company. Evacuate people and animals from the site.
Know guidelines for water and food limits of Hg. For water: In 1992, EPA
established 2 ug/L or 2 parts per billion (PPB) as the Maximum Contaminant
Level
or MCL as the enforceable standard. For fish: the FDA's action level is1 ppm
(1
ug/g) (FDA, 1994). Women of childbearing age, pregnant women, nursing women,
and young children should avoid eating shark, king mackerel, swordfish, and
tilefish. New FDA guidelines are due in early 2004 for these same groups
urging a
limit on tuna of 4-6 ounces per week (Washington Post, 2003). Regarding
freshwater fish, 41 states have health advisories to limit or avoid walleye,
pike,
muskie, and bass. Current advisories are available at www.epa.gov/OST/fish/
Be aware that acceptable residential air mercury levels set by Agency for
Toxic Substances and Disease Registry (ATSDR) are not to exceed 0.5 ug/cubic
meters (AAP, 2003).
Avoid improper disposal and burning of mercury products in the hospital.
Recognizing the hazard and rising abatement costs for spills, the American
Hospital Association and its members are taking steps to phase out all
mercury
products. See the University of Massachusetts, Lowell Sustainable Hospital
Project
for more information at www.uml.edu/center/LCSP/hospitals
In schools, identify and remove sources of mercury such as mercury
thermometers, thermostats, motion switches, and chemicals in school labs and
cleaning
products. For a complete list see
www.epa.gov/grtlakes/bnsdocs/merccomm/merccomm.pdf
Practice Points: Environmental History Taking and Discharge Information
How can you incorporate environmental history questions that may reveal
potential problems? Suggestions and resources can be found on-line. For
example,
the University of Maryland School of Nursing Web site (www.enrirn.umaryland.edu)
has an Environmental Health Assessment Guide to download, as well as many
other links to assist with discharge.
The Children's Environmental Health Network (www.cehn.org) has an on-line
training manual Pediatric Environmental Health: Putting It into Practice.
Download and review the chapter on environmental history taking. The Canadian
Association of Physicians for the Environment (CAPE) (http://children.cape.ca)
also
has helpful suggestion on the process and what to include.
Supply patients with clear, helpful discharge resources from several of these
sites. Go to the ATSDR web site, (http://www.atsdr.cdc.gov) to find discharge
sheets for specific chemical exposures.
What is Next?
What is the next step? Continue to educate yourself with credible sources
(see Table 3 for suggested resources). When using the Internet, keep the
following points in mind when evaluating the source: (a) Who is the author?
(b) Is the
site accurate and current? and (c) Is the site commercial, government, or
educational? (Paulson, 2002). Take a look around and see how many sources you
can
identify. Go to the Health Care Without Harm web site for lists of mercury
hazards. Join a list serve from a reputable environmental organization for
current updates in your area of interest. Protecting children from harm,
whether
physical, emotional, or environmental, is our responsibility as professionals
and adults. Educating ourselves as professionals is one way to support that
mandate.
Post-script -- Washington, DC
The high school in Washington, DC, re-opened November 5, 2003. The final
tally of contamination: the high school, a bus, several homes and apartment
buildings; 69 people were displaced from their homes. Special contractors
supervised
by local and Federal health agencies have cleaned the school by using vacuums
emptying into sealed containers. Final air testing was performed to determine
Hg vapor presence. If Hg has fallen into cracks in the floors, removal of the
floor may be the only way to ensure cleanup. The health threat in this
situation came from inhaling the vapor over weeks or longer. Unfortunately,
there is
no way to predict an individual's reaction to an exposure, making the issue
even more complex. The good news is this school appears safe again; the bad
news: Hg spills occur many times a year in schools and colleges across the
country.
The Environmental Health Hot Topics column focuses on issues, information,
and practical guidelines related to environmental health problems, including
sources of toxicants and resources for nurses to prevent, minimize, or treat
adverse environmental exposures particularly as they relate to children. To
suggest topics, obtain author guidelines, or to submit queries or
manuscripts,
contact Ann Pike-Paris, MS, RN, Section Editor; Pediatric Nursing, East Holly
Avenue Box 56; Pitman, NJ 08071-0056; (856) 256-2300 or FAX (856) 256-2345.
