NEXT PAGE -->
|
| * * * COMPANIES & PRODUCTS * * * |
|---|
Updated Daily!
| * * * IN-HOUSE RESOURCES * * * |
|---|
DUMBING DOWN THE CHILDREN--PART 1
The NEW YORK TIMES reported in 1999 that, "Federal investigators say most states are flouting a 1989 law requiring that young children on Medicaid be tested for lead poisoning. As a result, they say, hundreds of thousands of children exposed to dangerously high levels of lead are neither tested nor treated."[1]
The TIMES explained that, "The General Accounting Office [GAO], an investigative arm of Congress, found that 'few Medicaid children are screened for blood-lead levels,' even though the problem of lead poisoning is concentrated among low-income children on Medicaid." Medicaid is a federal medical insurance program for poor people. In the U.S. today, more than 40% of all poor people are children.[2]
Today nearly a million children (983,000) in the U.S. younger than 5 are believed to suffer from low-level lead poisoning, according to the federal Centers for Disease Control.[3] Low-level lead poisoning can cause permanent learning disabilities, hyperactivity, poor motor coordination, and other developmental deficits. Indeed, reduced IQ, hearing loss and diminished stature are associated with lead levels considerably lower than the 10 micrograms of lead per tenth-of-a-liter of blood now deemed "acceptable" by the U.S. government.[4]
Supplementing and corroborating the GAO study, the state auditor of California, Kurt R. Sjoberg, reached a similar conclusion about Medicaid compliance in a separate 1999 report. "'Thousands of lead-poisoned children have been allowed to suffer needlessly,' because California has not complied with the federal requirement to test them for lead poisoning, Mr. Sjoberg said," according to the TIMES.[1]
Federal rules require that children in the Medicaid program be tested for lead poisoning at age 12 months and again at age two years. The GAO report found that states varied considerably in their compliance with this federal law. Washington State tested fewer than 1% of eligible children; New Jersey tested 40%. Alabama performed best, testing the highest proportion but still fewer than half (46%) of all eligible children.
The TIMES also reported that many states simply don't keep the necessary records to know whether they are complying with federal law or not. "Many states, including Connecticut [the wealthiest state in the Union] said they did not have statewide data on testing rates or the prevalence of lead poisoning," the TIMES reported. The question occurs, why would a state not maintain records to assess the size of this problem and the steps being taken to solve it?
From a state's perspective, the problem isn't one of cost. A lead poisoning test is relatively cheap at $10 or less and besides the federal Medicaid program pays 100% of the costs of testing. If a child is found to have elevated lead levels, Medicaid will pay 100% of the costs of treatment. (Medicaid will NOT pay to test water, paint or house dust to find the source of the contamination, however.)
To summarize: An 11-year-old federal law requires all children up to age 2 in the Medicaid program to be tested for lead poisoning. Medicaid pays all the costs. The purpose of the law is to catch signs of lead poisoning early in hopes of limiting the damage to the child's central nervous system. Lead poisoning, even at low levels, can leave a permanent legacy of slow learning, hearing impairment, cardiovascular disease, behavioral problems and delinquent behavior.2 But the states are thumbing their noses at the federal law, thus allowing these debilitating medical conditions to develop in tens of thousands of American children each year.
Why? Why are governments refusing to comply with a public health law intended to protect children?
Here are a few preliminary reasons:
** Dr. Maxine D. Hayes, the acting health officer for Washington state, gave a states-rights explanation: "We don't think it's right for the Federal Government to dictate what states should do," she told the NEW YORK TIMES. Dr. Hayes seems to be asserting a state's right to ignore the poisoning of its children and to disregard federal law if it chooses to do so, a dubious legal proposition at best (leaving aside the ethical issues it raises). The question still remains, why would a state government choose to do such a thing?
