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Drugs in Drinking Water Killing Our Brains

Drugs in Drinking Water Killing Our Brains

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qGWWarqyp8I

 

Pharmaceuticals, Personal Care Products Found in New York City Water Supply

Natural News
December 31, 2009

The Environmental Working Group (EWG) has issued support for a proposed law that would require the Department of Environmental Protection in New York City to test the city’s drinking water supply for personal care product and pharmaceutical residue. Citing numerous studies that have found measurable levels of such contaminants in water supplies around the nation, EWG is encouraging support for measures that would investigate and report contaminant levels to the public.

Reports have found that the nation’s water supplies contain various antibiotics, phytoestrogens and estrogenic steroids, and pharmaceutical and genotoxic drugs. New York City’s water supply is no exception. Since these contaminants have the potential to inflict widespread reproductive harm, neuro-degeneration, endocrine disruption, and cell destruction in humans, EWG is urging that New York City monitor contaminant levels and issue annual water quality reports that outline the results. Since most of these contaminants are currently unregulated, they are typically not disclosed in existing water quality reports.

Wastewater treatment facilities are capable of removing most contaminants from water, however a small percentage of fragments make their way back into the water supply. When combined with thousands of other fragments, the aggregate mass of contaminant particles can pose serious health risks. The extent to which such contamination causes harm has yet to be fully understood and observed.

As it currently stands, pharmaceutical drugs are not regulated in tap water. Drinking water is usually not tested for them and, when it is, the results are usually withheld from the public. Both the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) have failed to set any guidelines for pharmaceutical content in water. Thus any level of pharmaceuticals in water is considered to be legal.

Perhaps the most important call from EWG is for improvements in wastewater treatment facility technology. Current methods work for certain microorganisms and compounds but fail to adequately filter pharmaceutical drugs and other synthetic compounds from water. Ultraviolet treatment, activated carbon treatment, and ozonation are some of EWG’s suggestions for updating filter technology.

The goal of EWG is to promote water pollution reduction strategies that include raising public awareness about the issue, gathering and disseminating regular water quality data, and working to implement mitigation strategies both in the short and long terms.

Installing a home reverse osmosis system is a great way to ensure that one’s family is receiving clean water. Reverse osmosis is highly effective at purifying water, removing virtually every known particle and contaminant. It also removes chlorine, fluoride, and other toxic substances added to many municipal water supplies that would otherwise pass through most other water filtration systems.

STOP DRINKING CITY WATER: Get an EcoloBlue Atmospheric Water Generator!

 



BP Fails Proper Booming of Oil Spill

BP Fails Proper Booming of Oil Spill

 



Plastic Trash Found in Whale’s Stomach

Wheres greenpeace now? Thats right, trying to pass carbon taxes.
Plastic Trash Found in Whale’s Stomach

 



BPA hormone disruptor contaminates Earth’s oceans

BPA hormone disruptor contaminates Earth’s oceans

Natural News
April 13, 2010

Earlier this year, research linked bisphenol A (BPA), a common component of plastics and a powerful hormone disrupter, to heart disease (http://www.naturalnews.com/027974_b…). Now, in the March issue of the Journal of the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology, researchers have reported yet another newly discovered danger posed by BPA. Hugh S. Taylor, M.D., professor in the Department of Obstetrics, Gynecology and Reproductive Sciences at Yale University, and his research team have found for the first time that BPA exposure during pregnancy can cause abnormalities in the uterus of offspring and permanent alterations in DNA.

But at least you can avoid plastics and therefore avoid exposure to the BPA, right? Unfortunately, another group of scientists has just announced that’s getting harder and harder to do. Bottom line: there is now solid evidence that Earth’s oceans have been contaminated on a global scale with BPA.

Katsuhiko Saido, Ph.D., of Nihon University in Chiba, Japan, and his colleagues announced their startling and worrisome findings at the 239th National Meeting of the American Chemical Society held in San Francisco recently. He stated that the massive BPA contamination of oceans resulted from hard plastic trash thrown in the seas as well as from another surprising source — the epoxy plastic paints used to seal the hulls of ships.

“This new finding clearly demonstrates the instability of epoxy, and shows that BPA emissions from epoxy do reach the ocean. Recent studies have shown that mollusks, crustaceans and amphibians could be affected by BPA, even in low concentrations,” Dr. Saido said in a statement to the media.

The scientists noted that light, white-foamed plastic decomposed rapidly at temperatures commonly found in the oceans, releasing the endocrine disruptor BPA. It isn’t just soft plastics that leach BPA, either.

“We were quite surprised to find that polycarbonate plastic biodegrades in the environment,” Dr. Saido explained. “Polycarbonates are very hard plastics, so hard they are used to make screwdriver handles, shatter-proof eyeglass lenses, and other very durable products. This finding challenges the wide public belief that hard plastics remain unchanged in the environment for decades or centuries. Biodegradation, of course, releases BPA to the environment.”

Dr. Saido’s research team analyzed sand and seawater from over 200 sites in 20 countries, including areas in Southeast Asia and North America. Every site tested contained what Dr. Saido labeled as “significant” amounts of BPA, ranging from 0.01 parts per million (ppm) to 50 ppm.

Dr. Saido pointed out that littering currently results in about 150,000 tons of plastic debris washing up on the shores of Japan alone each year. In addition, a huge area of plastic waste known as the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, which is about two times the size of Texas, now contaminates the area between California and Hawaii. “Marine debris plastic in the ocean will certainly constitute a new global ocean contamination for long into the future,” Dr. Saido predicted in the press statement.

In yet more BPA news, Rolf Halden, associate professor in the School of Sustainable Engineering at Arizona State University and assistant director of Environmental Biotechnology at the Biodesign Institute, has just published a sobering research article on the hazards of chemical-loaded plastics. His findings, which are included in the latest issue of the Annual Review of Public Health, provide more evidence that plastics in garbage dumps, landfills and the world’s oceans are an ever-increasing toxic problem.

In fact, Dr. Halden concluded in his paper that plastics and their additives such as BPA aren’t only around us; they are inside virtually every human. The chemicals show up in blood and urine tests because they are ingested with the food we eat, the water we drink and from other environmental exposures.

“We’re doomed to live with yesterday’s plastic pollution and we are exacerbating the situation with each day of unchanged behavior,” Dr. Harden said in a press statement. “We are at a critical juncture and cannot continue under the modus that has been established. If we’re smart, we’ll look for replacement materials, so that we don’t have this mismatch — good for a minute and contaminating for 10,000 years.”

 



Earth Being Sprayed With Aluminum?

Earth Being Sprayed With Aluminum?

Michael J. Murphy
Infowars.com
April 6, 2010

Could a Ban of Transparent Reporting at the Asilomar Conference be an Attempt to Cover-Up World-Wide Contamination From Stratospheric Aerosol Geo-Engineering Programs?

