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Healthy Living in a Toxic World

Do You Know What YOUR Child is Wearing? 5 Tips to Keep Them Safe

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flame retardants and children
Vojtech Soukup /Dollar Photo Club

Chemicals are everywhere in our world.  I’ve said before that we live in a toxic soup, and that absolutely includes our children.

Our kids have a particular susceptibility to toxins in our environment because their detoxification ability is not as strong as an adult’s.  To make this worse, we are particularly sensitive to the plight of children and the scary fear that their pajamas may burst into flames at any given moment.

Yes.  Spontaneous combustion.  The eternal fear of lawmaking officials.

The problem is that it requires chemicals to meet the standards that are required.  There are natural materials that a naturally flame-resistant, but industry doesn’t seem interested in using these fibers.

Still all of this would be OK if we are saving lives without the cost of toxic exposure to our children while trying to prevent the almost 200 burns due to clothing in the US per year.  The current standards require the materials to resist an actual flame for a certain period of time.  Clothing that fits close to the skin is far less likely to catch on fire and does not require the higher flame resistant standards.

California sets the standard for the rest of the country when it comes to flame resistance in household materials and the rest of the country just seems to follow suit.  Which would be just fine if any of the chemicals used in the process of making children’s clothes flame retardant underwent any type of safety testing.

In other words, the use of chemicals to meet flame resistant standards is mandated, but any safety testing for these same chemicals is not required.  Quite a catch-22.

(The following information is from a viewpoint article written by Dr. Eric Hecht, Dr. David Landy and Julien Thomas)

As a way of history to show just how backwards this is, the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC-the government entity that oversees this type of thing), in 1977 banned the use of CFR 2,3-dibromyopropyl phosphate one year after it was introduced.  Unfortunately, it turns out that this compound was absorbed through the skin and had the potential to cause DNA mutations.

After this, the polybrominated diphenyl esters (PBDE) took over and became the most widely used flame retardant.  That was until 2004 when concerns again arose over the toxicity of certain PBDE and these were likewise removed from the market.  These concerns ranged from endocrine disruptions, neurodevelopmental disorders and cancer.

Just in case you thought this was the end the debacle, another PBDE called decabromodiphenyl ester was banned in several states in 2013 over the same concerns.

Overall, some billion pounds of flame retardants are used annually in the US, where the typical household contains several pounds in clothing, furniture, electronics and insulation.  As these materials break down, they attach to dust particles and can make it into ours and our children’s bodies by this route as well.  This results in children in the US having toxic levels of flame retardants that are some 10 TIMES higher than other countries.

And our pets?  That’s even worse since they are much closer to the sources of these chemicals.

All of this wouldn’t be an issue if these toxic chemicals were not linked in children to neurodevelopmental disorders, lower IQs, ADD and other behavioral problems.

The regulation of these compounds is slim, and a huge chunk were grandfathered in when the Toxic Substances Control Act was passed in 1976.  Overall, this is a scenario where you need to be proactive in protecting your children from toxic exposures rather than trusting in the manufacturers and the government to ensure that products used are safe for your family.

Here are some tips:

  1. For pajamas, use form fitting clothing that do not require the flame resistant standards of loose pajamas.
  2. Look for clothing and toys made with naturally-flame resistant materials (this article is a great resource).
  3. Consider the mattresses your family sleeps on.  Standards were changed in 2007 to include more toxic chemicals, but in my recent search for a new mattress, many of the larger manufacturers have move to naturally flame-resistant fibers to meet the standards.
  4. Throw out items that have been in use for too long.  Drapes, carpets, rugs, dog beds, furniture–as these age, the toxic chemicals in them leach out into your house.
  5. Purchase air filters for your home and dust, sweep and vacuum frequently to keep dust to a minimum.

For a long time, I considered the foundation to health to consist of diet, exercise and stress management.  Unfortunately, over the years which growing use of chemicals everywhere in our environment, I’ve had to add an environmental tab to this foundation.  The problem with this aspect is that is remains largely unknown to most of us, yet has a direct effect on health.

Everyone knows that the McDonald’s Big Mac they are going to eat is bad for them, but few consider the hidden danger of returning to a car after that fast food meal that has been baking in the sun for a 1/2 hour and breathing in the toxic phthalates that have been off-gassing in the heat.

Scary.

 

Have You Gone BPA-free? Does it Really Make a Difference?

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BPA free water bottles
Photo courtesy of https://www.flickr.com/photos/kevinmic/

For several years now, the BPA-free craze has been on the rise. The initial concern focused on baby’s products.

Keegan is 9 now, and I do not remember any BPA-free water bottles when he was an infant, so the public demand for these types of products began after this time. Now, I don’t think you can actually buy any products that contain BPA.

