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Column: Pollution linked to illness

by Maceo Carrillo Martinet

Daily Lobo columnist

Many different cultures have adopted the belief that the environment is an extension of who we are as a people. Never does this type of relationship ring more true than when we compare environmental pollution with the pollution we carry in our bodies - when we pollute the environment we are ultimately polluting ourselves.

In today's world, everyone carries in their body at least 500 man-made chemicals that did not exist on earth before the 1930s.

Within the last 75 years, the chemical industry has produced more than 80,000 new chemicals for almost every application, from food sweeteners to plastic coatings on food cans to the fragrances that fill our nostrils when moisturizing our skin. Many of these chemicals are harmless to humans and the environment, but some of these chemicals have produced serious health problems to an extent which often is not understood by the general public.

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There are two major categories of chemicals that seriously effect the environment and our bodies. One of these categories is called persistent bioaccumulative chemicals, which, as the name implies, are chemicals that are not easily broken down in the environment and accumulate inside the bodies of animals. The other threatening chemical category is known as endocrine disrupters. These are chemicals that disrupt an organisms' natural balance of hormones, which play an essential role in the growth and development of the body.

Some chemicals that fall into these two categories have been banned in certain countries, but are still being used by those countries with less stringent environmental laws.

Before the introduction of man-made chemicals and other pollutants, the Arctic was once considered home to some of the most pristine environments on earth and was home to some of the healthiest people, like the Inuit indigenous peoples. The Beluga whale, one of the main staples of the Inuit people, has 10 times the iron of beef, twice the protein and five times the vitamin A. The arteries of a typical 70-year-old Inuit from Greenland have shown the same elasticity as a typical 20-year-old in Europe. However, natural winds and ocean currents have carried the world's pollution from the south into this pristine area, converting this region into one of the most polluted on earth.

Two of the most detrimental persistent bioaccumulative chemicals - polychlorinated biphenyls (PCB) and mercury - have found their way into the bloodstream of newborn babies and women's breast milk at a rate 20 to 50 times greater in many of these Arctic communities than in major urban areas in the United States and Europe.

The animals that the Inuit people have depended on for millennia to feed their families and their culture now carry some of the highest levels of toxic compounds ever found in living animals. Toxic pollution of modern society has reached every corner of the earth, even in regions where the people living there do not even have a word in their language for pollution.

Scientists have pointed to the increase in hormone-related cancers such as breast and prostate cancer, signs that young women are having puberty earlier, and the decrease in the sperm count of many men in Europe and North America as evidence that today's synthetic chemicals are causing serious health problems. Clinics in Europe and America are reporting an increase in breast-reduction operations on men to remove mammary gland tissue usually found only in women.

Scientists also speculate that chemicals found in tap water and growth hormones found in the animals we eat might explain why we are witnessing such bizarre developmental problems. Researchers have shown that when male carp and trout are exposed to sewage known to contain chemicals found in birth control, male fish started producing an egg protein only found in female fish.

Locally sponsored research of an indigenous community living next to one of Canada's largest concentrations of agricultural-chemical industries has documented a significant decline in the number of live births that are male.

This reality check is not meant to overwhelm or keep us depressed, but it is a call to become aware of what types of synthetic chemicals we consume. The industries that produce such chemicals are not going to inform the general public about the health concerns of their products, and apparently neither are the complacent agencies that are created to protect the general public. The only source of power is becoming informed, spreading the word and ultimately becoming conscious consumers.

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