Geo-engineers gathered once again near Monterey California at the Asilomar International Conference on Climate Intervention Technologies meeting to develop norms and guidelines for what they say will be “controlled experimentation” on geo-engineering the planet. While many claim that stratospheric aerosol geo-engineering (SAG), aka chemtrail programs are in full-scale deployment, organizers of this meeting showed a lack of transparency by either denying or holding reporters to a high set of rules which limited what information was brought to the attention of the public. While we might never know how much information from the conference was suppressed in articles and reports, we do know some of the information that was not included. The issue of current SAG deployment and the use of aluminum in these programs seemed to be missing from reports and articles that came out of the conference.

Mauro Oliveira, webmaster of GeoEngineeringWatch said that aluminum became a concern to many after the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) meeting when independent journalists sent shockwaves around the world after breaking the story of scientists discussing the plausibility of spraying 10 to 20 mega-tons of aluminum into the sky in SAG campaigns. Francis Mangels, a retired USDA/USFS Biologist commented on the use of aluminum by saying, “although aluminum is an abundant element, it does not exist naturally in the environment in free form. Dispersing massive amounts of ultra-fine aluminum particulates as proposed by geo-engineers into the stratosphere would have unquantifiable human health and environmental impacts”. When scientists were asked about the risks associated with the use of aluminum sprayed as an aerosol in SAG programs, they admitted that they have only begun to research aluminum and have published nothing. They also admitted that something terrible could be found in the future that they don’t know about. Also, when asked about deployment of current programs, scientists denied that any SAG programs have been deployed. This contradicted the findings of many who claim that SAG programs are well under-way and that high amounts of aluminum and other harmful substances from these programs are being found resulting in the devastation of eco-systems and the health of people around the world.

Like the AAAS meeting, the Asilomar geo-engineering conference hosted some of the world’s leading geo-engineers, environmental groups and scientists who gathered to discuss various issues relating to SAG. Unlike the AAAS meeting, reporters were either denied attendance or set to a high standard of rules which included a ban on daily reporting, quoting, and recording anything from the meeting without the consent of presenters. Stewart Howe was one of the reporters denied access into the conference. Howe helped break the story about aluminum when he was sent to the AAAS meeting in San Diego to report for Infowars. He feels that he was denied access because of this and his reporting of evidence that suggests SAG programs are in full-scale deployment. Howe said, “due to the devastating effects of aluminum and world-wide claims of current deployment, transparent reporting of this could devastate the entire SAG agenda compromising billions of dollars in contracts.” He went on to say that it was apparent that this meeting had no intentions of being transparent.

Whereas many reporters were denied access to this event, some “privileged” journalists did have the opportunity to attend. Although some of the articles about the conference appeared to be critical of geo-engineering, they largely ignored the use of aluminum and other serious issues that could have impacted or changed the damaging components of the SAG agenda. Due to their agreement to the strict, non-transparent guidelines of the conference, the reporting journalists not only helped keep some of the meeting secret, they also helped hide the fact that geo-engineers are “planning” to use aluminum in SAG programs. Some articles were also falsely written stating that geo-engineers are planning on using sulfur in the various SAG campaigns. This contradicts articles written by some reporters who attended the AAAS meeting and quoted scientists as stating that they initially considered using sulfur for the program; however, aluminum is more effective and will be the ingredient considered for use. To date, scientists have not corrected the journalists who falsely reported the use of less damaging sulfur instead of harmful aluminum as being an ingredient for SAG programs.

Let’s look at this issue a little more closely. People from around the world are witnessing white trails behind airplanes and believe them to be a product of SAG programs that scientists deny exist. People are also reporting test results of high amounts of aluminum, barium and strontium in their snow, rain and soil where the alleged spraying is occurring. These are the exact substances that scientists are “considering” implementing into the various SAG programs discussed at the AAAS meeting. Shockwaves were sent around the globe after the AAAS meeting because of reports that led many to believe that the destruction of eco-systems and the massive amounts of aluminum found in the snow, rain and soil are in fact from SAG programs that have already been deployed. As a result of these reports, many around the world are asking questions about the current deployment and the dangers of using aluminum in these programs. And finally, journalists are restricted from reporting certain facts from this conference that could be damaging to the SAG agenda.

Could transparent reporting of certain facts threaten the current and future deployment of SAG programs around the world? Could denying independent reporters the freedom to openly report on this meeting be an attempt to cover-up allegations that SAG programs are in full-scale deployment and are also destroying eco-systems around the world with the use of aluminum? Is it possible that the reporters who were allowed into this meeting were invited for the purpose of protecting the corporate and political interests of those involved with SAG programs? What would the political and monetary implications be for those who have vested interests in SAG if the larger public was made aware of the multiple environmental and health effects of spraying mega-tons of aluminum into our environment? Whatever the reason for this lack of transparency and denial of information, we the public need to hold both reporters and scientists to a higher degree of professionalism, transparency and ethical consideration when it comes to these and other issues of public interests. The future of our health and environment is dependent upon it. More information and videos on the subject of geo-engineering/chemtrails can be found on my blog at http://truthmediaproductions.blogspot.com/ . I can also be reached at whtagft@hotmail.com.

 



Chinese Fluoride In Mass. Water Raises Concern

Story on Mystery Substance Distracts from Fact Fluoride is a Deadly Killer

Kurt Nimmo
Infowars.com
March 13, 2010

The “investigative” team at WCVB TV in Boston ran a story yesterday about an unknown substance in fluoride imported from China. “Team 5 Investigates found the Amesbury Water Department pulled fluoride from its system amid concerns about its supply from China,” the news station reported. “Department of Public Works Director Rob Desmarais said after he mixes the white powder with water, 40 percent of it will not dissolve.” Desmarais said the residue clogs his machines and makes it difficult to get a consistent level of fluoride in the town’s water.


A screen capture from the WCVB TV report reveals fluoride added to drinking water is a deadly toxin.

In the video report below, WCVB mentions melamine in food products and the heavy metal cadmium in toys imported from China while completely ignoring the larger and more important issue — fluoride is an extremely dangerous toxin that kills.

“Fluoride is added to the water most of us drink because the government believes it’s a safe and inexpensive way to prevent tooth decay.”

Fluoride does not prevent tooth decay. According to numerous studies, water fluoridation actually increases tooth decay. The AMA and others fallaciously claim that fluoride added to over 62% of U.S. water supplies reduces tooth decay. However, no less than six studies from dental journals show it does not and, in fact, may increase the likelihood of dental cavities.

Exposure to fluoride often results in dental fluorosis. Large numbers of U.S. young people — estimated up to 80 percent in some cities — now have dental fluorosis, the first visible sign of excessive fluoride exposure. Dental fluorosis consists of damage to tooth-forming cells, leading to a defect in tooth enamel. It is also an indicator of fluoride damage to bones.

WCVB TV’s own report reveals that fluoride is a deadly chemical. Near the beginning of the video, we are shown an industrial sized bag of fluoride at the Amesbury Water Department. “Sodium Fluoride,” a label on the bag warns, “Danger! Poison-Toxic by Ingestion.” The label states the chemical targets the heart, kidneys, bones, central nervous system, the gastrointestinal system, and teeth.

