A very provocative article from BERLIN (Reuters) starts with” Cancer is a bigger killer in developing countries than tuberculosis, malaria and AIDS combined and a “tsunami” of the disease threatens to overwhelm the nations worst equipped to cope, experts said on Tuesday.

While only about 5 percent of global resources for cancer are spent in developing countries, the burden of the disease is far greater there, they said, with 60 percent of last year’s 7.6 million cancer deaths occurring in poorer nations.

Women-specific cancers like breast and cervical cancer, which account for more than a quarter of all female deaths worldwide, could be dramatically cut in low and middle-income nations by improving awareness and detection, they said.”

This is an amazing oupouring of disease but is it surprising? In the U.S., cancer incidence has been rising for decades and is just now slowing as the reduction in smoking is starting to reduce lung cancer. Meanwhile,cancer causing, endocrine disrupting, and immune system suppressing chemicals such as the PCBs and  the persistent pesticides … toxapnene, chlordane, Mirex, Lindane, and others that we banned deades ago have found global favor and are still being used in developing countries. Is it any wonder that cancer is rapidly escalating in the developing world and remains a continuing threat in the developed world as global use continues to contaminate our food, water, and air.

Global banning of PCBs and POPs pesticides would do more for our health than any of the nealth care plans currently being discussed. Why don’t we put our resources where the problems are?

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The White House taskforce on oceans, including the Great Lakes is being reviewed in meetings around the nation. See an introduction and get the report here:  http://www.sustainablebusiness.com/index.cfm/go/news.display/id/18923

Its goal includes preservation and protection of the Great Lakes. However, it is silent on POPs contamination of our coastal bays by airborne foreign PCBs, the toxaphene in Lake Superior, and the pollution of the Arctic Alaska with chlordane, toxaphene, and PCBs.

An “ecosystem” approach is recommended with focus on all NATIONAL stakeholders. This is just like the IJC’s approach to the Great Lakes. They have “protected” Lake Superior through a strong ecosystem approach that controls all local inputs. Lake Superior trout contain toxaphene at multiples of the level that classifys dirt as hazardous waste and this problem is ignored as we “protect” our citizens from toxaphene by removing it from fish consumption guidelines.Unfortunately, these “ecosystem approaches” ignore the main source of POPs pollution … global air that is continuously polluted by  megaton uses in developing countries.

Internatonal researchers realize this. Why do we waste effort at cleaning up residues while not addressing the source?

Please add your comment to: http://www.whitehouse.gov/administration/eop/ceq/initiatives/oceans/interimreport/

Tell them that we want endocrine disrupting and cancer causing chemicals out of our lakes and oceans and that we are tired of our government agencies turning their backs to foreign sourced pollution.

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Endocrine disruption seems to be getting more news as birth defects in man and beast become more prevalent.

This overview: http://www.miller-mccune.com/science_environment/seeking-chemical-culprits-for-those-deformities-1483

details the magnitude and increasing nature of the number of problems and the number of people affected.

Why do we tolerate the continuing use of “banned” substanses that are known to be in the environment and proven o be endocrine disruptors …. chemicals such as PCBs, toxaphene, chlordane and the rest of the “dirty dozen” that continue to poison our air, food, and water?

Why do we argue the costs and benefits of health CARE and ignore issues of disease PREVENTION?

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The news today is full of reports of the Inspector General’s findings of lagging in the clean up of the Great Lakes. See:

http://blog.taragana.com/n/inspector-general-report-faults-epa-for-delays-in-cleaning-up-toxic-sediments-in-great-lakes-169506/   for details.

The gist of the finding is that $475,000,000 is not nearly enough. $2,250,000,000 is needed and the EPA must be held accountable for results. EPA accountability is defined as dollars effectively and timely spent, sediment removed, or AOCs remediated. Unfortunately none of these expensive tasks has anything to do with PCB levels in the water.

