Signs of Toxic Flame Retardants Found in Americans
Source: WebMD News from HealthDay
By Robert Preidt
HealthDay Reporter
WEDNESDAY, Nov. 12, 2014 (HealthDay News) -- Scientists report that they found evidence of six kinds of toxic flame retardants in Americans.
The researchers tested urine samples from California residents and found detectable levels of a rarely studied group of flame retardants known as phosphates, and one -- tris-(2-chloroethyl) phosphate (TCEP) -- has never been seen in Americans before.
TCEP, a known carcinogen that can also damage people's nervous and reproductive systems, was detected in 75 percent of the people tested, the scientists said. This flame retardant is used in polyurethane foam, plastics, polyester resins and textiles.
Another cancer-causing flame retardant detected in nearly all of the study participants was TDCIPP (chlorinated tris), which is similar to TCEP. This came as a surprise because TDCIPP was phased out of children's pajamas in the 1970s, the researchers noted.
The findings were published online Nov. 12 in the journal Environmental Science & Technology.
"We found that several toxic flame retardants are in people's bodies. When you sit on your couch, you want to relax, not get exposed to chemicals that may cause cancer," study author Robin Dodson, a scientist with the Silent Spring Institute, said in a news release from the nonprofit research group.
Read more: http://www.webmd.com/news/20141112/scientists-find-signs-of-toxic-flame-retardants-in-americans
proverbialwisdom
(4,959 posts)EMBARGOED UNTIL: 8:01 AM Eastern, November 12, 2014
[center]A Previously Unrecognized Flame Retardant Found in Americans for the First Time
Scientists Discover How to Detect Several Additional Flame Retardants in Peoples Bodies[/center]
A new peer-reviewed study found that people are contaminated with several toxic flame retardants rarely studied in the US, including one that has never before been detected in Americans called TCEP. Scientists tested urine samples of California residents for biomarkers of six chemicals, all of which were present.
The scientists discovered a way to test for this class of toxic flame retardants (phosphates), which could open up a new wave of research into a group of pervasive flame retardants that were previously not studied nearly as much as some other flame retardants.
Funded in part by the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the study by researchers at Silent Spring Institute and the University of Antwerp was published online today in the peer-reviewed journal Environmental Science & Technology.
We found that several toxic flame retardants are in peoples bodies. When you sit on your couch, you want to relax, not get exposed to chemicals that may cause cancer, said lead author, Robin Dodson, ScD, a scientist with the nonprofit research group Silent Spring Institute. Some flame retardants have been targeted for phase out, but unfortunately there are others that have largely been under the radar.
Fortunately, furniture without flame retardants is now available since the State of California recently revised its flammability standard after a public health outcry. The earlier standard resulted in high levels of flame retardants used in upholstered furniture across the country without appreciably improving fire safety. Hopefully levels of the chemicals in peoples bodies will decrease as consumers are able to choose flame retardant-free furniture.
The chemical detected in Americans for the first time, TCEP [tris-(2-chloroethyl) phosphate], is a carcinogen and can also harm peoples nervous and reproductive systems. The biomarkers for the chemical were detected in the urine of 75% of the people tested. More than a half a million pounds of TCEP are produced every year for use in polyurethane foam, plastics, polyester resins and textiles. It is listed under Californias Proposition 65 as a carcinogen and the European Union has classified it as a Substance of Very High Concern.
Another carcinogenic chemical detected in the study is similar to TCEP, like an evil cousin, called TDCIPP (chlorinated "tris" . Some had expected that it wouldnt be so prevalent because they thought its production diminished after it was phased out of childrens pajamas years ago. Arlene Blum, PhD, Executive Director of the Green Science Policy Institute and Visiting Scholar Silent Spring Institute at UC Berkeley, said, "It is hard to believe that a metabolite of chlorinated tris, the same flame retardant we helped remove from baby pajamas in the 1970s, was found in almost all of the study participants. It is such good news that, thanks to the new flammability standard, such harmful chemicals are no longer needed in our furniture."