Studies reveal fluoride also attacks the immune and respiratory systems. It negatively affects blood circulation and accumulates in the bones. It attacks thyroid function. Fluoride also accelerates aging. Austrian researchers proved in the 1970s that as little as 1 ppm fluoride concentration can disrupt DNA repair enzymes by 50%. When DNA can’t repair damaged cells, advanced aging occurs. Researchers from Harvard University and the National Institutes of Health knew in the 1960s that fluoride disrupted collagen synthesis and increased aging.

Instead of the in-your-face danger of fluoride presented in the “investigative” news report, the intrepid reporters at WCVB concentrate on the mystery substance from China and connect it to melamine and cadmium. Talk about missing the forest for the trees.

The fluoride added to 90% of drinking water is hydrofluoric acid which is a compound of fluorine that is a chemical byproduct of aluminum, steel, cement, phosphate, and nuclear weapons manufacturing. “In this form, fluoride has no nutrient value whatsoever. It is one of the most caustic of industrial chemicals. Fluoride is the active toxin in rat poisons and cockroach powder,” notes Prevent Disease.

Moreover, hydrofluoric acid is used to refine high octane gasoline, to make fluorocarbons and chlorofluorocarbons for freezers and air conditioners, and to manufacture computer screens, fluorescent light bulbs, semiconductors, plastics, herbicides, and remarkably toothpaste.

Fluoride is a big time neurotoxin. Substantial research reveals it results in widespread brain damage and learning disabilities. Extensive research on fluoride and the brain has been prompted by studies from China, India, Iran, and Mexico discovering that elevated levels of fluoride exposure are associated with IQ deficits in children.

“Repeated doses of infinitesimal amounts of fluoride will in time reduce an individual’s power to resist domination, by slowly poisoning and narcotizing a certain area of the brain, thus making him submissive to the will of those who wish to govern him,” the chemist Charles Perkins wrote to the Lee Foundation for Nutritional Research in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, on 2 October 1954.

Perkins explained how the Nazis exchanged ideas with the Russians on mass medication of a population through drinking water prior to invading Poland in 1939. “I was told of this entire scheme by a German chemist who was an official of the great IG Farben chemical industries and was also prominent in the Nazi movement at the time. I say this with all the earnestness and sincerity of a scientist who has spent nearly 20 years’ research into the chemistry, biochemistry, physiology and pathology of fluorine — any person who drinks artificially fluoridated water for a period of one year or more will never again be the same person mentally or physically.”

Both Nazi and Soviet concentration camps maintained fluoride administration to inmates to decrease resistance to authority.

However, of vital importance to our eugenics-minded rulers, fluoride has repeatedly been found to interfere with reproduction. “A few human studies suggested that high concentrations of fluoride exposure might be associated with alterations in reproductive hormones, effects on fertility, and developmental outcomes,” the National Research Council reported in 2006. In 1994, the Journal of Toxicology and Environmental Health published a study demonstrating a correlation between fluoride and reduced fertility and birth rates.

Fluoride is no longer confined to drinking water. According to the Agricultural Research Service, as of 2004 fluoride was present in 400 separate food and beverage items.

None of this was mentioned in the WCVB TV news report. Instead we are told to worry about melamine and cadmium, both certainly dangerous but nowhere approaching the threat level posed by massive fluoride poisoning.

As for the story researchers at WCVB TV, one has to wonder if maybe their cognitive ability to get to the bottom of the real story was seriously affected by a lifetime of fluoride ingestion.

 



Stock Up on Incandescent Light Bulbs

Stock Up on Incandescent Light Bulbs: In Fact, Buy a Lifetime Supply of Them

J. Speer-Williams
Infowars.com
March 11, 2010

Our government’s”Green Revolution” is another covert attack on our collective health and environment, largely using their mythical global warming hoax to do so.

A Compact Fluorescent Light bulb.

The new Compact Fluorescent Light (CFL) bulbs are a perfect example of this kind of subterfuge. While claiming these new CFL bulbs will reduce carbon emissions,”our” Congress passed legislation stating these new light bulbs must completely replace our everyday incandescent light bulbs by 2014, without telling us of the serious dangers to health and environment, that these mandated bulbs pose.

Most of these new CFLs will make people sick, by emitting radio frequency radiation that contributes to dirty electricity, that can cause migraines, dizziness, nausea, confusion, fatigue, skin irritations, and eye strain.

But far more importantly, CFLs are loaded with deadly mercury, one of the most toxic elements on Earth. In fact, all CFL bulbs contain – at least – four to five milligrams of mercury, about 200 times the amount of mercury in a flu vaccine shot. There is enough mercury in each CFL bulb to contaminate 6,000 gallons of clean water. To break one of these CFL bulbs is to risk ruining the health of one’s entire family, or office staff, with enough released atmospheric mercury to best require the expensive, professional services of a Haz/Mat Removal Team.

Believe not the”clean-up” methods for broken CFL bulbs offered by those in the mainstream media, which tell us to open a window, then leave the area of the broken bulb for 15 minutes; then return with duct tape to pick-up the broken glass.

Then what is one to do? Put the broken glass and duct tape into a glass jar and screw on a tight lid.

What is one to do with the glass jar? Take it to a special toxic dump.

Where are such dumps? Check your local listings.

ll of the above, of course, is sheer nonsense. Want proof? Ask your dentist about the Haz/Mat teams that come into their offices to remove their old collection of dental amalgams, which dentists keep in little lead lined boxes.

All Americans will be well advised to practice a”mercury escape plan” in the case of an accidental breakage of one of these CFL bulbs: Grab your cell phone, babies, dogs, cats, and parakeets (if they aren’t already dead), and get well away from your house. Call a Haz/Mat company to completely clean your house before re-entering it. Such are the serious dangers of mercury.

And our environment? This is where mercury laden CFL bulbs do their most serious damage to everyone of us. This is the same environment that our hordes of”Greenies” are so concerned about dying from global warming. But unknown to our greenie friends, already there are hundreds of millions of disposed CFL bulbs that have contaminated personal garbage cans, fleets of garbage trucks (spreading their toxicity near and far), and garbage disposal sites, that are doing irreparable damage to our ground water, except when such garbage is burnt; then, mercury is released into the very air we all breathe. You see there are precious few toxic dump sites in the world equipped to handle mercury, the most dangerous element in the world, after radio-active materials.

With over 100 million American households, and tens of millions of other lighted facilities, all over our country, and with each of them disposing of even just one CFL bulb a month … can anyone imagine how much mercury will poison our disposal dumps, our ground water, our air, our lungs, and our entire bodies. If one did not know better, mercury is the perfect chemical/weapon for genocidal madmen: Mercury is in dental amalgams, vaccines, corn syrup light bulbs, and who knows what else.

Are our lawmakers simply without a shred of common horse sense, or are they driven by a sinister power, intent on not only destroying our environment, but our very lives.

In any case, something inhuman drove our CFL horror, and is driving the”Green Revolution,” and its off-shoots of global warming, and the entire climate change circus of death.