Tables
Table 1. Routes of Exposure/Sources
Inhalation: Elemental/metallic -- air from burning coal, incinerators Ingestion:Organic/methyl -- fish and shell fish; produced naturally by microscopic organisms in soil and water. Hg present from pollution
increases the
organisms' output. Elemental/metallic -- thermometers, fillings, medical treatments, alkaline batteries, electrical switches (thermostats), fluorescent lights, dental fillings, thermometers, sphygmomanometers Dermal:Inorganic/salts -- skin lighteners, antiseptic creams and ointments; rituals
Note: Accidental exposures in the home and workplace often are the source
of unintentional exposures (ATSDR, 2001).
Table 2. Signs and Symptoms of Exposure
Acute Exposure: (Uncommon) cardiovascular collapse, kidney failure, severe GI damage. Inhalation of 1-3mg/m3 for 2-5 hrs. May cause headaches, salivation, chills, cough, fever, tremors, abdominal cramps, diarrhea,
nausea,
vomiting, tightness in the chest, difficulty breathing, fatigue, and lung
irritation. Chronic Exposure: Permanent damage to CNS, kidneys, changes in gait,
speech, sucking and swallowing, abnormal reflexes, impairment of language,
attention and memory. Pink Disease -- irritability, sleeplessness, sweating, severe leg cramps, painful peeling rash. Note: From ATSDR, 2001; GBPSR, 2001; Michigan State University, 1996.
Table 3. Resources
For Your Education:
EnviroDX
> A "virtual clinic;" practice in environmental history taking, tests for diagnoses, sources for chemical products, and treatment possibilities
http://medstat.med.utah.edu/envirodx/index.html New York University Information on Environmental Problems An index of over 125 environmental issues with links and contacts>
http://charlotte.med.nyu.edu/outreach/index.html
Greater Boston Physicians for Social Responsibility (GBPSR)> GBPSR's In Harm's Way: Toxic Threats to Child Development
http://www.igc.org/psr National Library of Science Toxnet-dataases on toxicology, environmental health and a toxicology tutorial http://toxnet.nlm.nih.gov University of Maryland School of Nursing Created for nurses to support environmental health
http://www.EnviRN.umaryland.edu
For You and Families:
> The Children's Environmental Health Network
> National organization promoting protection of the fetus and child,
> education, and research; numerous links, publications, tips for parents
> http://www.cehn.org
> Environmental Protection Agency
> Government site with fact sheets, community data and educational material
> EPA Homepage: http://www.epa.gov
> Office of Children's health: http://epa.gov/children
> National Library of Medicine
> Toxicology and environmental health information
> http://tox.nlm.nih.gov
> The Health Schools Network
> Resources and links pertaining to environmental issues in schools
> http://www.healthyschools.org
> National Center for Environmental Health Centers for Disease Control and
> Prevention
> CDC site devoted to environmental topics including resources, health
> effects, chemical exposures, and more
> http://www.cdc.gov/nceh/default.htm
> Agency for Toxic Substance Disease Registry
> Fact sheets and information on a range of issues
> http://astdr.cdc.gov
> Children's Health Environmental Coalition
> Parent information about preventing health problems by exposures to toxic
> substances
> http://www.checnet.org
> For Diagnostic Questions:
> Pediatric Environmental Health Specialty Units (PEHSUs)
> Ten regional sites for education, consultations
> www.aoec.org/pesu
References
Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry. (2001). Managing hazardous
materials incidents [CD-ROM]. Atlanta, GA: ATSDR Information Center.
Academy of Pediatrics Committee on Environmental Health American. (2003).
Pediatric environmental health (2nd ed.). Elk Grove, IL: American Academy of
Pediatrics.
Children's Environmental Health Network. (1999). Training manual on pediatric
environmental health: Putting it into practice. Retrieved May 14, 3003 from
http://www.CEHN.org
Goldman, L., & Shannon, W. (2001). Technical report: Mercury in the
environment: Implications for pediatricians (RE109907). [Electronic version]
Pediatrics, 108(1), 197-205. Retrieved November 12, 2003, from
http://www.aap.org/policy/t109907.html
Greater Boston Physicians for Social Responsibility. (2001). In harm's way:
Toxic threats to child development. Boston: Red Sun Press.
Institute of Medicine. (1995). Nursing, health, and the environment:
Strengthening the relationship to improve the public's health. Washington,
DC:
National Academy Press.
