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Thursday, June 30, 2005

Common sense and science prevail: radiation & cancer
The nuclear industry lost a hard-fought battle yesterday when a NAS panel concluded that even low level doses of radiation still pose a cancer risk. From the AP:
The preponderance of scientific evidence shows that even very low doses of radiation pose a risk of cancer or other health problems and there is no threshold below which exposure can be viewed as harmless, a panel of prominent scientists concluded Wednesday.

The finding by the National Academy of Sciences panel is viewed as critical because it is likely to significantly influence what radiation levels government agencies will allow at abandoned nuclear power plants, nuclear weapons production facilities and elsewhere.

The nuclear industry,, as well as some independent scientists, have argued that there is a threshold of very low level radiation where exposure is not harmful, or possibly even beneficial. They said current risk modeling may exaggerate the health impact.

The panel, after five years of study, rejected that claim.

"The scientific research base shows that there is no threshold of exposure below which low levels of ionized radiation can be demonstrated to be harmless or beneficial," said Richard R. Monson, the panel chairman and a professor of epidemiology at Harvard's School of Public Health.

The committee gave support to the so-called "linear, no threshold" model that is currently the generally acceptable approach to radiation risk assessment. This approach assumes that the health risks from radiation exposure declines as the dose levels decline, but that each unit of radiation — no matter how small — still is assumed to cause cancer.



Posted by Robert Shull, 01:10:01 PM



Wednesday, June 29, 2005

Homeland unsecured: the milk supply
The National Academy of Sciences published in its journal an article about homeland security and the food supply, after delaying publication at the request of the administration. The article essentially models the likely scenario of a bioterror attack on the food supply via dumping botulinum toxin into a milk silo. Despite press reports to the contrary, the article is not a handbook for terrorists; it is one of a series of scholarly efforts to predict what might happen in the course of a bioterroristic attack, what the scope of the damage might be, how effective current protective policies would be in responding to the attack, and what lessons can be learned.

Some of the observations from the article:

  • “A foodborne attack is much more preventable than an airborne or mailborne attack, due to the restricted number of release locations. Requiring all tanks, trucks, and silos to be locked when not being drained or filled would be an obvious step forward, as would security checks for personnel who have access to prebottled milk (farm laborers, truck drivers, receiving labor at the processing facility, and plant engineers) and requiring one person from each stage of the supply chain to be present while milk is transferred from one stage to the next (15). Although these and other measures are included in proposed Food and Drug Administration guidelines (16), they are currently voluntary.”

  • “Although enforcement options range from voluntary guidelines to new laws, the most promising approach may be to develop International Organization for Standardization (ISO) security standards that are analogous to the ISO 9000 standards for quality management and the ISO 14000 standards for environmental management (www.iso.ch_iso_en_iso9000—14000_index.html, accessed on November 12, 2004).”

  • Current botulinum testing protocols may not permit rapid detection of a widespread outbreak. “Our study highlights the value of rapid in-process testing for detecting an attack, and because stockpiling sufficient ventilators and antitoxin in the event of a large-scale attack would be exorbitantly expensive, it seems wise to aggressively invest in rapid, sensitive, and specific in-process testing.”

  • The potential for secondary cases from cross-contamination of otherwise uncontaminated milk also raises concerns. “Two locations in the supply chain, trucks that are cleaned daily but that make two trips daily and processing lines that are cleaned daily, offer the opportunity for uncontaminated milk to become tainted by uncleaned residue from the primary release. The secondary effect from a release in a truck has an ~50% chance of causing damage equivalent to a release that is 8 h later and ~0.5% as large as the primary release…. 640,000 gallons per day of freshly produced milk would need to be discarded until the attack is effectively investigated, the supply chain is turned back on, and consumer confidence returns. This delay could be hastened by effective product tracing, decontamination, and risk communication.”

An accompanying editorial discusses the controversy over the suppression of the article and the rationale for its publication.

More information:



Posted by Robert Shull, 12:49:08 PM



Sunday, June 26, 2005

Mad cow cover-up (again)
The New York Times is reporting that Friday's announcement of the second confirmed case of mad cow in the U.S. was delayed ... for seven months!
Although the Agriculture Department confirmed on Friday that a cow that died last year was infected with mad cow disease, a test the agency conducted seven months ago indicated that the animal had the disease. The result was never publicly disclosed.

The delay in confirming the United States' second case of mad cow disease seems to underscore what critics of the agency have said for a long time: that there are serious and systemic problems in the way the Agriculture Department tests animals for mad cow.

Indeed, the lengthy delay occurred despite the intense national interest in the disease and the fact that many countries have banned shipments of beef from the United States because of what they consider to be lax testing policies.

This isn't the first time.

  • Federal investigators have been probing allegations from a former USDA veterinarian that the USDA was covering up concnerns about mad cow from the very beginning of USDA's mad cow surveillance program in 1990.
  • Moreover, Canadian news uncovered recently that the USDA may have mishandled two 1997 tests of suspected mad cow. In one, an independent university lab concluded that the cow "had a rare brain disorder never reported in that breed of cattle either before or since — not the dreaded bovine spongiform encephalopathy." CBC discovered, however, that "key areas of the brain where signs of BSE would be most noticeable were never tested. The most important samples somehow went missing."