During this same timeframe, the use of BPA-free plastics has become common in other plastic products. However, BPA is present in many other commonly used items, including:

  • Thermal register receipts
  • The lining of aluminum cans (both drinks as well as foods)
  • Other plastic bottles

Overall, it seems like society has become aware of the BPA concerns in plastics and is a least driving the market for BPA-free containers. Unfortunately, it still seems like the health implications of BPA have not quite settled in.

Let me say this—the research on the links between BPA and breast cancer, obesity and diabetes is clear and consistent. This chemical compound has distinct hormonal effects on the human body. Despite this, you can’t go ten feet without seeing someone lugging around a plastic water bottle like their life depended on it. This just seems to represent a disconnect between the health effects of BPA and the reality of its continued usage.

For the rest of you that have moved to BPA-free plastics does it really make a difference? Are the BPA-free plastics that have replaced the BPA-loaded plastics really any better?

My gut feeling has also been to be leery of all plastics. My family moved to stainless steel and glass for containers and dishware our household for quite a while now. Unless there are no additional options, we do not drink out of plastic water bottles, regardless of whether or not the bottles are BPA-free or not.

Turns out that I may not be completely off my rocker on this one. In this particular study, researchers looked at the hormonal effects of the alternative plastics that have replaced BPA. Two of the common replacement plastics contain bisphenol S (BPS) and bisphenol F (BPF).

They looked across 32 studies (25 in vitro only, and 7 in vivo—meaning in actual patients). Here’s what they found:

  • The majority of these studies found the potency to be as potent as BPA.
  • These mechanisms included estrogenic, antiestrogenic, androgenic, and antiandrogenic.
  • BPS also has estradiol-like properties as they relate to cell proliferation, differentiation, and death.
  • BPS and BPF also showed other effects in vitro and in vivo, such as altered organ weights, reproductive end points, and enzyme expression.

In other words, the plastics that have been used by industry to replace BPA are likely no better for us than the plastics we are trying to avoid.

The bottom line is that you should be doing your best to avoid plastics for both you and your family. Switch to stainless steel and glass-based products when possible.

 

Firmiculates Bacteria in the Gut and Pollutants in Your Diet

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microbiome and glutamine
abhijith3747 / Dollar Photo Club

Gut bacteria and your health.  The microbiome.  These strange bedfellows play a massive role in our health and yet we know so little about how to positively impact our microbiome using lifestyle and supplementation.

Luckily, it seems like weekly there are new studies published that help to fill in the major gaps in our understanding of this relationship.  One thing that remains clear is that the types of bacteria acting as King of the Hill makes a big difference in your long term health.  Firmicutes is a class of bacteria that is generally considered anti-diabetic, anti-obesity and an overall good guy.

Bacteroidetes, on the other hand, is on the other end of the scale, increased the risk of obesity and diabetes.  It is far more common in Westernized societies while Firmicutes is found in higher levels in hunter-gatherer populations.

This is where the solidity in understanding what goes on in our microbiome stops, although it does seem like we are getting a better and better idea of how to change this bacteria in our gut to a more friendly neighbor.  Diet, of course, plays a major role.  Avoidance of antibiotics in all except the most necessary of conditions is a major factor in destroying your microbiome.  Stress can change the character of your microbiome in a matter of minutes.

Other, less obvious factors can include certain amino acids.  A recent article on glutamine demonstrated just how powerful a single amino acid could be at making positive changes in your microbiome.  Another study found positive effects using cranberry extracts.  And I’m sure there’s a bunch more I’ve missed.

But while you’re busy positively affecting your microbiome with cranberry-flavored glutamine powder, you have to remain vigilant to the environment in which we live.  I have stated before that we live in a toxic soup that most of us blissfully swim through without being aware.  Or maybe you are one of the enlightened ones.  Maybe you stick to organics for the produce found on the Dirty Dozen list.  Maybe you didn’t buy a mattress after July 2007 due to the increase in flame resistance standards and the chemicals required to withstand a Bunsen burner.

Maybe you even ditched your non-stick cookware and you would never dream of drinking out of a plastic water bottle.

If this describes you, then you’re going to feel vindicated in front of all of those friends who called you a hippie and a health freak.  In this particular article, researchers looked at the effects of persistent organic pollutants (POPs) on the microbiome.  In this mouse study, researchers exposed the animals to a specific POP called 2,3,7,8-tetrachlorodibenzofuran (TCDF).  This compound is sometimes referred to as a dioxin (although it is better described as dioxin-ish) and we are typically exposed to it through the food we eat.

Most common exposures are through diet and, more specifically, animal products.  This is because, like heavy metals, animals cannot get rid of persistent organic pollutants so they just keep getting concentrated up the food chain.  This makes it very difficult to actually avoid exposure to POPs, although there are things you can do to reduce your exposure.  More on that in a bit.