Michigan State University, Office of Radiation, Chemical and Biological
Safety. (1996). Mercury: A fact sheet for health professionals. Ann Arbor,
MI:
Author.Paulson, J. (September, 2001). Using the Internet to find environmental
health information and avoiding misinformation. Presented at the first Annual
Conference on Children's Health and the Environment, Washington, DC.
Pianin, E. (2003, December 11). Federal warning on tuna planned. The
Washington Post. p. .A01.U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (No date). Consumer factsheet
on: Mercury [Online]. Available: http:www.epa.gov/cgi-bin/epaprintonly.cgi
U.S. Food and Drug Administration (September, 1994). Mercury in fish: Cause
for concern?
[Online]. Available: http://www.fda.gov/fdac/reprints/mercury.html
Ann Pike-Paris, MS, RN is a consultant, East Aurora, NY.
Kellogg’s
cereals with the Spider-Man “Spidey Signals” toys inside are displayed on the
aisle of a Manchester market yesterday afternoon. The toys are being recalled
from New Hampshire store shelves. (MARK BOLTON/UNION LEADER)
The Kellogg Company has agreed to remove all cereal boxes that contain Spider-Man toys called “Spidey Signals” from New Hampshire stores.
Poor Spider-Man.
First, the reluctant superhero confronts angst and glitches in his web-spinning powers on the silver screen. Now, cereal boxes with a toy version of the comic-book character inside are being kicked out of New Hampshire.
Kellogg Co. yesterday agreed to pull from store shelves statewide all its cereal boxes containing the “Spidey-Signal” wrist band because the small battery inside contains mercury. “It’s not a problem of exposure if you eat the cereal. That’s not our concern,” said Senior Assistant Attorney General Maureen D. Smith. Rather, the small, button battery that powers the promotional toy contains mercury, a toxin that can damage the environment if thrown in household trash, and not recycled, she said. State law bars the sale or distribution in the state of “mercury-added novelties” and other mercury-containing products. The toys beam either a red spider web or Dr. Octopus-shaped light and are being used to promote the “Spider-Man 2” movie.
Connecticut has a similar law and Attorney General Richard Blumenthal on Wednesday threatened to take legal action if the products weren’t pulled from store shelves in that state. New Hampshire environmental officials learned of the battery-operated toys yesterday and, working with the Attorney General’s Office, quickly reached an agreement with Kellogg, Smith said. “We learned of it and resolved it in one day, which is lightning speed for a matter like this,” Smith said. Acting Attorney General Kelley A. Ayotte commended the food giant for its swift action.
All retailers are being told to substitute cereal boxes containing “Spidey-Signal” toys with those that don’t, Kellog senior vice-president of corporate affairs Celeste Clark said in a telephone interview from the company’s Battle Creek, Mich. headquarters. Clark estimated several hundred thousand boxes of cereal will be replaced in Connecticut and New Hampshire. They have been on the shelves for one to two months. “I want to affirm that . . . the inclusion of the Spidey promotional toy in no way affects the safety nor the quality of our food,” Clark said.
Clark said Kellogg manufactured the wrist band so it would not pose a choking hazard by securing the battery within the casing. “Unfortunately, the process that we used put the item in conflict with environmental regulations that are specific and unique to both New Hampshire and Connecticut,” Clark said. Kellogg stopped shipment of cereal boxes containing the toys to New Hampshire Thursday, Smith said. Retailers are being asked to ship the boxes back and Kellogg will send “third parties” to monitor stores to confirm they have been removed, she added. Kellogg also posted a toll-free number for consumers to call for instructions on how to return the toys for proper disposal. The number is 1-800-237-1132.
Both the cereal box and a slip of paper inside the plastic pouch in which the toys are wrapped warn the toys contain mercury and should be disposed properly.
Newspaper: The Union Leader Sunday News New Hampshire
Copyright: The Union Leader
Published: 3 July 2004
Contact:
Url: www.theunionleader.com/articles_showa.html?article=40206
http://www.btinternet.com/~k.trethewey/amazing_facts.htm
The magnification of light from the lamps in lighthouse takes place through
giant arrangements of curved prisms and lenses which weigh several tons and
which float in baths of liquid mercury. Despite their great weight, they will
begin to rotate with a gentle push from one finger. Mercury vapour is a very
poisonous substance, the symptoms of mercury poisoning being madness. It has
long been thought that breathing in mercury vapour over a period of years was
the reason why some lighthouse keepers went mad. The theory is unproven,
however. The vast majority of lighthouse keepers who spent the whole of
their working lives in close proximity to these very large masses of mercury
remained as normal as you and me.
