• Toxics in People

• Chemicals of Concern

Find Us on Facebook
Follow Us on Twitter
Share Our Content
Watch Us on YouTube

Toxics in People

If you're a parent, you've probably already taken your child to have blood drawn to find out if - and more likely how much - of the heavy metal lead is in their body. Lead is just one of the many chemicals that can be detected in our blood, urine, hair, breast milk and fat. The sad truth is that not only are dangerous chemicals found in chemical manufacturing facilities, air and water pollution and in products, they're in our bodies. In response to this growing awareness, in the past decade government agencies and non-profit organizations alike have sought to learn more about the extent to which we all carry toxic chemicals in our bodies by testing human samples - also known as "biomonitoring". What they've found is alarming - even newborn babies have hundreds of industrial chemicals in their umbilical cord blood. From the very beginning of life, we all carry a "body burden" of industrial chemicals that have been linked to a host of diseases, most of which have been on the rise since the post-World War 2 expansion of reliance on synthetic chemicals.

Got Toxic Chemicals?

Hazardous Chemicals in Health Care Professionals

Physicians for Social Responsibility, along with JustGreen Partner Clean New York, SAFER States partners in nine other states, Health Care Without Harm, American Nurses Association and the Safer Chemicals, Healthy Families campaign, released a new biomonitoring report, Hazardous Chemicals in Health Care: A Snapshot of Chemicals in Doctors and Nurses.  

20 doctors and nurses from ten states donated blood and urine samples which were tested for six categories of chemicals (62 individual chemicals in all) and the results were disturbing - though sadly, not surprising.  Each of the 20 participants had at least five of the chemical categories, and at least 24 individual chemicals.  All participants had the same four categories and the same 18 individual chemicals in their bodies.

Is It In Us?

With recent headlines about toxic chemicals in everything from cars and computers to lipstick and toys, 5 New Yorkers and 30 other Americans - including a commercial fisherman from Alaska, a 9/11 first responder from New York, a U.S. naval veteran from Illinois, a Massachusetts minister, a Connecticut State Senator, a Michigan seventh grader, and a stay-at-home mom in Minnesota - volunteered to find the answer to one simple question: If toxic pollution is in products, is it in us?

The simple answer: yes. The project found toxic chemicals in every person tested.  You can see the full results at  www.IsItInUs.org.