Chemical Pollution by Jane Thurnell-Read

Many people are worried about the level of chemicals in the modern world, but should we really be concerned? Are these chemicals polluting the environment and compromising our safety?

Sources Of Chemical Contamination In The Environment

In food in the form of colourings, flavour enhancers, pesticides, herbicides, growth hormones, antibiotics, industrial solvents, etc.

In the water supply in the form of run off from farming, industry and recycled drugs such as the contraceptive pill.

Direct consumption of both medical and recreational drugs.

Personal care products; these can be skin, eye or mucus membrane irritants; if the molecular size is small enough to go through the skin, these products can enter the blood stream and cause problems internally. We just do not know the long-term effect of these combination of chemicals in skin care products.

Household cleaning and construction products; modern furniture and furnishings makes extensive use of man-made chemicals particularly plastics and glues.

In the air from cars, planes, industry, cigarette smoke, etc. (British standards for benzene in petrol are regularly exceeded in urban streets, particularly around petrol stations UK Times March 2nd 1999 - this is an old study, but there's no reason to believe that things are any better now). Diesel exhaust contains more than 40 chemicals listed as toxic air contaminants, carcinogens, reproductive toxins or endocrine disrupters.

How Dangerous Are These Chemicals?

This is difficult to assess for several reasons:

• Many of the detrimental effects may happen only after long-term exposure. This is difficult to prove.
• Some chemicals are not broken down easily and so will accumulate in the body's tissues (bio-accumulation). According to Friends Of The Earth our bodies are now contaminated with over 300 man-made chemicals. Removal of these is difficult.
• There is a large amount of individual variation in people’s susceptibility to these chemicals. People who are allergic to a chemical will experience toxicity problems at a much lower level of exposure than people who are not.
• Each chemical is usually tested for safety on its own. Dr Daniel Osborn is Head of Pollution and Ecotoxicology at the Centre for Ecology & Hydrology, Monks Wood. He is at the forefront of the UK’s monitoring of man-made chemicals in the environment:

“… there are still substantial scientific challenges to be overcome because many of the existing procedures can only deal with one chemical at a time, and are not very good at dealing with real world environmental conditions. This is partly because in the laboratory, where much of the data for risk assessment is gathered, conditions aredeliberately held constant, whereas in the real world, conditions constantly change. Another potential complication is that risk assessment procedures are often applied one chemical at a time, whereas in reality, living organisms are exposed to mixtures of chemicals that vary in composition and even in their availability.”

• Many of the chemical safety tests are carried out on animals that do not necessarily respond in the same way as humans to these chemicals, c.f. thalidomide.

Over the years many chemicals that were thought safe have turned out to be detrimental - mercury, nicotine, arsenic, DDT have all been found to have devastating effects. It is probably wishful thinking to believe that the vast array of chemicals we are now exposed to is not harming us in some way.

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