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Cancer From the Kitchen?
The battle over health care focuses on access to insurance, or tempests like the one that erupted over new mammogram guidelines.
But what about broader public health challenges? What if breast cancer in the United States has less to do with insurance or mammograms and more to do with contaminants in our water or air -- or in certain plastic containers in our kitchens? What if the surge in asthma and childhood leukemia reflect, in part, the poisons we impose upon ourselves?
This last week I attended a fascinating symposium at Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York, exploring whether certain common chemicals are linked to breast cancer and other ailments.
Dr. Philip Landrigan, the chairman of the department of preventive medicine at Mount Sinai, said that the risk that a 50-year-old white woman will develop breast cancer has soared to 12 percent today, from 1 percent in 1975. (Some of that is probably a result of better detection.) Younger people also seem to be developing breast cancer: This year a 10-year-old in California, Hannah, is fighting breast cancer and recording her struggle on a blog.
Likewise, asthma rates have tripled over the last 25 years, Dr. Landrigan said. Childhood leukemia is increasing by 1 percent per year. Obesity has surged. One factor may be lifestyle changes - like less physical exercise and more stress and fast food - but some chemicals may also play a role.
Take breast cancer. One puzzle has been that most women living in Asia have low rates of breast cancer, but ethnic Asian women born and raised in the United States don't enjoy that benefit. At the symposium, Dr. Alisan Goldfarb, a surgeon specializing in breast cancer, pointed to a chart showing breast cancer rates by ethnicity.
"If an Asian woman moves to New York, her daughters will be in this column," she said, pointing to "whites." "It is something to do with the environment."
What's happening? One theory starts with the well-known fact that women with more lifetime menstrual cycles are at greater risk for breast cancer, because they're exposed to more estrogen. For example, a woman who began menstruating before 12 has a 30 percent greater risk of breast cancer than one who began at 15 or later.
It's also well established that Western women are beginning puberty earlier, and going through menopause later. Dr. Maida Galvez, a pediatrician who runs Mount Sinai's pediatric environmental health specialty unit, told the symposium that American girls in the year 1800 had their first period, on average, at about age 17. By 1900 that had dropped to 14. Now it is 12.
A number of studies, mostly in animals, have linked early puberty to exposure to pesticides, P.C.B.'s and other chemicals. One class of chemicals that creates concern - although the evidence is not definitive - is endocrine disruptors, which are often similar to estrogen and may fool the body into setting off hormonal changes. This used to be a fringe theory, but it is now being treated with great seriousness by the Endocrine Society, the professional association of hormone specialists in the United States.
These endocrine disruptors are found in everything from certain plastics to various cosmetics. "There's a ton of stuff around that has estrogenic material in it," Dr. Goldfarb said. "There's makeup that you rub into your skin for a youthful appearance that is really estrogen."
More than 80,000 new chemicals have been developed since World War II, according to the Children's Environmental Health Center at Mount Sinai. Even of the major chemicals, fewer than 20 percent have been tested for toxicity to children, the center says.
Representative Louise Slaughter, the only microbiologist in the House of Representatives, introduced legislation this month that would establish a comprehensive program to monitor endocrine disruptors. That's an excellent idea, because as long as we're examining our medical system, there's a remarkable precedent for a public health effort against a toxic substance. The removal of lead from gasoline resulted in an 80 percent decline in lead levels in our blood since 1976 - along with a six-point gain in children's I.Q.'s, Dr. Landrigan said.
I asked these doctors what they do in their own homes to reduce risks. They said that they avoid microwaving food in plastic or putting plastics in the dishwasher, because heat may cause chemicals to leach out. And the symposium handed out a reminder card listing "safer plastics" as those marked (usually at the bottom of a container) 1, 2, 4 or 5.
It suggests that the "plastics to avoid" are those numbered 3, 6 and 7 (unless they are also marked "BPA-free"). Yes, the evidence is uncertain, but my weekend project is to go through containers in our house and toss out 3's, 6's and 7's.
16 Comments so far
Show AllAnd not one mention of the book that tried to warn us: "Our Stolen Future." It is the equivalent of "Silent Spring," and the chemical corporations don't want you to read either. Nor do they want you to know about Bill Moyers's extremely important documentary "Trade Secrets."
These three works--"Silent Spring," "Our Stolen Future," and "Trade Secrets" ought to be seen and read by the entire citizenry. What keeps Kristof from mentioning these vastly important works? Probably the publication this is published by--The Great Abettor of Capitalist Crime New York Times.
I only recently stopped using any plastics in the MW and as water bottles. At my age it's not a reproductive issue, but we live in a sea of chemicals, have for years, and any control we may exert on our exposure to untested or known dangerous chemicals like one particular ingredient in plastics, BPA (bisphenol A) is Good Thing.
See Wikipedia (or search anywhere for "bpa", "plastics id code", etc.):
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bisphenol_A
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Resin_identification_code
My surrogate Grandmother, Sister Mary Rose, joined the order at 18 and never looked back.
She's 83. A life devoted to God, 100% clean living, no red meat, still a virgin... liver cancer. With no family cancer history.
Eight other Sisters also have cancer of some sort.
If cancer's taking out the Sisters... ... ...
We are all sitting ducks in this toxic environment we live in. I am going through every cabinet, every drawer, every closet and examining the products I've brought into my home. Reducing, reusing the safe ones and recycling when possible. We've got to educate ourselves and refuse to use anything that contributes to the situation. We have to teach our children and grandchildren how to protect the earth, the air, the water and themselves. Thanks to karlof1 for the book titles and documentary. I'm off to the library.......