** Washington state does participate in the federal Medicaid program. The state's Medicaid director gave the TIMES a different explanation: "We don't believe we have much of a problem with lead exposure here." However, this is speculation and the purpose of the lead-testing program is to lay such speculation to rest by producing hard evidence. Bitter experience shows that testing is likely to identify some lead-poisoned children who live in homes built prior to 1978, particularly homes that have been poorly maintained. Eighty percent of housing built before 1978 contains some lead-based paint, which in poorly-maintained buildings is by now probably turning into a fine powdery dust, which toddlers may get on their hands and then into their mouths. But of course without testing, a state official is free to speculate that his or her state is, miraculously, an exception to this general rule. The question remains, why would a state medical officer choose to speculate rather than acquire hard data?
** Many states have turned over their Medicaid responsibilities to health maintenance organizations (HMOs) but have neglected to specify the full range of services they expect HMOs to provide, so lead testing has often slipped through the cracks. The question remains: since Uncle Sam is picking up the tab, why don't states require lead testing when they negotiate contracts with HMOs?
The long and the short of it seems to be that most state governments have designed policies that assure that the lead-poisoning of children continues, and the federal government seems paralyzed in the face of this rebellion.
The question remains, Why?
There are two major sources of lead in the environment, both of them human in origin. The first is leaded gasoline, which was outlawed in the U.S. in 1976 but which left a residue of about 5.9 million metric tonnes (13 billion pounds) of lead in the environment in the form of a fine, toxic dust.[2] Much of that powdery lead is still moving around in soil and house dust. Furthermore leaded gasoline is still being used in many countries outside the U.S., so contamination of the atmosphere continues, producing a steady toxic fallout.[5] Without human help, nature does produce some lead dust, but humans now produce 19 times as much as nature produces each year -- a startling reminder of how numerous market-based decisions can add up to an intractable problem of enormous proportions.[5]
The second major source of lead dust is lead in paint. Lead, the soft, gray metal makes an excellent white pigment, and paint made with white lead pigment provides a high-quality, durable protective coating. Eventually, however, even lead-based paint deteriorates. It begins to flake, peel and disintegrate into a fine, powdery dust, which is toxic. Lead in paint was restricted on a voluntary basis by the paint industry in 1955, but voluntary compliance proved ineffective so, in 1970, Congress outlawed leaded paint for interior uses. However there is evidence that leaded paint was used illegally inside buildings until at least 1978. Between 4 and 5 million metric tonnes (approximately 10 billion pounds) of lead were used in paint in the U.S. between 1889 and 1979 and much of it remains where it was originally put, slowly deteriorating into a toxic dust. An estimated 42 million families live in homes containing an average of 140 pounds of lead in paint. If it has not been covered, this paint is a constant danger to toddlers who often pick up the dust on their hands, then transfer it into their mouths.[3]
The danger of lead in paint was first identified 96 years ago when J. Lockhart Gibson, an Australian physician, published the first report in a medical journal describing children poisoned by lead-based paint. Gibson specifically described the dangers to children from lead-based paint on the walls and verandas of houses.[1] The following year Gibson urged that, "[T]he use of lead-based paint within the reach of children should be prohibited by law."[6] Australia finally took Gibson's advice in 1922, 50 years before the U.S. took similar action.
Unfortunately, lead is extremely toxic, especially to children whose developing nervous systems are particularly susceptible to lead poisoning. As little as 10 micrograms ingested daily can poison a child;[2] a microgram is a millionth of a gram and there are 28 grams in an ounce. With 10 micrograms being a toxic daily quantity, the 10 million metric tonnes of lead introduced into the environment by humans during the 20th century creates an almost unbelievably large "sink" of toxic powder available in soil and in house dust, waiting to cause brain damage in toddlers.