 



GM Food Causes Liver and Kidney Damage

GM Food Causes Liver and Kidney Damage
Disturbing Fact: 75% of processed foods that Americans eat have genetically modified ingredients

Daily Mail
January 21, 2010

Fresh fears were raised over GM crops yesterday after a study showed they can cause liver and kidney damage.

According to the research, animals fed on three strains of genetically modified maize created by the U.S. biotech firm Monsanto suffered signs of organ damage after just three months.

The findings only came to light after Monsanto was forced to publish its raw data on safety tests by anti-GM campaigners.

They add to the evidence that GM crops may damage health as well as be harmful to the environment.

The figures released by Monsanto were examined by French researcher Dr Gilles-Eric Seralini, from the University of Caen.

Yesterday he called for more studies to check for long-term organ damage.

‘What we’ve shown is clearly not proof of toxicity, but signs of toxicity,’ he told New Scientist magazine. ‘I’m sure there’s no acute toxicity but who’s to say there are no chronic effects?’

The experiments were carried out by Monsanto researchers on three strains of GM maize. Two of the varieties contained genes for the Bt protein which protects the plant against the corn borer pest, while a third was genetically modified to be resistant to the weedkiller glyphosate. All three strains are widely grown in America, while one is the only GM crop grown in Europe, mostly in Spain.

Monsanto only released the raw data after a legal challenge from Greenpeace, the Swedish Board of Agriculture and French anti- GM campaigners.

Dr Seralini concluded that rats which ate the GM maize had ‘ statistically significant’ signs of liver and kidney damage. Each strain was linked to unusual concentrations of hormones in the blood and urine of rats fed the maize for three months, compared to rats given a non-GM diet.

The higher hormone levels suggest that animals’ livers and kidneys are not working properly.

Female rats fed one of the strains also had higher blood sugar levels and raised levels of fatty substances caused triglycerides, Dr Seralini reported in the International Journal of Microbiology.

The analysis concluded: ‘These substances have never before been an integral part of the human or animal diet and therefore their health consequences for those who consume them, especially over long time periods are currently unknown.’

Monsanto claimed the analysis of its data was ‘based on faulty analytical methods and reasoning, and does not call into question the safety findings for these products’.

 



BPA found in plastic linked to heart disease

New study confirms bisphenol A found in plastic is linked to heart disease

Natural News
January 19, 2010

According to the American Heart Association, cardiovascular disease is the number one killer in the U.S. Various forms of the disease take the lives of over 80 million Americans a year. And while we’ve all heard about the risk factors for cardiovascular disease — including smoking, being overweight, high cholesterol and lack of exercise — it appears it’s time to add bisphenol A, better known as BPA, to that list.

This chemical has been used for decades in polycarbonate plastic products including refillable drink containers, plastic eating utensils and baby bottles as well as the epoxy resins that line most food and soft-drink cans. Now a new study just published in the journal PLoS ONE provides the most compelling evidence so far that BPA exposure is dangerous to the cardiovascular system.

Using 2006 data from the US government’s National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES), researchers from the Peninsula Medical School at the University of Exeter in the UK studied urinary BPA concentrations and found a significantly strong link between BPA exposure and heart disease. In 2008, these same scientists discovered that higher urinary BPA concentrations were associated with a long list of medical problems in adults, including liver dysfunction, diabetes and obesity. This research team was also the first to report evidence that BPA was linked to cardiovascular disease — and their new research offers further confirmation of a strong connection between BPA and heart ailments.

Despite the fact the new study found that urinary BPA concentrations were one third lower than those measured from 2003 to 2004, higher concentrations of BPA were still associated with heart disease. “This is only the second analysis of BPA in a large human population sample. It has allowed us to largely confirm our original analysis and exclude the possibility that our original findings were a statistical ‘blip’,” David Melzer, Professor of Epidemiology and Public Health at the Peninsula Medical School and the research team leader, said in a statement to the media.

“We now need to investigate what causes these health risk associations in more detail and to clarify whether they are caused by BPA itself or by some other factor linked to BPA exposure. The risks associated with exposure to BPA may be small, but they are relevant to very large numbers of people. This information is important since it provides a great opportunity for intervention to reduce the risks,” added scientist Tamara Galloway, Professor of Ecotoxicology at the University of Exeter and senior author of the paper.

As NaturalNews has previously reported, BPA exposure has been shown in other studies to be associated with neurological problems (http://www.naturalnews.com/025801_B…), diabetes and aggressive behavior in little girls (http://www.naturalnews.com/027382_B…). Unfortunately, the FDA has demonstrated little ability or interest in taking decisive measures to protect consumers from this chemical (http://www.naturalnews.com/024593_t…).Your best strategy to avoid BPA? Eat natural, fresh foods and stay away from cans, bottles and other plastic containing products that are not certified BPA-free.

 



How Does Feces Get Into Soda Fountains?

How Does Feces Get Into Soda Fountains?

Daily Bread
January 8, 2010

Nearly half of all the fast-food soda fountains tested in a recent study dispensed coliform bacteria—that’s feces, folks—along with the pop.

The study, published in the International Journal of Food Microbiology, is being widely picked up in the blogosphere today. I kept clicking from one blog to the next, but none of them raised what to me is the obvious question: How does the fecal material make its way into the soda?

CBS News wondered, too, but they asked “Dr. Alanna Levine, a primary care physician,” who, as far as I can tell, had nothing to do with the study and has no particular expertise on soda fountains. For what it’s worth, she said: “Contamination can occur from employees or customers failing to wash their hands properly and touch the machine. Also, bacteria can enter your drink if the soda fountain machine and/or its water lines aren’t cleaned properly.”

Levine said, “You can get collections of bacteria in the water line, and that then runs through the whole machine and gets into the beverage.”

OK. I still wonder how that level of contamination can occur, given that soda fountains are basically closed-loop systems. How often do people touch the area around where the soda is dispensed? And are that many machines really being contaminated by dirty employees changing out the dispensers and hoses? If so, most of those employees are also handling food, right? How different is this level of contamination from the levels in other public places, like movie theaters or high-end restaurants?

Only the abstract of the study is available online, and it doesn’t address these questions. I am making inquiries.

However the nasty bacteria is getting there, it might be causing “episodic gastric distress in the general population and could pose a more significant health risk to immunocompromised individuals,” say the authors, who hail from a couple of colleges in Virginia.

And worse: it’s not just coliform, but other “opportunistic pathogenic microorganisms.” And most of what they found is at least somewhat resistant to antibiotics.

 

Thirsty? Bacteria linked to feces found on soda fountains

ABC News

If you’re chugging a soda from a fast food joint, you may want to put it down and read this.

A team of microbiologists from Hollins University found that 48% of the sodas they tested from fast food soda fountains had coliform bacteria, according to Tom Laskawy, a media and technology professional and blogger for grist.org.

Coliform is typically fecal in origin.

On top of that, the study found that most of the bacteria were resistant to antibiotics.

The team tested 90 beverages from 30 fountains, and published their findings in the International Journal of Food Microbiology.

