How Congress Is About To Make It Easier For Chemical Companies To Poison Us
By Claire Bernish
ActivistPost.com
JANUARY 14, 2016
In the United States, we have become so inured to ironically-titled legislation, the majority of us simply assume legislators find dystopic, tongue-in-cheek humor in toying with our hopes — think: USA Freedom Act, the sole freedom of which lies in the government’s green light to spy on the populace however it chooses. Similarly, a set of bills purporting to reform the 1976 Toxic Substances Control Act makes no exception to that practice, as the Senate’s version, The Frank R. Lautenberg Chemical Safety for the 21st Century Act, bears the name of the late New Jersey senator who espoused strong environmental policy.
But these bills do anything but protect the environment or the people; in fact, states would have a far more difficult time regulating dangerous chemicals on their own, and would be prohibited entirely from doing so while waiting for often snail-paced evaluation by the EPA.
Maine’s 2008 Kid Safe Product Act could serve as an excellent example for potential pitfalls in these ostensible improvements. Though the state has since used that law to list over 1,700 “chemicals of concern” and has required manufacturers to divulge when they employ some of those — even prohibiting the use of other toxic substances altogether when safer alternatives exist — the federal bills would nullify such vital protections in certain scenarios.
Polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDEs) are flame retardants found in everything from foam furniture cushions to plastic housings for TVs, computers, and electronics. PBDEs are also common in automotive parts and children’s toys. Their chemical structure closely resembles notoriously toxic PCBs, dioxins, and furans, and can leach and evaporate into the environment over time. This process “has led to rapid bioaccumulation” in fat tissue of humans and animals. Since their discovery in living organisms in 1981,
[T]hey have been found in birds, fish, shellfish, amphibians, marine mammals, sewage sludge, sediments, air samples, meats, dairy products, and even vegetables in numerous North American and European locations, as well as in Japan. Most alarming, however, has been their discovery in human blood, fatty tissue, umbilical cord blood, and breast milk in every region where scientists have conducted studies. Furthermore, in many areas, concentrations have been increasing exponentially.
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