It's Time to Take Out Toxics
Posted July 21, 2010 in Curbing Pollution, Environmental Justice, Health and the Environment, U.S. Law and Policy
Today we are releasing a new video as part of our Take Out Toxics campaign. Check it out:
A centerpiece of our campaign is the need for Congress to pass strong legislation to reform the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA).
For more than 30 years since TSCA was enacted, industrial chemicals have been barely regulated, with no requirement that chemicals meet a safety standard or that industry prove that a new chemical is safe before it is allowed on the market. Dozens of chemicals known to cause cancer, reproductive harm, or learning and developmental disabilities remain in use, with few if any restrictions. And there are thousands of chemicals for which we simply don’t have enough information to determine whether they are safe or not.
So why has it turned out to be so difficult for Congress to reform this law? The chemical industry says that chemicals in commerce are safe. But the industry has fought for years to prevent the Environmental Protection Agency from updating its assessments of well-known carcinogens like formaldehyde and styrene and hidden data that called into question the safety of those same chemicals. While pretending to support the public’s right to know about chemicals, the industry is trying to prevent EPA from even publishing a list of chemicals that the agency is concerned may be unsafe. While pretending to care about protecting the health of America’s families, the chemical industry is spending millions of dollars to fight federal and state-based efforts to remove the endocrine disrupting chemical bisphenol A (found in the blood of 90% of those tested by the Centers for Disease Control) from infant formula and baby bottles. While pretending to be for “sound science,” the chemical industry is mounting a massive campaign to dissuade the EPA from adopting the most up-to-date methods for assessing the risks of toxic chemicals recommended by the National Academy of Sciences.
Enough is enough. It’s time to take toxics out of our cleaning products, our clothes, our furniture, floors, and carpets. It’s time to reform TSCA to protect the public from chemicals, and not the chemical industry from the public. Watch our video. And watch the video from the Safer Chemicals Health Families coalition (NRDC is a founding member).
Send them to your friends.
Then write, call, email, text, meet with, or even communicate telepathically with your representatives in Congress (but if you opt for telepathic communication, use one of the other methods also, just as a backup). Tell them that you want fewer carcinogens in your closet, fewer endocrine disruptors in your cupboard, fewer reproductive toxins in your bedroom (or your kids’ bedroom) and fewer neurotoxins in your office. And you don’t want them in the water your drink or shower in either. Tell your elected representatives that you want Congress to make the chemical industry take their toxics out of your body, and that you want Congress to pass strong TSCA reform. Repeat as necessary until your member of Congress gets it and supports strong reform. You’ll be glad you did.
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Comments
Rihana Max — Jul 23 2010 01:27 PM
Making industrial chemicals safer is something we can all get behind. However, if we want safer chemicals and a safer environment then we must use nonanimal methods of testing.
Currently, many toxicity tests are based on experiments in animals and use methods that were developed as long ago as the 1930’s; they and are slow, inaccurate, open to uncertainty and manipulation, and do not adequately protect human health. These tests take anywhere from months to years, and tens of thousands to millions of dollars to perform. More importantly, the current testing paradigm has a poor record in predicting effects in humans and an even poorer record in leading to actual regulation of dangerous chemicals.
The blueprint for the development and implementation of nonanimal testing is the National Academy of Sciences report, "Toxicity Testing in the 21st Century: A Vision and a Strategy in 2007." This report calls for a shift away from the use of animals in toxicity testing. The report also concludes that human cell- and computer-based approaches are the best way to protect human health because they allow us to understand more quickly and accurately the varied effects that chemicals can have on different groups of people. They are also more affordable and more humane.
These methods are ideal for assessing the real world scenarios such as mixtures of chemicals, which have proven problematic using animal-based test methods. And, they're the only way we can assess all chemicals on the market.
Robin Ingenthron — Jul 31 2010 04:30 AM
I am a strong supporter of nearly all of NRDC's positions on environmental issues, especially regarding extinction and habitat loss leading to extinction. On the subject of toxics, my concern is that too much emphasis is placed on disposal of the toxics, which is the last point of the lifecycle. Our environmental community made a serious error in supporting ROHS (replacement of lead in electronics solder, which was replaced by non-toxic silver and tin, the mining of which produces more toxics than the disposal of the solder). I use the example in lectures of a completely reuseable, organic, non-toxic packaging material - baby seal pelts - to illustrate that obsession with landfills can lead to unintended consequences. So, glad to see NRDC is taking a leadership position, I just want to urge you to consider LCA.