- WASHINGTON - Following a published report that the Bush Administration
is holding up a study that shows most Americans carry a toxic rocket
fuel chemical in their bodies at levels close to federal safety limits,
Environmental Working Group (EWG) is calling for the immediate release
of the study so EPA and state agencies can take steps to protect
the public.
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- Risk Policy Report, an independent newsletter,
reported Feb. 28 that the White House Office of Science & Technology
Policy is pressuring the Centers for Disease Control to delay the
release of a study that tested for perchlorate in human blood samples
from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES).
An EPA source told the newsletter that CDC has found levels of perchlorate
that "leave no margin of safety" for the public, compared
to EPA's current risk limit.
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- Perchlorate, the explosive ingredient
in solid rocket fuel, has contaminated drinking water and soil in
at least 35 states, with most of the known contamination coming from
military bases and defense contractors. Tests by EWG, academic scientists
in Texas and Arizona, state officials in California and the U.S.
Food and Drug Administration have found perchlorate in milk, produce
and many other foods and animal feed crops from coast to coast. Perchlorate
is a thyroid toxin, and animal tests show that even small amounts
can disrupt normal growth and development in fetuses, infants and
children.
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- The NHANES study is a followup to a CDC
study last year that found perchlorate in the urine of every one
of 61 Atlanta residents tested, even though concentrations of perchlorate
in the cityÕs drinking water are very low. Last year, scientists
at Texas Tech University also found perchlorate in every sample of
human milk from 36 mothers.
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- In a letter to Dr. Julie Gerberding,
director of the CDC, EWG Senior Vice President Richard Wiles said
the results of the study of Atlanta residents "indicate that
food is likely a major source of perchlorate exposure, and that perchlorate
exposure is likely to be widespread in the general population."
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- Although the EPA has no timetable for
developing a national drinking water standard for perchlorate, both
Massachusetts and California are moving forward with their own safety
standards. The proposed standards - 1 part per billion in Massachusetts
and 6 ppb in California - are far below EPA's recently adopted risk
limit of 24.5 ppb, which is a level used as a guidance for cleaning
up perchlorate- contaminated sites. When the EPA announced the risk
limit, it acknowledged the need for "national guidance on relative
source contribution" - exactly the information the NHANES data
could provide.
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- "In the absence of national safety
standards, the CDC should not be sitting on data so clearly needed
to protect the public from a chemical that appears to be widespread
in drinking water and food," wrote Wiles. "The NHANES perchlorate
data should be released immediately."
-
- http://www.ewg.org Bill Walker or Renee
Sharp, (510) 444-0973 EWG Public Affairs, (202) 667-6982
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