Here is an excerpt from the abstract:

“…Coliform bacteria was detected in 48% of the beverages and 20% had a heterotrophic plate count greater than 500 cfu/ml. […] More than 11% of the beverages analyzed contained Escherichia coli [E. Coli] and over 17% contained Chryseobacterium meningosepticum. Other opportunistic pathogenic microorganisms isolated from the beverages included species of Klebsiella, Staphylococcus, Stenotrophomonas, Candida, and Serratia. Most of the identified bacteria showed resistance to one or more of the 11 antibiotics tested.”

Lawasky made sure to note that there has been only one recorded outbreak linked to soda fountains, and that was 10 years ago.

But, the bacteria could cause sickness that could go unreported and therefore never linked to soda fountains.

You can read the abstract or purchase the report here.

 



Six Risky Chemicals You’re Carrying in Your Body

Six Risky Chemicals You’re Carrying in Your Body

Dr. Mercola
January 7, 2010

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has released its latest assessment of the chemicals people are carrying around in their bodies.

The biomonitoring study is the most comprehensive in the world, measuring 212 chemicals in the blood and urine of 8,000 Americans.

The CDC highlighted a few chemicals because they are both widespread — found in all or most people tested — and potentially harmful.

Here’s a look at what they are and how you can try to avoid them:

Polybrominated diphenyl ethers

    Better known as “flame retardants”, PBDEs are used widely in all sorts of goods to reduce fire risk. They also accumulate in human fat, and some studies suggest they may harm your liver and kidneys as well as your neurological system. Some states have restricted the use of certain PBDEs, but short of such bans, avoiding them is difficult because the chemicals are integrated into so many products.

Bisphenol A

    BPA, which is found in many plastics, in the lining of cans, and even coating many sales receipts, was found in more than 90 percent of Americans tested. The health concerns about BPA are many and growing. While BPA-free products are available, it can be difficult to find them unless you do research ahead of time.

PFOA

    PFOA and other perfluorinated chemicals are used to create heat-resistant and non-stick coatings on cookware, as well as grease-resistant food packaging and stain-resistant clothing. Studies have linked these chemicals to a range of health problems, including infertility in women, and to developmental and reproductive problems in lab animals. Avoiding products that contain them is a first step towards avoiding them.

Acrylamide

    Formed when carbohydrates are cooked at high temperatures (fried foods), acrylamide and its metabolites are extremely common in Americans. High-level exposure has caused cancer and neurological problems in lab animals and workers, respectively. Avoiding it in food comes down to food choice, storage and preparation.

Mercury

    The main source of mercury — a potent neurotoxin that can lead to permanent brain damage if young children or fetuses are exposed — continues to be contaminated fish. I do not recommend eating most fish for this reason (mercury is also found in amalgam tooth fillings and vaccines).

MTBE

    This gasoline additive has been phased out of use in the U.S. in favor of ethanol, but it still can be detected widely in American’s bodies; it has contaminated many drinking water supplies. Studies have linked it to a variety of potential problems, including neurological and reproductive damage.

 



Russia Bans U.S. Poultry Treated With Chlorine

Russia Bans U.S. Poultry Treated With Chlorine

Food Safety News
January 7, 2010

With as much as 30,000 tons of American poultry in the pipeline to Russia, the government in Moscow imposed a ban on future U.S. poultry imports on New Year’s Day.

Russia joins the European Union in prohibiting the use of chlorine as an anti-microbial treatment in poultry production, which is commonly used in the United States.

As for birds in the pipeline, USA Poultry and Egg Export Council President Jim Summers said he thinks based on earlier assurances from the Russian Veterinary Service that poultry in transit will be allowed to enter.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture defended the use of chlorine by the American poultry industry.

“Since chlorine has been used as an anti-microbial treatment for more than 25 years, this resolution effectively blocks U.S. exports of poultry to Russia, has a devastating impact on the U.S. poultry industry and trade, and raised the costs of poultry products for Russia’s consumers,” says USDA spokeswoman Katie Gorscak.

She said there is overwhelming scientific evidence that chlorine is safe and effective as a disinfectant for poultry.

American poultry exports to Russia are the biggest component of U.S. agricultural exports to the former Soviet Union. Since the fall of the Iron Curtain, Russia has grown to become American’s tenth largest Ag export market for a total of $1.8 billion in 2008. Poultry was almost half of that amount.

Losing another near billion-worth of exports to Russia over chlorine comes as the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative has also been unable to open the EU to U.S. poultry for the same issue. For trade disputes with the EU, complaints go to the World Trade Organization (WTO). But, Russia is not a member of WTO.

In 2009, Russia accepted poultry from the U.S. under a quota lowered from 2008 levels. Russia’s domestic poultry industry has improved greatly over the past few years, but experts say the country will still need U.S. birds to meet the demands of its consumers.

The EU ban on bathing chicken in chlorine has been in effect since 1997. The US-EU dispute was a test case for the Transatlantic Economic Council, which was formed in 2007 to facilitate trade and business between the two economies. A plan to end the ban was vetoed by EU veterinary experts.

The U.S. and Russia plan to hold technical talks over the chlorine issue. As written, there is more chlorine in most U.S. public water systems than Russia would allow for chicken baths.

 



Fight The New World Order with Global Non Compliance

Fight The New World Order with Global Non Compliance

 



17,000 toxic chemicals kept secret from consumers

17,000 toxic chemicals kept secret from consumers

Lyndsey Layton
Washington Post
January 4, 2010

Of the 84,000 chemicals in commercial use in the United States — from flame retardants in furniture to household cleaners — nearly 20 percent are secret, according to the Environmental Protection Agency, their names and physical properties guarded from consumers and virtually all public officials under a little-known federal provision.

The policy was designed 33 years ago to protect trade secrets in a highly competitive industry. But critics — including the Obama administration — say the secrecy has grown out of control, making it impossible for regulators to control potential dangers or for consumers to know which toxic substances they might be exposed to.

At a time of increasing public demand for more information about chemical exposure, pressure is building on lawmakers to make it more difficult for manufacturers to cloak their products in secrecy. Congress is set to rewrite chemical regulations this year for the first time in a generation.

Under the 1976 Toxic Substances Control Act, manufacturers must report to the federal government new chemicals they intend to market. But the law exempts from public disclosure any information that could harm their bottom line.

Government officials, scientists and environmental groups say that manufacturers have exploited weaknesses in the law to claim secrecy for an ever-increasing number of chemicals. In the past several years, 95 percent of the notices for new chemicals sent to the government requested some secrecy, according to the Government Accountability Office. About 700 chemicals are introduced annually.

Some companies have successfully argued that the federal government should not only keep the names of their chemicals secret but also hide from public view the identities and addresses of the manufacturers.

“Even acknowledging what chemical is used or what is made at what facility could convey important information to competitors, and they can start to put the pieces together,” said Mike Walls, vice president of the American Chemistry Council.

