EPA RULES, TOXIC SUBSTANCE CONTROL ACT, CHEMICALS, HUMAN EXPERIMENTATION, CHRONIC DISEASE, CAREGIVER SUPPORT

"New and Improved" EPA rules boost "acceptable" levels of toxins

In the editorial for the September 2013 Consumer Reports, CR President Jim Guest writes about the 1976 Toxic Substances Control Act:

"In theory it gives the Environmental Protection Agency the authority to collect information about the hazards posed by chemicals and to take action to control 'unreasonable risks'. In reality, collecting information is all but impossible because of trademark secrets embedded into the law; and controlling risks is so tied up in legalese that even asbestos, long ago proved to cause cancer and other fatal diseases is not banned in the U.S.

There are now more than 83,000 chemicals and classes of chemicals listed in the EPA inventory. In the years since the act was passed, the agency has banned, limited or restricted the use of five of those.
Five.

Does that mean that the manufacturers of the other 82,995 have confirmed that they're safe to be in our food containers, cleaning products, carpets and toys?  No, it doesn't. Manufacturers don't have to do a thing; the law requires instead that the EPA prove that a chemical is not safe."
 



Even very low levels of chemicals in the environment found to cause signs of chronic disease

A common mantra of the "skeptics" crowd purports that industrial and environmental chemicals are not necessarily a threat to humans, because these chemicals exist at levels so low that their toxicity is moot. But a new study published in The FASEB Journal suggests otherwise, having found that exposure to even very low levels of chemicals is dangerous, particularly due to their synergistic toxicity.

Individual chemicals may be deemed 'safe' at certain levels, but what happens when these chemicals combine?

But are individual chemicals the problem? Not necessarily. As it turns out, it is the synergistic effect of chemicals in combination with one another that poses the highest risk. And yet existing toxicology assessment protocols fail to look at how individual chemicals affect humans when they combine with other chemicals.

The Human Experiment is a new documentary which explores chemicals that are in everyday household products. 

 


23 Tips For Men on Supporting a Partner with Chronic Pain

Pete Beisner knows a lot about supporting a partner in pain. Here, he shares insights on how to take care of the person you love.

So, I have two sets of tips. The first set of tips is for supporting someone you love who has chronic pain. The second set of tips are practical suggestions for how to support a woman in an episode of critical pain, like just after she has had major surgery or a serious injury.



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