Much of childhood leukemia and asthma can be attributed to a product called OSB - oriented strand board. It is the mottled looking sheet goods which most houses in america are built with. It off gasses carcinogens for several years. Houses are sheathed with it, floored with it, stairs are built of it. Then the house is made air tight. And the floors are carpeted with extremely toxic carpets. Then we put the infant on the nice new floor to play with her toys. Small wonder they don't all die before the age of ten. In Flirida one year when a hurricane came thru all the houses on the block built of OSB exploded. The plywood ones did not. It is truly trash stuff. But no one will listen because ... because ...
If we knew even half the stuff we're exposed to daily we'd be amazed that we've survived as long as we have. I was exposed to the infamous DDT used on the family garden growing up, until it was banned. Now it comes to us from foods grown in foreign countries.
It doesn't matter how many studies there are about hazards to our health, if they're the products of big business, the studies will be dealt with just as climate change is currently being dealt with.
I think the only thing that's going to save humankind is its destruction so the few survivors can start over. Of course it'll all end up the same way.
I am a city girl but I cook everyday in the kitchen since I hate going out for meals and don't want to let the produce I buy rot. I don't think I will be as prone to breast cancer with a lot of what I am doing to take care of myself. However, I completely understand a lot of what is leading up to the way most people do meals everyday. It is not only the plastics that are the problem but the fact that people are stressed out of work and with all that bloody traffic congestion thanks to lack of improvement in public transportation and most people working farther away from where they live though not as bad as my case of 45 miles, it's easier to stop by a restaurant on the way or heat a ready-made meal in cans or plastics than it is to take the time to prepare a good meal especially if one is single.
Whenever I hear about cancer, I wish people would give greater attention to the possibility of our diet having an effect on the disease. Not just cancer - but other autoimmune diseases as well. We simply rely too much on the "experts" to tell us what to eat, and how can something so basic as food be so confusing? It's like doing research on what to breathe and how much to breathe. That kind of a research has its place, say, in a space program. Although humans have eaten meat all through the ages, the amount of meat consumed per person could never have been so high at any point in history - and this did not happen naturally as civilization evolved.
I would really like to recommend the book "China Study: The Most Comprehensive Study Of Nutrition Ever Conducted and the Startling Implications for Diet, Weight Loss and Long-Term Health" by Dr. T. Colin Campbell. This book specifically talks about the concerted effort that goes on in spreading and maintaining misinformation - even in cancer research. And the misinformation starts at the grade school level - which I heard about first from "Diet for a New America" by John Robbins. Not surprisingly, you'll find some criticism of these books as well - most likely from some astroturf bloggers.
I first read of the work of Dr. Gerson in Acres USA. The web addy is http://www.gerson.org/ . Hope the information finds its way to those that are in need.
Terran
My cousin, age 53, vegan, exercised, lived as close to the earth as possible, died 14 months ago - filled with four kinds of cancer.
I don't believe it's all from the kitchen.
I believe in her case, well, she never expressed negative emotions. She held her anger in. Just a thought.
"Yes, the evidence is uncertain, but my weekend project is to go through containers in our house and toss out 3's, 6's and 7's."
I hope that last sentence is meant "tongue in cheek". I don't use ANY plastics in the microwave, period.
From the article:
"It is something to do with the environment."
Well, DUH...
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Many people still believe that US government agencies protect them from the worst toxic chemicals and dangerous products.
But it ain't so.
While some agencies do try to do so, and occasionally succeed in a particular instance after widespread injury or death has been shown, the proliferation of manufactured toxins is too huge and the regulatory apparatus too overwhelmed and corrupted by corporate influence, to enable any realistic protection.
Just one especially ominous example:
In 1996 the FDA allowed Monsanto corp to introduce Genetically Modified Organisms (GMOs) into the US food supply with no independent safety studies for animal health effects (under the FDA's ridiculous concept of 'substantial equivalence.')
Today, 80-90% of the 5 major US food crops - soybeans, corn, canola, wheat, and sugar beets - are genetically modified, despite that fact that in subsequent years virtually all independent, peer-reviewed tests have documented substantial harm to animals from GM food ingestion.
While the snowballing results of these independent tests have caused many European countries to ban GM food production and sales entirely (including, thus, many US food imports to Europe), in the US these independent tests have been ignored by government regulators in favor of accepting Monsanto's own, self-interested tests, which consistently show "no harm" to animals.
Pseudo-ethically bolstering this suicidal approach to US food/product safety are most Libertarian think thank thinkers, who, like the Freeman Institute thinkers, typically argue [still!] that since the human beings behind the food manufacturing process of corporations inevitably end up, in the real world, eating their own products, their real world "rational self-interest" against poisoning themselves (and therefore, us) is mostly all that civil society needs as a safety guarantee.
Rational Self-Interest, uh huh.
Would that possibly be the same kind of rational self-interest that just recently failed to restraint our greed propelled financial sector, and caused our economy to tank?
Unless we believe in having sex with 72 virgins in afterlife, we all - Conservative and Liberal, Republican, Democrat and Independent, progressive and not so - want to delay the inevitable. Unfortunately, it is not under our control. As we all know, even the most healthy lifestyle is not a guarantee of an extra minute of existence.
On a lighter note, if cancer comes from kitchens, should not people avoid them and eat out more?
Where do you think food is prepared when you go out to eat? My 25+ years in food services informs me that commercial kitchens are no better than domestic as lots of PVC and other plastics are used.
The article does not mention food - only once regarding microwaves... It does suggest, however, that cancer is linked to kitchens.... :-)