Although a number of the roughly 17,000 secret chemicals may be harmless, manufacturers have reported in mandatory notices to the government that many pose a “substantial risk” to public health or the environment. In March, for example, more than half of the 65 “substantial risk” reports filed with the Environmental Protection Agency involved secret chemicals.

“You have thousands of chemicals that potentially present risks to health and the environment,” said Richard Wiles, senior vice president of the Environmental Working Group, an advocacy organization that documented the extent of the secret chemicals through public-records requests from the EPA. “It’s impossible to run an effective regulatory program when so many of these chemicals are secret.”

Of the secret chemicals, 151 are made in quantities of more than 1 million tons a year and 10 are used specifically in children’s products, according to the EPA.

The identities of the chemicals are known to a handful of EPA employees who are legally barred from sharing that information with other federal officials, state health and environmental regulators, foreign governments, emergency responders and the public.

Last year, a Colorado nurse fell seriously ill after treating a worker involved at a chemical spill at a gas-drilling site. The man, who later recovered, appeared at a Durango hospital complaining of dizziness and nausea. His work boots were damp; he reeked of chemicals, the nurse said.

Two days later, the nurse, Cathy Behr, was fighting for her life. Her liver was failing and her lungs were filling with fluid. Behr said her doctors diagnosed chemical poisoning and called the manufacturer, Weatherford International, to find out what she might have been exposed to.

Weatherford provided safety information, including hazards, for the chemical, known as ZetaFlow. But because ZetaFlow has confidential status, the information did not include all of its ingredients.

Mark Stanley, group vice president for Weatherford’s pumping and chemical services, said in a statement that the company made public all the information legally required.

“It is always in our company’s best interest to provide information to the best of our ability,” he said.

Behr said the full ingredient list should be released. “I’d really like to know what went wrong,” said Behr, 57, who recovered but said she still has respiratory problems. “As citizens in a democracy, we ought to know what’s happening around us.”

The White House and environmental groups want Congress to force manufacturers to prove that a substance should be kept confidential. They also want federal officials to be able to share confidential information with state regulators and health officials, who carry out much of the EPA’s work across the country.

Walls, of the American Chemistry Council, says manufacturers agree that federal officials should be able to share information with state regulators. Industry is also willing to discuss shifting the burden of proof for secrecy claims to the chemical makers, he said. The EPA must allow a claim unless it can prove within 90 days that disclosure would not harm business.

Meanwhile, the Obama administration is trying to reduce secrecy.

A week after he arrived at the agency in July, Steve Owens, assistant administrator for the EPA’s Office of Prevention, Pesticides and Toxic Substances, ended confidentiality protection for 530 chemicals. In those cases, manufacturers had claimed secrecy for chemicals they had promoted by name on their Web sites or detailed in trade journals.

“People who were submitting information to the EPA saw that you can claim that virtually anything is confidential and get away with it,” Owens said.

The handful of EPA officials privy to the identity of the chemicals do not have other information that could help them assess the risk, said Lynn Goldman, a former EPA official and a pediatrician and epidemiologist at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.

“Maybe they don’t know there’s been a water quality problem in New Jersey where the plant is located, or that the workers in the plant have had health problems,” she said. “It just makes sense that the more people who are looking at it, they’re better able to put one and one together and recognize problems.”

Independent researchers, who often provide data to policymakers and regulators, also have been unable to study the secret chemicals.

Duke University chemist Heather Stapleton, who researches flame retardants, tried for months to identify a substance she had found in dust samples taken from homes in Boston.

Then, while attending a scientific conference, she happened to see the structure of a chemical she recognized as her mystery compound.

The substance is a chemical in “Firemaster 550,” a product made by Chemtura Corp. for use in furniture and other products as a substitute for a flame retardant the company had quit making in 2004 because of health concerns.

Stapleton found that Firemaster 550 contains an ingredient similar in structure to a chemical — Di(2-ethylhexyl) phthalate, or DEHP — that Congress banned last year from children’s products because it has been linked to reproductive problems and other health effects.

Chemtura, which claimed confidentiality for Firemaster 550, supplied the EPA with standard toxicity studies. The EPA has asked for additional data, which it is studying.

“My concern is we’re using chemicals and we have no idea what the long-term effects might be or whether or not they’re harmful,” said Susan Klosterhaus, an environmental scientist at the San Francisco Estuary Institute who has published a journal article on the substance with Stapleton.

Chemtura officials said in a written statement that even though Firemaster 550 contains an ingredient structurally similar to DEHP does not mean it poses similar health risks.

They said the company strongly supports keeping sensitive business information out of public view. “This is essential for ensuring the long-term competitiveness of U.S. industry,” the officials said in the statement.

 



USDA Approves Injecting Beef with Ammonia

U.S. Government Approves Treating Beef With Ammonia

NoWorldSystem
January 3, 2010

The New York Times forgot to mention that in the past, the USDA and FDA approved of injecting meat with carbon monoxide to keep rotten meat looking fresh, treating meat with viruses and even Oked the use of Mad Cow diseased beef into the food market just as long as it was mixed with 1% healthy beef.

The plan to inject ammonia into meat is just another toxic substance added to our daily intake that the government seems not to mind. The eugenicist elite that control the U.S. government know that stuff like this is bad for us and are purposely increasing the toxins in our environment. These are softkill methods of eugenics to cut the human population down by a ‘reasonable’ number, they use methods like; radiating us at airports, leaving drugs in the city water supply and using human sewage as fertilizer on major U.S. crops.

It should be painfully obvious now that the government doesn’t give a damn about you, the eugenicist elitists want you dead sooner than later because they look at ‘humans’ as a threat to the ‘ruling class’ clique, they consider us monsters that are unworthy of life. This is the real threat against humanity, not some patsy/terrorist crotch bomber. A decade from now we’ll all be wondering why people are dying at age 50 or 60.

New York Times
December 30, 2009

Eight years ago, federal officials were struggling to remove potentially deadly E. coli from hamburgers when an entrepreneurial company from South Dakota came up with a novel idea: injecting beef with ammonia.

The company, Beef Products Inc., had been looking to expand into the hamburger business with a product made from beef that included fatty trimmings the industry once relegated to pet food and cooking oil. The trimmings were particularly susceptible to contamination, but a study commissioned by the company showed that the ammonia process would kill E. coli as well as salmonella.

Officials at the United States Department of Agriculture endorsed the company’s ammonia treatment, and have said it destroys E. coli “to an undetectable level.” They decided it was so effective that in 2007, when the department began routine testing of meat used in hamburger sold to the general public, they exempted Beef Products.

With the U.S.D.A.’s stamp of approval, the company’s processed beef has become a mainstay in America’s hamburgers. McDonald’s, Burger King and other fast-food giants use it as a component in ground beef, as do grocery chains. The federal school lunch program used an estimated 5.5 million pounds of the processed beef last year alone.

But government and industry records obtained by The New York Times show that in testing for the school lunch program, E. coli and salmonella pathogens have been found dozens of times in Beef Products meat, challenging claims by the company and the U.S.D.A. about the effectiveness of the treatment. Since 2005, E. coli has been found 3 times and salmonella 48 times, including back-to-back incidents in August in which two 27,000-pound batches were found to be contaminated. The meat was caught before reaching lunch-rooms trays.