""Kids shouldn't be given toxic toys in their cereal boxes," said Laura
Haight, NYPIRG's senior environmental associate. "Unlike comic book heroes,
children don't gain superpowers from toxic chemicals.""
How about injecting it into their bodies????? Maybe NYPIRG should be
informed.
Sheri
Kellogg's Urged to Withdraw Toxic 'Spidey' Toys from Cereal; Groups Praise
State Leaders for Enacting Mercury Labeling, Reduction Law
Mon Jul 12,12:27 PM ET
To: National Desk
Contact: Michael Bender of the Mercury Policy Project, 802-223-9000 or
802-249-8543 (cell); Laura Haight of NYPIRG, 518-436-0876 ext. 258; David
Higby of EANY, 518-462-5526 ext. 239; Judy Braiman of ESCA, 585-383-1317; or
Catherine Bowes of NWF, 802-229-0650
ALBANY, N.Y., July 12 /U.S. Newswire/ -- Consumer and environmental groups
praised the New York State Legislature and Governor Pataki for enacting a law
today that will require labeling and proper management of consumer products
sold in New York State that contain mercury, and will ban the sale or
distribution of mercury-added novelty products such as toys containing
mercury as of January 1st, 2005.
The groups called on Kellogg's cereal company to immediately comply with the
spirit of the law and recall cereal boxes in New York that contain "Spidey-Signal"
toys. The toy is powered with a mercury battery and is
designed to project a web-shaped light. The cereal boxes contain the warning
label, "Battery in toy contains mercury, dispose of properly."
Kellogg's has already withdrawn these products from New Hampshire and
Connecticut, whose laws are similar to the one New York has now enacted.
"Kids shouldn't be given toxic toys in their cereal boxes," said Laura
Haight, NYPIRG's senior environmental associate. "Unlike comic book heroes,
children don't gain superpowers from toxic chemicals." "After a few hours of
fun, most of these toys will end up in the garbage, and ultimately, will
pollute our land, air, and water," said David Higby, Environmental Advocates
of New York solid waste project director. "Mercury can cause irreversible
damage to infants and children."
"While the toy comes with a warning, the battery is not easily removable, not
replaceable, and no instructions are provided on how to dispose of it
properly," said Michael Bender, director of the Mercury Policy Project in
Montpelier, Vermont. "We hope that Kellogg's has learned a valuable lesson -
putting mercury in children's toys is unacceptable. With great power comes
great responsibility."
Across the country, groups have urged local supermarket chains to stop
selling cereal boxes containing the Spidey-Signal toys. Hannaford Bros., one
of New York's major supermarket chains, has stopped selling them at all 34 of
its stores in New York.
"We're very pleased that the Governor has signed this important law," said
Judy Braiman, president of the Empire State Consumer Association. "We urge
our local supermarkets to follow suit and remove the cereals that contain
mercury batteries which pose an environmental hazard." Braiman received a
letter from a Kellogg's company representative stating: "We have made a
decision that moving forward we will source non-mercury
added batteries for all children's toys." However, the company plans to
continue to distribute the Spidey-Signal toy in cereal boxes throughout the
U.S. except for Connecticut and New Hampshire. The groups urged consumers to
call Kellogg's hotline, 1-800-237-1132, with their complaints about the toy.
The mercury bill was signed into law by Governor George E. Pataki at a press
conference in White Plains today. The new law was sponsored by Assemblyman
Thomas P. DiNapoli and Senator Carl Marcellino, the Assembly
and Senate Environmental Conservation Committee chairs. The groups also
praised Westchester County Executive Andy Spano for speaking out on this
issue. In a press statement dated July 6th, Spano called on residents and
stores to boycott Kellogg's cereal products, saying, "We need to send a
message that we won't tolerate such corporate irresponsibility."
http://www.usnewswire.com/
Groups Chide U.S. on Mercury Regulations
Thu Aug 19, 7:50 AM ET
By TOM STUCKEY, Associated Press Writer
ANNAPOLIS, Md. - Environmentalists and two Maryland Democratic congressmen
chastised the Bush administration Wednesday for proposed regulations they
said will not do enough to reduce mercury contamination of Maryland rivers,
lakes and the Chesapeake Bay. "The Bush administration is trying ... by
regulations to undo congressional law," Rep. Benjamin Cardin (news, bio,
voting record), who represents Maryland's 5th District, said. "Mercury is a
dangerous air pollutant. There is no question about that."
