The nation is not quite as poisonous as it used to be.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) yesterday released an analysis of Americans’ exposure to toxic chemicals that revealed we have lower levels of lead, pesticides, nicotine and other harmful substances compared with a decade ago.
“This is the most extensive assessment ever,” said Dr. Julie Gerberding, CDC director. “It shows we’re making tremendous progress, and that’s good news. Exposure to secondhand smoke continues to plummet, and blood lead levels in children are way down.”
That finding caused considerable excitement among the researchers. In the early 1990s, 4.4 percent of children ages 1 to 5 had elevated lead levels in their blood. The number has dropped to 1.6 percent, which Dr. Gerberding deemed “an astonishing public health achievement.” She credits the decrease to use of unleaded gasoline and better monitoring and treatment of lead exposure.
Public awareness of the hazards of environmental tobacco smoke also has paid off. The study says that levels of cotinine, a form of nicotine, decreased by 68 percent in children, 69 percent in adolescents and 75 percent in adults, compared with data taken between 1988 and 1991.
The pesticides aldrin, endrin and dieldrin are at “undetectable or very low serum levels.” The researchers called these findings “encouraging.”
Fears of mercury in tuna notwithstanding, the study finds that 95 percent of women ages 16 to 49 had mercury levels of 4.6 micrograms per liter of blood or less. Physicians become concerned when this number reaches 58 micrograms per liter of blood in women of childbearing age, a level that can cause birth defects.
The CDC says almost 6 percent of the women in this group have potentially hazardous levels of mercury in their blood and recommended more research and monitoring.
The study, the third in an ongoing series at the agency, measured the levels of 148 potentially dangerous substances in the bodies of about 2,400 people nationwide through blood and urine analysis between 1999 and 2002. Those substances typically are encountered through air, soil, water, dust or food.
This year’s results “help relieve worry and concern,” Dr. Gerberding said.
Others are not so relieved. The American Chemistry Council, a trade group representing pesticide manufacturers, gave the CDC accolades for its “biomonitoring efforts” but questioned its overall recommendation that harmful levels of environmental chemicals warrant even closer research.
CropLife America said pesticides already were “the most intensely researched, tested and regulated chemicals in the United States.”
The Washington-based World Wildlife Fund, meanwhile, said the CDC report “falls short in recognizing the scale of chemical exposure to people and wildlife,” said director Clif Curtis, who recommended the agency include “brominated flame retardants and perfluorinated chemicals” in its next analysis.
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