Carl S. Custer, a former U.S.D.A. microbiologist, said he and other scientists were concerned that the department had approved the treated beef for sale without obtaining independent validation of the potential safety risk. Another department microbiologist, Gerald Zirnstein, called the processed beef “pink slime” in a 2002 e-mail message to colleagues and said, “I do not consider the stuff to be ground beef, and I consider allowing it in ground beef to be a form of fraudulent labeling.”

One of the toughest hurdles for Beef Products was the Agricultural Marketing Service, the U.S.D.A. division that buys food for school lunches. Officials cited complaints about the odor, and wrote in a 2002 memorandum that they had “to determine if the addition of ammonia to the product is in the best interest to A.M.S. from a quality standpoint.”

“It is our contention,” the memo added, “that product should be labeled accordingly.”

Represented by Dennis R. Johnson, a top lawyer and lobbyist for the meat industry, Beef Products prevailed on the question of whether ammonia should be listed as an ingredient, arguing that the government had just decided against requiring another company to list a chemical used in treating poultry.

School lunch officials said they ultimately agreed to use the treated meat because it shaved about 3 cents off the cost of making a pound of ground beef.

 



U.S. wants farmers to use coal waste on fields

U.S. wants farmers to use coal waste on fields

Washington Post
December 23, 2009

The federal government is encouraging farmers to spread a chalky waste from coal-fired power plants on their fields to loosen and fertilize soil even as it considers regulating coal wastes for the first time.

The material is produced by power plant “scrubbers” that remove acid-rain-causing sulfur dioxide from plant emissions. A synthetic form of the mineral gypsum, it also contains mercury, arsenic, lead and other heavy metals.

The Environmental Protection Agency says those toxic metals occur in only tiny amounts that pose no threat to crops, surface water or people. But some environmentalists say too little is known about how the material affects crops, and ultimately human health, for the government to suggest that farmers use it.

“This is a leap into the unknown,” said Jeff Ruch, executive director of Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility. “This stuff has materials in it that we’re trying to prevent entering the environment from coal-fired power plants, and then to turn around and smear it across ag lands raises some real questions.”

With wastes piling up around the coal-fired plants that produce half the nation’s power, the EPA and U.S. Department of Agriculture began promoting what they call the wastes’ “beneficial uses” during the Bush administration.

Part of that push is to expand the use of synthetic gypsum — a whitish, calcium-rich material known as flue gas desulfurization gypsum, or FGD gypsum. The Obama administration has continued promoting FGD gypsum’s use in farming.

The administration is also drafting a regulatory rule for coal waste, in response to a spill from a coal ash pond near Knoxville, Tenn., one year ago Tuesday. Ash and water flooded 300 acres, damaging homes and killing fish. The cleanup is expected to cost about $1 billion.

The EPA is expected to announce its proposals for regulation early next year, setting the first federal standards for storage and disposal of coal wastes.

EPA officials declined to talk about the agency’s promotion of FGD gypsum before then and would not say whether the draft rule would cover it.

Field studies have shown that mercury, the main heavy metal of concern because it can harm nervous-system development, does not accumulate in crops or run off fields in surface water at “significant” levels, the EPA said.

“EPA believes that the use of FGD gypsum in agriculture is safe in appropriate soil and hydrogeologic conditions,” the statement said.

Eric Schaeffer, executive director of the Environmental Integrity Project, which advocates for more effective enforcement of environmental laws, said he is not overly worried about FGD gypsum’s use on fields because research shows it contains only tiny amounts of heavy metals. But he said federal limits on the amounts of heavy metals in FGD gypsum sold to farmers would help allay concerns.

“That would give them assurance that they’ve got clean FGD gypsum,” he said.

Since the EPA-USDA partnership began in 2001, farmers’ use of the material has more than tripled, from about 78,000 tons spread on fields in 2002 to nearly 279,000 tons last year, according to the American Coal Ash Association, a utility industry group.

About half of the 17.7 million tons of FGD gypsum produced in the United States last year was used to make drywall, said Thomas Adams, the association’s executive director. But he said it is important to find new uses for it and other coal wastes because the United States will probably rely on coal-fired power plants for decades to come.

“If we can find safe ways to recycle those materials, we’re a lot better off doing that than we are creating a whole bunch of new landfills,” Adams said.

 



Toxic Sewage Sludge in Your Food

Toxic Sewage Sludge in Your Food

Mercola.com
December 16, 2009

The increasing use of sewage sludge as fertilizer for your food is an under-publicized and often hidden threat.

Sludge is the toxic mix that is created by our municipal wastewater treatment facilities. Just about anything that is flushed down toilets or that ends up in sewers is in this sludge; the pollutants in sludge come not just from household sewage, but also from every hospital, industrial plant, and stormwater drain.

For a long time, sludge was simply dumped in the oceans. Over time, it became apparent that this was an environmental and human health disaster. An alternative solution has been pushed since the 1980’s by the U.S. government. The EPA determined that a good way to dispose of treated sewage sludge was to legally distribute it as a cheap alternative to fertilizer.

Unsurprisingly, scientific analysis of the poisons in sewage sludge shows it’s the wrong, and dangerous, solution for U.S. farmers and communities. Unfortunately, many American farmers and gardeners are unknowingly using sludge-derived “compost,” which is given away free in many cities throughout the United States.

As a result, farms and homes across the country have been unknowingly spreading hazardous chemicals and heavy metals on their fields, lawns and gardens.

Meanwhile, Michael Mack, the chief executive of Syngenta, a Swiss agribusiness giant that makes pesticides, is waging war against the organic movement as a whole. He argues that, “Organic food is not only not better for the planet. It is categorically worse.”

“If the whole planet were to suddenly switch to organic farming tomorrow, it would be an ecological disaster,” he said. Pesticides, he argued, “have been proven safe and effective and absolutely not harmful to the environment or to humans.”
Of course, Mr. Mack dismissed the notion that Syngenta, a company that sold nearly $12-billion worth of “crop protection” technologies last year, felt threatened by the organic movement.

Dr. Mercola’s Comments:

If you’re looking for a compelling reason to switch to a primarily organic diet, the fact that it is free from sewage sludge fertilizers is a very good one. Sewage sludge, or “biosolids” — as they’re referred to with a PR spin — began being “recycled” into food crops when, ironically, it was realized that dumping them into rivers, lakes and bays was an environmental disaster.

Today, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) states that about 50 percent of all biosolids are recycled to land. This sludge is what’s leftover after sewage is treated and processed.

Your first thought may be the “yuck factor” of human waste being used to fertilize your food, but that is only the tip of the iceberg. Every time a paintbrush gets rinsed, an old bottle of medications flushed, or solvents are hosed off a factory floor, it ends up in the sewage system.

