American children are “guinea pigs in an uncontrolled experiment,” according to Senator Frank Lautenberg D-New Jersey who spoke to the Senate Subcommittee on Superfund, Toxics and Environmental Health on October 26th.
Among the many shocking facts shared at the hearing was that only 1 percent of the 84,000 chemicals commonly used in the US today have been studied for safety. Lautenberg sited lax EPA [Environmental Protection Agency] standards, and the ineffective Toxic Substances Control Act of 1976, which has only banned five chemicals in its 34-year history.
The Senate hearing was called to address an increasing number of studies, which have found hundreds of toxic chemicals in the bodies of mothers and, subsequently, in the bodies of their babies. In one such study Dr. Frederica Perera at Columbia Center for Children’s Environmental Health required expectant mothers to wear special backpacks for 48 hours as they walked around New York.
The backpacks included a tube resting only inches from each subject’s mouth. The tube monitored chemical levels in the air the women breathed.
Witnesses called to testify for the Subcommittee included Lisa Jackson, Environmental Protection Agency Administrator, and CNN Chief Medical Correspondent Dr. Sanjay Gupta. Jackson has made toxic chemicals one of her main priorities.
"Everything from our cars to the cell phones we all have in our pockets are made with chemicals," Jackson said at the hearing. "A child born in America today will grow up exposed to more chemicals than any other generation in our history."
CNN’s Gupta was lead reporter on a feature story entitled “Toxic in America” which first aired in June. Gupta said he was shocked to learn during his research that only 200 of the chemicals in use today have undergone required testing by the EPA. He suggested that we were willing to expose first and ask questions later, "What we don't know can really hurt us. And there's a lot we don't know."
The United States falls behind many countries in chemicals it’s willing to ban- most notably countries in Western Europe. Michael Wilson, a professor at UC Berkeley's Center for Occupational and Environmental Health, said the United States is becoming a "dumping ground" for consumer goods that are unwanted and illegal in much of the world. The US has been reluctant to restrict chemicals as companies complain bans would cost their businesses time and money reformulating.
The US government now has to decide if it prefers sick citizens to whining business leaders.
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