Posted by Robert Shull, 05:34:54 PM



You're exposed; your grandkids suffer
We already know that exposures to toxic substances can have immediate consequences for our offspring. But what about the next generation, and the next generation after that? Without genetic mutations?

The field of epigenetics studies how we can have intergenerational consequences for public health hazards without the genes themselves being mutated. Researchers look at, for example, how molecules can attach themselves to the DNA molecule without changing the genetic sequences themselves, but then ride along from generation to generation.

The latest issue of Rachel's Environment & Health News reports on the latest epigenetic discovery:

The latest information appears in a new study by Michael Skinner and colleagues at Washington State University, published in the June 3 issue of Science magazine. Skinner found that mother rats exposed to hormone-mimicking chemicals during pregnancy gave birth to four successive generations of male offspring with significantly reduced fertility. Only the first generation of mothers was exposed to a toxin, yet four generations later the toxic effect could still be detected.

Prior to this study, scientists had only been able to document epigenetic effects on the first generation of offspring. These new findings suggest that harm from toxins in the environment can be much longer lasting and pervasive than previously known because they can impact several generations.

And therefore a precautionary approach to toxics is even more important that previously believed.



Posted by Robert Shull, 05:14:29 PM



Friday, June 24, 2005

Let's not forget Listeria
Now with the late Friday announcement of the second confirmed case of mad cow disease in the U.S. -- a high-profile example of the need for regulatory protections of the public interest, and a reminder of the consequences of government inaction -- it makes sense to look over the latest news on another food safety danger: Listeria. The White House has inexplicably put the already weak protections against Listeria on a hit list of regulatory safeguards to be weakened or eliminated. Aside from the news of yet another recall of potentially Listeria-contaminated foods, there are two new studies worth knowing more about:
  • one showing that the pathogen is remarkably dangerous even after being starved and assaulted by food safety measures: according to the study, "starved and injured cells, after more than six months of languishing, still had enough strength to kill 60 percent of their target cell population within six hours, then 90 percent of the target after eight hours"; and
  • another, revealing just how Listeria actually gets into our cells and destroys them from the inside.


Posted by Robert Shull, 08:43:27 PM



Mad cow confirmed
Strategically timing the news release for the end of the day on Friday, the USDA has confirmed the second official case of mad cow in the United States.

More information and background:



Posted by Robert Shull, 08:32:50 PM



Monday, June 20, 2005

Mad about mad cow
The USDA promised 18 months ago to close a loophole in current policy that could let mad cow disease sneak through. To prevent mad cow, we must stop feeding cows tissue and blood from other cows; the loophole is that cattle are fed chicken litter (from chickens that, in turn, have been fed cow blood and other cattle proteins), cattle blood, and restaurant leftovers, all of which could transmit the deformed protein (or prion) that causes mad cow disease.

The loophole has not yet been closed. "Once the cameras were turned off and the media coverage dissipated, then it's been business as usual, no real reform, just keep feeding slaughterhouse waste," said John Stauber, an activist and co-author of Mad Cow USA: Could the Nightmare Happen Here?, to the Associated Press. Stauber adds, "The entire U.S. policy is designed to protect the livestock industry's access to slaughterhouse waste as cheap feed."

Given that we may have a second case of mad cow in the U.S., the issue deserves more than what Rep. Rosa DeLauro describes as "a lot of talk, a lot of press releases, and no action."

Government inaction on mad cow may well stretch back to the early to mid 1990s. Federal investigators have been probing allegations from a former USDA veterinarian that the USDA was covering up concnerns about mad cow from the very beginning of USDA's mad cow surveillance program in 1990. Moreover, Canadian news uncovered recently that the USDA may have mishandled two 1997 tests of suspected mad cow. In one, an independent university lab concluded that the cow "had a rare brain disorder never reported in that breed of cattle either before or since – not the dreaded bovine spongiform encephalopathy." CBC discovered, however, that "key areas of the brain where signs of BSE would be most noticeable were never tested. The most important samples somehow went missing."

Posted by Robert Shull, 01:15:47 PM



Tuesday, June 07, 2005

NAS suppresses science paper at admin's request
The Associated Press is reporting that the National Academy of Sciences has suppressed a scientific assessment of the dairy industry's vulnerability to bioterror, after the administration requested the paper be delayed. The authors have argued elsewhere that these vulnerabilities demand government action to make us safer. It is only the latest example of the many ways that the homeland remains unsecured long after 9/11, because the Bush administration refuses to regulate the industries whose campaign funding propelled it into office.

This case is not the first time the NAS has been willing to be subservient to the Bush administration, even when the administration is subordinating science to politics. For example, the NY Times revealed last year that the NAS allowed the White House to edit an NAS scientific report on the health effects of mercury, with changes that downplayed the risks of mercury, replaced specific enumerations of mercury-related harms with bland, general references, and introduced additional emphasis on uncertainty to make the science of mercury's neurotoxic effects seem less reliable. The NAS has also, on several occasions, stacked its scientific advisory panels with industry hires.

Posted by Robert Shull, 05:59:33 PM




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