Lead poisoning of children in the U.S. was first described in medical literature in 1914.[7] In 1917, a physician at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore suggested that, if physicians looked harder for lead poisoning in children, they would find more of it. A pediatric textbook in 1923 described 8 cases of childhood lead poisoning: "The poisoning was caused in each instance by the child's nibbling and swallowing the paint from his crib or furniture."[7] In 1924 an article in the JOURNAL OF THE AMERICAN MEDICAL ASSOCIATION said, "There are many mild cases of lead poisoning in children, manifested by spasms or colic."[7] The article pinpointed the source of the problem as window sills, porch railings, and crib railings coated with lead paint. In 1926, an article in the AMERICAN JOURNAL OF DISEASES OF CHILDREN said, "Lead poisoning is of relatively frequent occurrence in children."[7]
Jane Lin-Fu, a well-known lead researcher, summarizes the early history of childhood lead poisoning in the U.S. this way: "By the 1920s... severe forms of childhood lead poisoning were recognized, and it became obvious that the illness was quite common in the U.S."[7] The federal Centers for Disease Control concurred in 1979, saying, "Lead poisoning in children from paint was recognized early in this century."[7] But recognizing a problem and acting upon it are two different things.
SUSTAINABILITY AND AG BIOTECH
How will genetically modified seeds, crops and foods affect the sustainability of U.S. agriculture? During 1999, agricultural economist Charles Benbrook tried to answer that question.[1] Benbrook has a long history of analyzing all aspects of agriculture as an employee of the executive branch, the Congress, and the National Academy of Sciences, and more recently in the private sector.[2]
Benbrook defines "sustainable agriculture" as a food system that:[1]
** Provides a reasonable rate of return to farmers, to sustain farm families, agricultural infrastructure, and rural communities;
** Assures a reasonable rate of return to public and private providers of farm inputs (seeds, fertilizers, etc.), information, services, and technologies;
** Preserves and regenerates soil, water, and biological resources upon which farming depends, and avoids adverse impacts on the natural environment;
** Increases productivity and per-acre yields at least in step with the growth in demand;
** Adheres to social norms and expectations in terms of fairness, equity, compliance with regulations, food safety, and ethical treatment of workers, animals, and other creatures sharing agricultural landscapes.
First we should acknowledge that, by these criteria, U.S. agriculture is not sustainable now and hasn't been for many decades.[3] Loss of profitability is almost always the immediate cause of unsustainability in farming, Benbrook says. "All too often in the U.S. in recent decades, the only thing that really changes is that energetic and ambitious managers willing to accept lower returns per bushel find the capital to expand, maintaining their income only by expanding their acreage base," Benbrook says. Of course when one farm expands its acreage, often another farm family has to move off the land. As a result, the U.S. Bureau of the Census stopped counting "farm residents" in 1993 because there were so few of them left; their numbers had dwindled to fewer than 2% of total U.S. population (4.6 million people).[4] (In contrast, in 1900, farm residents made up 35% of total population.)
Benbrook believes that genetically modified seeds, crops and foods will amplify recent trends and will have the following effects on farms:
** Increasingly serious economic surprises and setbacks for farmers because many emerging biotechnologies are more expensive to bring to market, for several reasons:
(a) Biotechnology results from mergers of seed companies and pesticide companies. For example, as a result of a series of acquisitions and mergers, DuPont and Monsanto together now own 73% of corn seed producers in the U.S.[5] Seed companies have traditionally had a relatively low profit margin (around 12% to 15%), whereas pesticide producers have had a higher profit margin (20% to 30%). As pesticide companies try to raise the profit margins of their newly-acquired seed companies up toward the levels expected of pesticide companies, the cost of seed and chemicals will probably continue to rise for farmers.
This has, in fact, been happening, Benbrook shows. In the midwestern farm belt, corn and soybeans are the major crops. Since 1975, for soybean farmers, the share of the farmer's gross income per acre devoted to seed plus chemicals has risen more than 50%, from 10.8% to 16.3%. For corn farmers, the increase has been even larger (from 9.5% of gross income to 16.9%, 1975-1997).