International researchers have known for decades that our waters remain PCB contaminated from air transport of PCBs still used in the developing world. They still use tens of thousands of tons per year and will continue to do so in spite of a “voluntary agreement” to cease.

“Cleaning up” the Great Lakes sediments while the air above them contains 75,000,000 molecules per liter of PCBs is like replacing carpeting and ignoring the hole in the roof.

Pleae tell the Inspector General and your congressman to wake up and stop useless spending …. then address the real problem, the continuing global use of long banned persistent organic pollutants such as PCBs, toxaphene, and chlordane..

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 Researchers from the Robert Wood Johnson Medical School and Environmental and Occupational Health Sciences Institute, a joint institute of Rutgers University and Robert Wood Johnson Medical School have fouhd a stong association between Lindane (Gamma Hexacloocyclohexane) postmortem brain concentraton and Parkinson’s disease.

http://archneur.ama-assn.org/cgi/content/short/66/7/870

Lindane is the most volatile of all persistent organic pesticides (POPs) and is found in the Arctic Ocean at forty times the concentration of oceans near its use. If this correlation is valid, people of the north who consume marine mammals should have high levels of Parkinson’s Disease.

A study was made comparing Inuit of Greenland and Faroese natives with people from southern Denmark.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15254942?dopt=AbstractPlus

Parkinson’s rate is more than doubled in the more northern populations that have higher exposure to POPs.

How much more data is needed before we demand global banning of Lindane, PCBs, toxaphene and chlordane?

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A researcher studying roadkilled deer in Montana is finding sexual anomalies in males in an increasing rate:

http://www.miller-mccune.com/science_environment/divining-the-secret-of-deformed-roadkill-1441

Gulls and terns exhibited these problems decades ago, and they were later found in polar bears. Will it have to be rampant in humans before a global ban of persistent organic ptsticides and PCBs is pursued?

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This interesting article: http://www.environmentalhealthnews.org/ehs/news/wildlife-cancer

discusses cancers in several types of wildlife. The main culprit seems to be chemicals such as PCBs and the banned persistent pesticides. The mechanism appears to be that these persistent organic pollutants (POPs)  compromise the immune system and allow cancer to run out of control.

As usual, the researchers see POPs as being banned, but “leaking out of old equipment.”

When are going to wake up to the fact that these chemicals are globally sourced and not going away until they are globally bannid?

The wild animals exposure should be treated as a guinea pig study. Humans are in danger, and should not eat the food that animals that get cancer eat.

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An article from Chicago Public radio: http://www.wbez.org/Content.aspx?audioID=36121 describes a correlation between blood levels of DDE, the DDE environmental degradation product, and diabetes in Consumers of Great Lakes fish.

This is a first time link between DDT and diabetes. The mechanism of action of DDE to produce diabetes is stated as “not known.” That does not mean that there is no correlation between  fish consumption and diabetes. There are plenty of other pollutants in Great Lakes fish and their consumption risks should be identified and made clear to the public.

Lake Superior Lake Trout are currently the most contaminated of Great Lakes Fish and the billions of dollars of Great Lakes Initiative clean up money will do nothing for them. There must be better ways to waste money or address contaminants.

See this video: 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l2FT9vgTIAY for an explanation of Lake Superior’s problems with toxaphene and how it is hidden and unaddressed.

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This Canadian article warns of the subtle toxicity of Great lakes fish.

http://www.winnipegsun.com/news/canada/2009/07/10/10088996.html

Unfortunately it says nothing about the fact that in the northern lakes, toxaphene is the most toxic component and is not even measured or communicated.

Please write your state or Provincial health authorities and insist that toxaphene be measured and communicated in fish consumption advisories.

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See: http://www.newsweek.com/id/208917

An interesting article on the association between POPs and cancr in wildlife. PCB is the most mentioned POP, but it is also the most measured. Many POPs have been found to affect the immune system and a compromised immune system can lead to vulnerability to cancer.

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