This study adds to a previous analysis of flame retardants in dust samples that were taken from homes of the same people whose urine was tested. The researchers chose to test urine samples for this class of phosphate flame retardants after seeing a high prevalence of them in the dust, and recognizing the dearth of information on this group of chemicals. In the household dust, half of the homes exceeded EPA health guidelines for either TCEP or TDCIPP.
Another interesting finding from this new study is that the people with the highest level of TCEP and TDCIPP metabolites in their urine live in homes that had the highest quantity of the respective chemical in dust.
This study provides more evidence that our homes are a primary source of exposure to toxic flame retardants, said Julia Brody, PhD, Executive Director and Senior Scientist at Silent Spring Institute.
Tony Stefani, President of the San Francisco Firefighters Cancer Prevention Foundation, said, It has been proven that flame retardants do not provide the level of protection necessary to save lives and property. We have known how toxic these chemicals are for decades and yet they are still being used.
It disturbs me that Californians have cancer-causing flame retardants in their bodies. Another recent study showed San Francisco firefighters had higher flame retardant levels in their blood than the general population of California. We feel that these chemicals are a very large piece of a toxic, complex chemical puzzle we encounter when fighting a fire.
Brody described some good news that came from the research: There has been a breakthrough in that we now know what to look for when trying to figure out if someone has these toxic chemicals in their bodies. This should open up future research on several toxic flame retardants that havent been scrutinized enough before. The study identifies which biomarkers to look for in urine for each chemical to indicate the presence of the contaminant.
Rachel Gibson, Director of the Safer Chemicals Program at Health Care Without Harm, commented, We are pleased to see furniture manufacturers taking steps to remove flame retardants from their products, as a result of California's new flammability standard. In support of the Healthier Hospitals Initiative, already five major health systems have pledged to buy furniture without these toxic chemicals." Those systems include Advocate Health Care, Beaumont Health System, Hackensack University Medical Center, Kaiser Permanente, and University Hospitals.
What Can Consumers Do? In addition to asking companies for flame retardant-free sofas at retailers like IKEA and Williams-Sonoma, which will begin selling these products early next year, consumers can also reduce their risk by cleaning surfaces with a wet cloth or mop and vacuuming with a HEPA filter, as these chemicals are emitted into the air and collect in dust. Consumers can also skip foam padding under carpets or request padding without flame retardants. People should also throw away foam that is deteriorating, as it likely sheds even more of the chemicals.
Senator Schumer recently introduced the Children and Firefighters Protection Act of 2014 (S.2811). The bill prohibits use of 10 designated flame retardants, including the three chlorinated phosphate flame retardants found in this study, in childrens products and upholstered furniture.
The study was funded by the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, The New York Community Trust, the Fine Fund, and Art beCAUSE Breast Cancer Foundation.
###
ATTENTION REPORTERS: More details, including tips for reducing exposure, are available. Scientists involved in the study and others who can comment on it are available for interviews.
Silent Spring Institute is a scientific research organization that studies links between the environment and womens health. www.silentspring.org
proverbialwisdom
(4,959 posts)BlueJazz
(25,348 posts)mountain grammy
(26,623 posts)Elmer S. E. Dump
(5,751 posts)mountain grammy
(26,623 posts)Gore1FL
(21,132 posts)Mnemosyne
(21,363 posts)WhiteAndNerdy
(365 posts)OnyxCollie
(9,958 posts)U-S-A! U-S-A!
jtuck004
(15,882 posts)Hey, with all the talk about Nixon, how could we leave out this charmer?
G. Gordon Liddy
...
The G, surprisingly, doesn't stand for "goon," "ghoul" or "gestapo." It stands for "George." However, G. Gordon Liddy's second middle name is "Battle," which has to count for something.
...