(b) Genetically modified crops are requiring more herbicides than farmers were initially led to believe they would, thus driving up weed management costs. Take Roundup Ready crops. These are crops genetically modified to withstand dousing with Monsanto's premier weed killer, Roundup. The idea was that farmers would give their crop one good dousing with Roundup and that would solve their weed problems. Monsanto placed print ads telling farmers Roundup was "the only weed control you'll ever need." You can see one of these 1998 ads on the Iowa State University Herbicide Ad "Hall of Shame" web site.[6]
Roundup Ready crops offered farmers a modest reduction in costs per bushel if everything worked as advertised. However, the reality is different from what Monsanto promised in its ads. Farmers using Roundup Ready crops find they have to use two or three applications of two or more herbicides to control weeds. Some farmers are finding they must use as many as four different herbicides after planting a seed that supposedly makes weed management easier. This disappointing trend is putting more of farmers' income into the pockets of the seed and chemical giants. As Charles Benbrook points out, the full Roundup Ready system is now costing farmers "an amazing $68.77 per acre in 1999, about 50% more than the cost of [other] seed plus weed management systems in the Midwest in recent years." This trend promises to deliver "significantly lower average returns to growers," Benbrook predicts.
(c) Some weeds are developing resistance to Roundup -- notably hemp weed or pig weed -- so Roundup is becoming less effective, requiring additional measures for weed control, raising costs for those relying on Roundup Ready crops.[7]
(d) There is evidence that low-dosage herbicides can disrupt beneficial soil microorganisms and perhaps interfere with plant uptake of phosphorus, an essential nutrient. Benbrook believes this can have an important negative impact on plant health and farm profitability.
(e) There is evidence of a "yield drag" associated with some Roundup Ready crops, meaning that per-acre yields are not consistently as high as it was once thought they would be. A yield drag quickly translates into a profitability drag.
There are additional reasons why genetically modified crops are likely to produce economic surprises and setbacks for farmers:
(f) The costs of creating and protecting intellectual property are already high and they are bound to rise, Benbrook believes;
(g) The regulation of GMOs (genetically modified organisms) seems likely to increase, and so will regulatory costs;
(h) Biotechnology is being promoted and used in a way that tends to reduce diversity on the farm -- precisely the wrong direction for farms to be going, in Benbrook's view. Successful pest management requires a diversified system that spreads the burden across differing mixes of chemical, biological, genetic, and cultural (farming technique) tools and tactics. Reliance on a single approach to pest management will fail because pests will successfully evolve and thrive in response to single approaches, Benbrook says.
(i) Trouble has appeared in another line of genetically modified crops -- those containing the pesticidal Bt gene. Bt is a bacterium that is toxic to a large class of common insect pests called lepidopterans. Lepidopterans are butterflies and moths; during the caterpillar stage of their life-cycle, lepidopterans eat leaves and can cause great damage to leafy crops. Because of the damage they inflict, lepidopterans provoke some of the greatest use of pesticides world-wide.
Bt is a naturally-occurring killer of lepidopterans. As such, it is a priceless gift from nature to row-crop farmers who need to control outbreaks of lepidopterans. Charles Benbrook makes this comparison: Bt is to the control of lepidopterans what antibiotics are to the control of human diseases. If Bt loses its effectiveness, it will have major consequences for vegetable farmers across the U.S., many of whom use Bt (in one form or another) as a foliar spray.
By inserting a gene from the Bt bacterium into plants, Monsanto and others have created crops that are themselves pesticidal to lepidopterans. For example, Monsanto's "New Leaf" potato, which is now sold in U.S. grocery stores, is itself a registered pesticide because every cell in every potato contains the Bt gene.[8] (Notably, it is one of the few registered pesticides that is not labeled as such.)
From the beginning, Monsanto and others have acknowledged that their Bt-containing crops might conceivably induce Bt resistance among lepidopterans, but they have insisted that the likelihood is "remote." Resistance is a well-understood phenomenon. When a group of insects is sprayed with a poison, those that are least affected survive and reproduce. Soon the only remaining insects are unaffected by that poison -- they have developed resistance to it.