Mercury is a toxin that interferes with development of the brain and the
nervous system in fetuses, said Sarah Tomeo, a field representative for U.S.
PIRG, a nonprofit, public interest advocacy group that is active in
environmental issues. Tomeo said the federal Centers for Disease Control
estimates that because of mercury poisoning, 630,000 children are at risk
each year for a range of problems including brain damage, learning
disabilities, attention deficit and heart problems.
"This is no time for the Bush administration to be weakening health
protections," she said. EPA Administration Mike Leavitt said earlier this
month that the regulations proposed by his agency will protect children and
pregnant women without causing undue economic harm to coal-producing states.
Energy plants, especially those that burn coal, are a major source of mercury
pollution
The Natural Resources Defense Council sued the EPA in 1992 trying to force it
to regulate hazardous air pollutants from power plants. As a result, Carol
Browner, who headed the EPA during the former Clinton administration,
directed in late 2000 that mercury be regulated as a toxic hazardous
substance requiring utilities to install "maximum achievable control
technology" at each of nearly 500 coal-fired power plants in the nation.
Natural resources groups contend the regulations proposed by the Bush
administration will weaken the federal Clean Air Act requirements. "In my
view, they are illegally trying to stop enforcement" of the Clean Air Act,
Cardin said.Rep. Christopher Van Hollen from Maryland's 8th District, in a
statement read by one of his aides at a news conference at the Annapolis City
Dock, said instead of enforcing Clean Air Act requirements, the Bush
administration "is now surreptitiously trying to gut it — by regulatory
slight-of-hand, slow-walking enforcement and cynical double speak."
Leavitt said the EPA still views mercury as a toxin. The former Utah governor
has been re-examining the agency's mercury plan since his appointment to the
EPA last November. The plan envisions a 70 percent cut in mercury emissions
from coal-burning power plants by 2018, from the current 48 tons a year to 15
tons. Beth McGee, senior scientist for the Chesapeake Bay Foundation, said
the reductions in mercury contamination proposed by the EPA "are not enough,
and they are not soon enough." "Maryland and the bay states may be among the
big losers," she said.
THE ENVIRONMENT
Here's mercury in your landfill
Do discarded vaccines pose a potential human health risk?
By Bill Lueders
Mike Wagnitz of Madison received the news with alarm. The
Wisconsin State Journal reported that thousands of doses of
flu vaccine "may end up in the trash." Channel 3, he says,
reported that 44,000 doses procured by the state will likely
be "dumped down the drain." Flu vaccine contains a
preservative known as thimerosal, which is half ethyl mercury,
or organic mercury. "They call it good mercury," notes Wagnitz,
a public-health chemist by profession. He says this form of
mercury is chemically nearly the same and possibly more
dangerous than ordinary mercury. (Wagnitz, profiled in 4/11/03
Isthmus article, is a crusader against mercury in vaccines,
which he suspects caused his daughter's autism.)
By Wagnitz's arithmetic, a ten-dose vial of flu vaccine
contains 50,000 parts per billion of mercury, which he believes
makes it too toxic for landfill disposal. There is an
excess of flu vaccines this year because supplies arrived late
and now the doses will soon expire. Judy Aubey of the Madison
Health Department says the city has 760 doses left, for which
it paid about $8.50 per dose. Because the vaccine contains
thimerosal, "It has to go to our Clean Sweep site, along with
other mercury-containing items." It then gets sent to a
hazardous-waste site.
But some health agencies discard unused vaccines as
medical waste, through a local company called Madison Energy
Recycling Inc. Manager John Crha says all med waste is treated
the same: It's ground up, microwaved to "confetti," and carted
off to the county's Rodefeld landfill in 20,000- 25,000-pound
shipments every other day. He says mercury in vaccines "has
never been an issue." Other sources confirm that microwaving
would not change its elemental nature. Gwen Borlaug of the
state Division of Public Health says
there's nothing "live" in flu vaccines so they can "just go
into the regular trash." Jeff Berg, an advisor with the
Wisconsin Immunization Program, says this is what will happen
with any of the 44,000 excess doses still unused past their
June expiration date. (About a quarter of these, he notes, are
thimerosol-free.) They will end up in "an
ordinary landfill." Is this a good idea?