Liddy left the White House to join the aptly named Committee to Re-Elect the President (CREEP) in 1972, but he remained an integral part of the Nixon administration's secret operational team. In early 1972, Liddy presented Nixon's attorney general, John Mitchell, with an action plan called "Operation Gemstone." Gemstone laid out a $1 million budget for black ops activity against the president's political enemies, including covert schemes to manipulate Howard Hughes and Aristotle Onassis and a proposal to kidnap dissidents who might protest at the Republican National Convention later that year.
...
Liddy's world view is probably best explained by some of the colorful anecdotes he likes to share. At parties, Liddy was known to hold his hand over a candle flame until it burned, in order to demonstrate the merits of willpower, explaining that "the trick is not to mind the pain." Liddy was once afflicted with a fear of rats, so he caught, cooked and ate a rat, just to get over it.
...
Here.
There are some far-reaching claims on that page, but it is certainly one view of a history that could be seen from different ways, with some of it likely buried so far no one may ever see it.
mountain grammy
(26,623 posts)jtuck004
(15,882 posts)He is such a rat bastard traitor to everything this nation aspires to be.
C Moon
(12,213 posts)I guess my worries of spontaneous human combustion are gone.
This sounds really awful.
I wonder if any of it has to do with chemicals used in fighting fires, and ends up in the water.
Spitfire of ATJ
(32,723 posts)hollysmom
(5,946 posts)have to look again. May have done it to myself for buying vinyl instead of cloth.
Javaman
(62,530 posts)Basically, if you have ever flown in a commercial airline during your lifetime, you will have flame retardant in your blood stream. It maybe microscopic in its levels, but it will be there.
this is just one of many chems in your system via environmental factors.
more over, National Geographic has a very expensive test that you can take to find out exactly what is in your system.
They had a very well researched article on this very same subject several years ago.
Sunlei
(22,651 posts)SFU health sciences professor Bruce Lanphear is part of the research team that measured the levels of flame retardants, or polybrominated diphenyl ethers, (PBDEs) in 309 U.S. women at 16 weeks of pregnancy, and followed their children to the age of five.
PBDEs have been widely used as flame retardants in furniture, carpet padding, car seats and other consumer products over the past three decades. While most items containing PBDEs were removed voluntarily from the market a decade ago, some are still in commerce and others persist in the environment and human bodies. Nearly all homes and offices still contain some PBDEs.
"The results from this and other observational human studies support efforts to reduce Penta-BDE exposures, especially for pregnant women and young children," says Lanphear. "Unfortunately, brominated flame retardants are persistent and North Americans are likely exposed to higher PBDE levels than people from other parts of the world. Because of this it is likely to take decades for the PBDE levels in our population to be reduced to current European or Asian levels."
http://medicalxpress.com/news/2014-05-flame-retardant-exposure-linked-iqs.html#inlRlv
MrScorpio
(73,631 posts)appalachiablue
(41,145 posts)canopy in flames. The incident was seen by many TV viewers, caused much concern about public fires. The event added even more impetus to using chemical flame retardants in home consumer products- carpets, foam, upholstery, pajamas. The Tobacco industry was a large supporter of this recourse rather than stopping cigarette smoking, a suspect of house fires. Keep on puffing, you'll be protected by the toxic sofa pillows!
James Redford's film, 'Toxic Hot Seat' (2013) on HBO covered the increase of flame retardants in consumer products for decades, the bad health effects and how firefighters are seriously sickened by the burning furnishings they encounter in their work over time.
An excellent consumer website that keeps up with chemicals we face in consumer goods, plastics, food and the environment is: saferchemicals.org. Rodale Press also covers agriculture, food and consumer toxins.
mountain grammy
(26,623 posts)This is serious stuff, but some of the comments on this thread are hilarious and I appreciate each and every one of them.
Chemicals are what ails us and they are us. The free market and all.
WhoWoodaKnew
(847 posts)I know, make fun of me if you want.
But, how can I tell if this stuff is in my sofa? Is it in all sofas???
Strelnikov_
(7,772 posts)oops