What You Don't Know Can Hurt You: Health and the Environment

I've had chronic rhinitis--that is, nasal congestion--for as long as I can remember. Doctors have recommended a succession of drugs, including pills and inhalers, to treat the symptoms. A month or so ago I finally went to an allergist to find the source of the problem, and underwent 48 tiny pinpricks plus a follow-up to find possible sources?pollen, dust mites, fungi, cat hair, and so on.

The doctor came in to pronounce the verdict: I was allergic to none of these things. What, then, was the source of the problem? "Air," she said, and shrugged her shoulders.

Actually I had read quite a bit about allergies caused by indoor products, such as gasses from paint, carpets, cleaning fluids, and particle board, and had expected to be tested for these. Evidently they don't have such tests. I was tested for allergies to natural substances, but not to the great variety of chemicals that permeate the indoor environments in which most of us spend our lives. Because these have not been with us as long, and because new substances are often introduced, the effects do not seem to be as well known.

Indeed, indoor air quality is often considered to be worse for us than outdoor air quality. Of course pollutants, such as ozone and sulfur dioxide, have become part of the outdoor environment. The rate of asthma, particularly among children, has more than doubled since 1980, almost certainly due to environmental causes (Report).

Air, then, is one key source of environmental health problems. Another is the food we eat and the water we drink. Forty-five years ago, Rachel Carson launched the modern environmental movement with her book Silent Spring, which warned of the dangers of DDT and other pesticides: "In the less than two decades of their use, the synthetic pesticides have been so thoroughly distributed throughout the animate and inanimate world that they occur virtually everywhere. . . . They have been found in fish in remote mountain lakes, in earthworms burrowing in soil, in the eggs of birds?and in man himself. For these chemicals are now stored in the bodies of the vast majority of human beings" (16).

Carson has been accused of sensationalism, and of causing the banning of chemicals with great potential to help humanity. Yet there is little doubt that DDT was causing great harm to birds and other species, leading for instance to the near extinction of the bald eagle. Very likely it would have hit humans next. And there is little doubt that we continue to accumulation hitherto unknown chemicals in our bodies.

Part of this is due to our position at the top of the food chain. As we eat animals we accumulate the chemicals that they have eaten from other species lower on the food chain. Fish higher on the food chain, for instance, accumulate larger amounts of mercury; we, in turn, inherit this high concentration (Mercury). In large concentrations, mercury can attack the nervous system, causing blindness among other symptoms.

Mercury is one suspect in the rising incidence of autism among children, from 1 in 200 in the 1980s to 1 in 150 today (Study). Mercury in vaccines was thought to have been a key cause of autism, but a recent study disputes this (Exposure). What is causing the rising rate, then? Is it something in the water? Is it something in the air? Nobody knows.

My point in writing this article is not that we should live in fear of invisible substance over which we have no control. Nor is it that we, as a society, need to banish all chemicals and pollutants, to return to a life of pre-industrial bliss. Technological advances are here to stay, and in countless ways make our lives far better. My point is that caution in introducing new substances is more than warranted. We need to test and retest chemicals, to monitor our environment, to reduce our exposure to substances about which we know little. Such government agencies as the Environmental Protection Agency, and such environmental organizations as the Sierra Club, play an important part in protecting our health.

On a personal level, we can do things to minimize our exposure to substances that may be harming us. Eating too much fish or meat may increase our build-up of chemicals with unknown effects. Processed foods are also better avoided. Using environmentally friendly paint and cleaning products can limit exposure, while our homes and workplaces should have proper ventilation. We can all be more informed, and wiser, in our daily lives and enjoy the benefits of technology while minimizing the risks.



Source:www.gather.com