When Monsanto approach EPA [U.S. Environmental Protection Agency] for permission to market Bt-containing plants, they came armed with numerous studies showing that resistance to Bt might take 30 years to develop, if indeed it developed at all. Because genetically-engineered Bt-containing crops had been developed in almost total secrecy, when EPA asked for public comment on Monsanto's proposal, the nation's agricultural experts had little to say. EPA assumed their silence meant all was well.
Traditionally, farmers get reliable information from the land grant colleges that Congress created in 1862. However, beginning with the Freedom to Farm Act of 1996, Congress has systematically reduced the role of the public sector in U.S. agriculture. Now development of genetically engineered crops is largely in private hands and the new technology is cloaked in secrecy. The veil of secrecy "raises an important public policy issue," says Benbrook. "When scientists are unwilling to share data, are constrained in what they can report, and/or have no opportunity to study new technology, public institutions and regulators have to fly blind for a period of time." So, flying blind and basing its decision on Monsanto's science, EPA approved crops with the Bt gene inserted into them.
Now it turns out that Monsanto's science was woefully weak and incomplete. New studies show that resistance to Bt is not nearly as rare in lepidopterans as Monsanto claimed it was, so resistance can be expected to develop much more rapidly than Monsanto initially projected. Furthermore, it is now clear that Bt-corn can adversely impact populations of key beneficial insects. Lacewing larvae, which eat lepidopteran larvae, are killed by Bt, thus removing a natural control on lepidopterans. It now seems clear that farmers who become reliant upon genetically modified crops containing the Bt gene can expect unpleasant surprises in the short term and loss of the effectiveness of Bt in the medium term.[9] It will be a grave loss indeed.
In sum, genetically modified crops seem poised to reduce diversity on farms, reduce farm profits, and make U.S. farms even less sustainable than they already are. For the U.S. food system, this hardly seems like progress.
CORRECTION: PRECAUTION IN LOS ANGELES SCHOOLS
We owe an apology to the Los Angeles Safe Schools Coalition (LASSC) who did the work that resulted in the path-breaking new pesticide policy adopted last year by the Los Angeles Unified School District, which we described in Rachel #684.
The new policy says Los Angeles schools will look for the least damaging way to control pests, in accord with the precautionary principle, and that the goal is to control pests by non-chemical means whenever possible. The policy represents a major step forward in environmental decision-making.
LASSC is a coalition of 20 organizations, including Pesticide Watch, Physicians for Social Responsibility, United Teachers Los Angeles, the Parent Teachers Association, and Action Now.
Six individuals made up the core group that successfully persuaded the Los Angeles Unified School District that "better safe than sorry" is the best pest management philosophy:
** Dr. Kirk Murphy of Physicians for Social Responsibility, who inserted the precautionary language into the draft policy;
** Sandy Schubert, a lawyer who negotiated the terms of the policy. Though not a member of any of LASSC's constituent groups, she contributed her writing skills and her extensive knowledge of California pesticide policies
** Robina Suwol, a parent who saw her child disappear in a cloud of pesticidal fumes as she dropped her child off at school one day; her tenacity and commitment ultimately drove the coalition to success.
** Yvonne Nelson, a member of Action Now, who culled through reams of school pesticide-use reports and documented the widespread mis-use of pesticides in Los Angeles schools;
** Christina Graves, a community organizer with Pesticide Watch, hired to help the coalition find the political strength it needed to overcome the opposition of the pesticide corporations and their friends in high places.
We implied in Rachel #684 that the new pesticide policy in Los Angeles resulted from efforts by Californians for Pesticide Reform (CPR). CPR and Pesticide Watch jointly raised the funds that paid the community organizer who helped build LASSC, and CPR generated support and publicity for the new policy at a crucial moment, just as it came up for a vote. But LASSC worked tirelessly for two years to make the new policy a reality and it is they who deserve the credit for this important public policy innovation. --P.M.
NEXT PAGE -->
|
| * * * COMPANIES & PRODUCTS * * * |
|---|
| * * * IN-HOUSE RESOURCES * * * |
|---|