In the study, mice were given a high dose of TCDF along with their food for five days.  The dose was 1,000 times the level that we are normally exposed to TCDF in our food supply, but the levels are in line with high dose occupational exposures.  Here’s what they found:

  • There was a shift in the gut microbiota Firmicutes to Bacteroidetes (not good).
  • There changes in bile acid metabolism.
  • The TCDF triggered inflammation and changed the way the liver was handling and storing both fat and glucose.

Granted, the levels of exposure were very high, but in a linked editorial, it was noted that further studies at dosages more in line with human exposures are showing the same types of negative changes in the gut microbiome.

So what can you do?  While you cannot avoid exposure completely, here are some tips:

  1. Considering that POPs are retained in animal tissues, living a vegetarian, vegan or plant-based lifestyle will lower your risk.
  2. If you do consume animal products, it would make sense that organic sources of  food would have lower levels of POPs.
  3. Lifestyle choices that promote growth of Firmicutes (as noted above) can counteract the chemical exposure-related changes.

For me, one of the scariest and most insightful things that I glean from studies like this is that so many of the negative consequences of our lifestyle choices are mediated through the gut bacteria.  Just how much of a role do these bacteria play?  In other words, it is well established that chemical compounds like POPs are associated with diabetes and obesity and certain cancers.  But is it the actual chemical compounds themselves causing problems internally, or is it that these chemicals are altering the gut microbiome and THIS is how these chronic conditions are created?

I’m sure it is a combination of the two, but what does this say about the importance of maintaining a good, solid, healthy microbiome?  Personally, I think it says everything.

 

Childhood Obesity Statistics: Contributions of a Forgotten Chemical

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environmental chemicals and obesity
absurdovruslan / Dollar Photo Club

 

Calories in, calories out.  Seems to be a simple enough equation for weight loss or maintenance.  Or, at least it used to be.

Make sure your son or daughter stays active.  Throw out any Kellogg’s breakfast cereals and keep them away from fruit juice.  These recommendations are simple enough and makes sense for keeping the rising obesity tide in children at bay.

But somewhere along the process the equation changed.

When you took math class, you were dealing with numbers you understood and could work with.  But what if the equation your teacher put in front of you had numbers that weren’t even on the page?  Makes absolutely no sense, right?

But when it comes to health, this is exactly what is happening.  As society and manufacturing have progressed we have introduced chemicals into the environment that can have a very strong impact on your risk of chronic disease.  It’s no longer about watching the calories you eat and making sure you stay active.  The equation now contains chemicals in the environment that are affecting your health.  And not in a good way.

Many are aware of the more common chemicals like bisphenol A (BPA) in plastic water bottles, thermal register receipts and soda cans.  Teflon in non-stick cookware.  Flame retardants in your clothing, mattress and furniture.

But if in casual conversation I asked your thoughts about dichlorodiphenyldichloroethylene I’m pretty sure you’d give me a blank look and steer the conversation to politics.  Unless, of course, you’re a biochemist for DuPont.

If instead I asked you if you had ever heard of DDT used as a insecticide in farming, that glossy look in your eyes would disappear and you’d become more and more animated as you recall the damage this chemical did to animals in the environment and how it was banned from use in the US in 1972.

The rest of the world was a little slow to catch on.  DDT was banned worldwide during the Stockholm Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants (POPs) on May 21, 2002, going into effect in 2004.  Over a decade ago.  Little did we know just how tough it was for Mother Nature to degrade and get rid of DDT.

With this in mind, if you knew that dichlorodiphenyldichloroethylene was a breakdown product of DDT, things would make a little more sense.  And your cause for concern would go up.

Here in the US, 40+ years after DDT was banned, almost all of us have breakdown products of DDT that can be found in our blood.  Scary.

The DDT ban is not so new in Europe and given how long it takes for DDT to clear from the environment it’s hard to imagine that this is not having an effect on our kid’s health.

As if this wasn’t enough to worry about, phthalates are incredibly common in our lives.  That “new shower curtain smell” or the new car smell likely indicates that phthalates are present.  Many “fragrances” have phthalates embedded within them.  Think about how many household items you use on a daily basis that have a scent to them.  It’s likely that phthalates are at work.

All of these environmental chemicals have been shown to contribute to chronic disease.  Top of the list is obesity.  But just how much do these chemicals contribute?  Just a little?  A lot?

