Study find pollutants in Canadian blood samples
From sympaticomsn.ctv.ca CTV.ca News StaffNovember 09, 2005
Canadians are walking around with a cocktail of harmful toxic chemicals in their bodies, says a new report from an environmental watchdog group.
The report, entitled Toxic Nation: A Report on Pollution in Canadians finds that, no matter where Canadians live, how old they are or what they do for a living, they are contaminated with measurable levels of chemicals that can cause cancer, disrupt hormones, affect reproduction, cause respiratory problems or impair neurological development.
The study was commissioned by Environmental Defence. It examined blood and urine samples taken from 11 people from across the country to examine the range of pollutants found in Canadians' bodies.
Researchers looked for the presence of 88 chemicals, including heavy metals, PCBs, PBDEs (which are used as flame retardants), organochlorine pesticides, and volatile organic compounds (VOCs).
The tests found 60 of the 88 chemicals in the 11 volunteers, including 18 heavy metals, five PBDEs, 14 PCBs, one perfluorinated chemical, 10 organochlorine pesticides, five organophosphate insecticide metabolites and seven VOCs.
On average, 44 chemicals were detected in each volunteer.
"The message to Canadians is: it doesn't matter where you live, how old you are, it doesn't matter how clean living you are or if you eat organic food, or if you get a lot of exercise," Environmental Defence director Rick Smith tells CTV News.
"We are all polluted. We all carry inside of us hundreds of different pollutants and these things are accumulating inside our bodies every day."
Although the study examined only 11 volunteers, Environmental Defence says the 11 included men and women from a variety of geographic locations, ethnicities, ages and occupations and were selected to represent the diversity of the Canadian population.
"The fact we have so many chemicals in our volunteers, we would expect similar results in all Canadians," Smith says.
The volunteer who had the highest concentrations of chemicals in his blood was David Masty, chief of the Whapmagoostui First Nation, a Cree community in northern Quebec. Some 51 chemicals were found in him, as well as some of the highest levels of heavy metals.
The report speculates that residents in the North tend to eat more marine life than other Canadians, putting them at greater exposure to mercury and persistent organic pollutants. As well, many chemicals tend to accumulate in the North due to air and water currents and climatic conditions.
Environmental Defence says similar studies on chemical exposure have been conducted in the United States and Europe. But until now, information on pollution in Canadians has been limited. This study is therefore the first in Canada to test for a broad range of chemicals in average Canadians throughout the country.
Casting light on the issue
"We are frankly trying to ring an alarm bell with this report," Smith says, "and point out how bad the situation has become with pollution."
The Toxic Nation report says that in the last 50 years, the global production of man-made chemicals has increased substantially, with more than 80,000 new chemicals created.
"Information on the health and environmental effects of chemicals has not kept pace with their development and use," the report says. "As a result, many of the chemicals that people are exposed to every day have never been assessed for their impact on human health."
The watchdog says the majority of chemicals on the market have never been assessed by Canadian government officials for their potential effects on human health. They say that our government's approach to toxic chemical regulation has proven ineffective.
"I cannot underline enough what a miserable failure the pollution policies of the federal government are," says Smith. "The OECD (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development) late last year released a report showing Canada ranks at the bottom of the barrel among industrialized nations for environmental performance and pollution prevention."
The one area of bright light the study did find is data that suggest that if certain chemicals are banned, younger generations benefit.
They point to the example of PCBs, which were banned in Canada in the 1970s. While the compounds were detected in all volunteers, including those born in the early 1980s, there were fewer of them in younger Canadians.
The study found between 12 and 14 PCBs in the samples from volunteers aged 60 and older, and only five PCBs in the samples from volunteers aged 25 and under.
"A decreased presence of PCBs in the younger volunteers in this study suggests that when governments take action to eliminate the use of toxic chemicals, people's toxic load will decrease, even if it does take several decades," the report says.
The watchdog would like the government to legislate the phase-out of PBDEs, perfluorinated chemicals and their precursors (PFOS), and phthalates (chemicals that make plastics soft.)
And they say that average Canadians can reduce their personal exposure to chemicals by buying organic foods, not using pesticides and using non-toxic cleaning products.