So it’s not surprising that a past analysis of sewage sludge by the Environmental Working Group found:

    *Over 100 synthetic organic compounds including phthalates, toluene, and chlorobenzene
    *Dioxins in sludge from 179 out of 208 systems (80%)
    *42 different pesticides — at least one in almost every sample, with an average of almost 2 pesticides per survey sample
    *Nine heavy metals, often at high concentrations

And it was sewage sludge that was partly blamed earlier this year for contaminating the White House lawn, and Michelle Obama’s organic vegetable garden, with lead.

This toxic sludge has been masterfully spun by PR masters into an acceptable, even “green,” fertilizer. Even San Francisco, arguably one of the “greenest” cities around, has been distributing toxic sewage sludge to homeowners and schoolyards and calling it “organic compost”! Nevermind that in 2008 its sludge was found to contain industrial chemicals, disinfectants, phenol, pesticides and solvents.

The Center for Food Safety (CFS) has recently petitioned San Francisco to stop this “compost” giveaway, lest it contaminate backyards and communities with toxic chemicals, but the sludge is still being widely used all across the United States.

If you want to get the real dirt on how this toxic sewage sludge has become such a popular fertilizer, I strongly encourage you to read Toxic Sludge is Good for You: Lies, Damn Lies and the Public Relations Industry. It’s written by Sheldon Rampton and John Stauber, the authors of one of my favorite exposes on the PR industry, Trust Us, We’re Experts, and does not disappoin

What is Going On With the State of Agriculture in the United States?

They say truth is stranger than fiction, and the once respectable business of farming in the United States is a perfect example of how true this statement can be.

Gone are the days when farmers grew food according to the laws of nature, with a deserved respect for the Earth and its resources. Nowadays, with the exception of the small but growing movement of organic and sustainable farmers, it may surprise you to learn that farming — once the symbol of all that’s natural and wholesome — creates some of the worst pollution in the United States.

That’s because most “farming” today is nothing like the small farming of our ancestors. The Farm Sanctuary points out that farm animals produce 130 times more waste than humans. And agricultural runoff is the primary reason why 60 percent of U.S. rivers and streams are polluted.

Meanwhile, in areas where animal agriculture is most concentrated (Iowa, Minnesota, North Carolina, Illinois and Indiana round out the top five states with the most factory-farm pollution) bacteria known as pfiesteria is common in waterways. Not only does pfiesteria kill fish, it also causes nausea, memory loss, fatigue and disorientation in people!

Aside from the pollution, factory farms use vast quantities of resources. According to FactoryFarm.org, industrial milking centers that use manure flush cleaning and automatic cow washing systems, go through as much as 150 gallons of water per cow per day!

Energy costs are even steeper.

A 2002 study from the John Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health found that industrial farms use an average of three calories of energy to create one calorie of food. Grain-fed beef is at the top of the list of offenders, using 35 calories of energy to produce one calorie of food! And this does not even take into account the energy used to process and transport the foods, so the real toll is even larger.

The Agribusiness Giants are Getting Out of Control!

On top of the environmental assaults, you have agribusiness executives like Michael Mack, the chief executive of pesticide manufacturer Syngenta, making outrageous statements like “Organic food is not only not better for the planet, it is categorically worse.”

What?!

His entire argument was based on the premise that organic farming takes up more land than non-organic farming for the same yield.

He obviously must have missed the recent study that examined a global dataset of 293 farming examples, which found that in developing countries organic systems produce 80% more than conventional farms. And a review of 286 projects in 57 countries found that farmers who used “resource-conserving” or ecological agriculture had increased agricultural productivity by an average of 79%!

    “It is clear that ecological agriculture is productive and has the potential to meet food security needs … Moreover, ecological agricultural approaches allow farmers to improve local food production with low-cost, readily available technologies and inputs, without causing environmental damage,” Lim Li Ching, the study’s author, writes.

Really, the question we should be asking ourselves shouldn’t be ‘Can organic or sustainable farming feed the world?’, but ‘How can food production possibly continue as it is?’

When I hear someone extolling the virtues of “modern” agriculture and wondering how “organic” or “sustainable” farming could possibly be the solution, I maintain that the fact we have come to accept inefficient, industrial practices, including dousing our food with chemical fertilizers and pesticides, as a viable way to grow food is the real wonder.

And then I always look at the source, which in this case is a pesticide giant CEO … which makes his motives very clear, indeed.

How Can You Find Safe Food for Your Family?

There are still safe food options out there, but it does take a bit of digging to find them. Your local grocery store is generally NOT going to be the best source for healthy, fresh food.

So, short of starting your own sustainable farm (which you can do on a small-scale in your own backyard), you can find safe food options by supporting sustainable agriculture movements in your area.

Make it a point to only buy food from a source you know and trust, one that uses safe and non-toxic farming methods. This will do your health a major favor and support the small family farms in your area. You’ll receive nutritious food from a source that you can trust, and you’ll be supporting the honest work of a real family farm instead of an agri-business corporation.

 



Chevron Sued For Dumping Toxic Waste in Amazon

Chevron Sued For Dumping Toxic Waste in Amazon


Celebrity support for the cause … actress Daryl Hannah in Ecuador’s oil region in the Amazon two years ago. Photo: AP

Sydney Morning Herald
November 17, 2009

Tens of thousands of Amazonians are suing Chevron, the American oil company, for poisoning their waterways in what is billed as one of the biggest environmental cases in history.

The Ecuadorean claimants said the company illegally dumped toxic waste from its oil production, which filtered into the lakes used by thousands of people for washing and drinking.

The result, they claimed, was one of the worst environmental disasters in history, which led to a public health crisis with rising levels of cancer, birth defects and miscarriages.

Some 30,000 Amazonians are behind a case to be heard by an Ecuadorean judge. Experts said the company might have to pay damages of up to $US27 billion ($29 billion).

The company said there was no proof that any illnesses were caused by its operations. It said the responsibility for cleaning the area lay with the Ecuadorean government and Petroecuador, the state oil company.

The court case is the result of the exploitation of the indigenous population by US trial lawyers and a corrupt government, according to Chevron.

The Amazon campaign has attracted high-profile supporters including actor Daryl Hannah. Chevron’s reputation for corporate social responsibility has already taken a blow.

The issue is the subject of Crude, a critically acclaimed documentary. The rags-to-riches tale of the most senior Ecuadorean lawyer fighting the case has earnt it a place on the front cover of Vanity Fair.

Texaco, which is owned by Chevron, started operating in Sucumbios, Ecuador, in 1964. Over 26 years it made more than $500 million, producing 1.7 billion barrels of oil. As the operator of a consortium with Petroecuador, it drilled hundreds of wells.

Pits were created for each well in which to put the water produced as a byproduct of the oil. Those fighting Chevron claimed that the 68 billion litres of water in the pits were toxic and were allowed to overflow into nearby rivers. They also claimed that Texaco spilt an additional 64 million litres of crude oil.

The contamination allegedly increased cancer rates in the area threefold, and led directly to 1400 deaths.

”Texaco treated Ecuador’s Amazon like a garbage dump,” said Douglas Beltman, a former official at the US Environmental Protection Agency who is a scientific consultant to the indigenous groups.