"We certainly want to get mercury out of the environment,
period," says John Melby, a solid waste policy expert with the
state Department of Natural Resources, which has worked to keep
old thermometers and thermostats out of landfills. But Melby
doesn't see mercury in vaccines as a big concern, saying levels
are "way down
from what they used to be." Barb Bickford, the DNR's
medical waste coordinator, says "mercury is supposed to be
managed as a hazardous waste." That means any mercury in excess
of hazardous-waste limits
should not going to an ordinary landfill or an infectious
waste facility.
Dave Parsons, a DNR chemist, says the threshold at which
mercury in liquid waste would make it hazardous waste is about
200 parts per billion. He confirms that flu vaccine with the
amount of thimerosal Wagnitz indicates is listed on the label
would contain about 50,000 parts per billion of inorganic
mercury, or about 250
times the allowable amount. In other words, "It appears that
the waste flu vaccine is very likely a hazardous waste."
In fact, Dane County's Rodefeld landfill considers any
amount of mercury too much. "My personal standard is zero,"
says John Reindl, Dane County's recycling coordinator and
gatekeeper of its Rodefeld landfill. "We don't want any of
it." He would be greatly concerned if any medical waste
containing mercury were to be ending
up in his landfill. "It's a very toxic material." Ralph
Erickson of the Madison Metropolitan Sewerage District says
mercury dumped in the Rodefeld landfill could remain in place
for years, evaporate into the environment along with methane,
or wash out in the leachate. An analysis of leachate from the
landfill last September showed mercury at less-than-detectable
levels. State toxicologist Lynda Knobeloch says "not much is
known about ethyl mercury" but adds that "it's assumed to be
similar to methyl mercury." She isn't sure how concerned
people should be about it ending up in landfills: "We need to
be more concerned about exposure from the shot."
Wagnitz, for his part, thinks any avoidable
mercury exposure ought to be, well, avoided: "I do not want any
family to go through what my family is going through due to
mercury in vaccines."
 |
http://www.newsday.com/news/local/wire/newyork/ny-bc-ny--soapoperascare0818aug18,0,3121826,print.story?coll=ny-region-apnewyorkMercury spills on New York set of `Guiding Light' when prop breaks
By JIM FITZGERALD Copyright 2005 Newsday Inc.
|
http://et.tv.yahoo.com/newslink/index.html#l3
Real-Life 'Guiding Light' Drama
August 18, 2005
The cast and crew of "Guiding Light" went through a real-life scare on-set
Thursday morning. Someone dropped a thermometer while filming scenes on the
"Emergency Room" set in New York City, causing it to
break and spread mercury -- as a result, six actors and about 25 crew members
were quarantined, according to a spokesperson. Fire trucks and a Hazmat team
were sent to the set, but no problems were reported at
this time.
http://tinyurl.com/dp5p6
Boston Globe and Associated Press
Newmont to challenge pollution case
August 18, 2005
MANADO, Indonesia --The world's largest gold mining company will
return to court Friday to defend itself against charges that it
polluted a bay in Indonesia, sickening villagers who lived nearby.
Lawyers for Denver-based Newmont Mining Corp. are expected to argue
that the investigation was flawed and that the law has been poorly
applied.
The trial, which opened two weeks ago on Sulawesi Island, is being
closely watched by business leaders who say a guilty verdict could
set back Indonesia's improving foreign investment climate.
The government says the company's Indonesian subsidiary, Newmont
Minahasa Raya, violated environmental laws by dumping millions of
tons of mercury and arsenic-laced pollutants into the Buyat Bay,
allegedly causing villagers to develop skin diseases and other
illnesses.
It is holding that company's chief, American Richard Ness,
accountable. He faces up to 10 years in prison and a fine of $68,000
if convicted.
Newmont has repeatedly said the charges are baseless, citing test
data that found the bay was not polluted.
But its defense plea on Friday is expected to focus almost entirely
on the legal flaws it says are in the 72-page indictment.
The company refused to discuss its legal strategy publicly this
week. But in the past, it has said it would challenge the case
against Ness, saying that such a challenge doesn't have a basis in
Indonesia's environmental law.
It will also argue that authorities failed first to bring up the
company on administrative charges -- as required by law -- and that
police ignored evidence that favored the company.
Prosecutors are expect to respond to the Newmont plea in the coming
weeks and a judge will rule by mid-September.
© Copyright 2005 The New York Times Company