This is the exact question posed in this particular study.  In it, a panel of researchers used models to estimate the potential that dichlorodiphenyldichloroethylene, BPA, phthalates and other chemicals were contributing to childhood obesity.  Then they went further, determining the costs related to healthcare expenditures due to these chemicals.  Here’s what they found:

  • The panel identified a 40% to 69% chance that dichlorodiphenyldichloroethylene caused 1555 cases of overweight at age 10 (in 2010) with associated costs of $36.7 million.
  • There was a 20% to 39% chance that dichlorodiphenyldichloroethylene caused 28,200 cases of adult diabetes with associated costs of $12.5 billion.
  • The panel also identified a 40% to 69% chance that phthalate exposure caused 53,900 cases of obesity in older women and $232 billion in associated costs.
  • Phthalate exposure had a 40% to 69% chance of causing 20,500 new cases of diabetes in older women with $907 million in associated costs.
  • Prenatal bisphenol A exposure had a 20% to 69% chance of causing 42,400 cases of childhood obesity with associated lifetime costs of $2.16 billion.

These are estimates, but they are based on what it known about how much these chemicals contribute to poor health.  Unless you take these chemicals into account for the equation of your good health, the solution won’t balance.

In everything you do, you need to pay attention to the chemicals you may be exposed to and do your best to avoid them whenever possible.

 

FDA and Drug Research: Watching Our Backs or Asleep at the Wheel?

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FDA inspections hidden
apops/Dollar Photo Club

Our world of medicine is dominated by drugs.  Drugs are the foundation upon just about every treatment that mainstream medicine offers.

The entire Affordable Care Act (aka Obamacare) was passed so that patients could now have access to doctors.  And by “access” I mean have someone else pay for services.  And by “services” I really mean drugs.

While this sounds simplistic and singleminded, think about it for a second.  If you KNEW you had high blood pressure, high cholesterol or were overweight and did not want to use drugs, would you make an appointment with your primary care doctor to find out how to change your lifestyle for the better?  Typically not.

No, the creation of the Medicare Part D program, the expansion of Medicaid across the country and the creation of the Affordable Care Act were all about one thing: getting access to doctors to get prescriptions for drugs.  Prescription drugs are the #3 most expensive line item in health care costs (and its growth is by far outpacing the #1 and #2 slots), with #2 being physician costs (the gatekeeper to get the drugs) and #1 being hospital costs.

At the heart of all the research and safety and protection for these drugs to the public is the Food and Drug Administration.  The FDA, as it became officially known as in 1930, has, for over a century, been a government watchdog for the safety of the general public.  One of the largest roles of the FDA is to oversee the approval and use of pharmaceutical drugs used on you and I.

And lord knows we need it.  Drug companies fulfill the archetypical big corporation in the most evil Hollywood blockbuster stereotype, using bribes and seedy marketing techniques to get patients to request their drugs and doctors to prescribe them.  There is little doubt that illegal activities and the fines that accompanying them (when caught) are just a part of the general business plan and put in as a line item expense.

With this business model, the FDA is the only thing standing between your safety and the pharmacetical industry’s desire to turn a massive profit.  And for many years the FDA has done an arguably wonderful job at this task.  However, in recent years, the industry has been plagued with less-than-adequate funding as well as internal influence from the very drug companies they were designed to oversee.

One of the ways that the FDA provides oversight on the drug companies is to inspect several hundred clinical sites performing biomedical research on human participants.  They will occasionally find evidence of substantial departures from good clinical practice and research misconduct. This is really good information for other researchers, grant agencies and regulators to know about.

But what if this information was essentially kept secret?  What if this important information never had an effect on that trial getting published and the study data used to drive your doctor’s opinion on how he or she should treat you?  That’s exactly what researchers looked at in this particular study.

They spent time digging around the FDA’s inspection documents that could be linked to a specific published clinical trial.  In comparing the inspection documents, the researchers looked for whether there was a mention in the published clinical trial of problems the FDA had identified.  Here’s what they found:

  • 57 trials were identified for which an FDA inspection of a trial site had found significant evidence of at least one problem.
  • Falsification or submission of false information was found in 22 trials (39%).
  • Problems with adverse events reporting was found in 14 trials (25%).
  • Protocol violations were found in a big chunk (42 trials or 74%).
  • Inadequate or inaccurate record keeping was found in 35 trials (61%).
  • Failure to protect the safety of patients and/or issues with oversight or informed consent in 30 trials (53%).
  • Other violations not otherwise categorized in 20 trials (35%).

Ok.  So they made some mistakes.  Haven’t we all faked the data on a lab report or lied about how bad we felt to get out of school?  And to heck with protocols–we all just make stuff up as we go along to the outcome is more likely to be in our favor.  And who REALLY cares about the safety of the patients?  It’s all about what’s good for everyone, right?

But none of this matters so long as you come clean in the end with the people you have deceived or lied to.  Unfortunately, the researchers found that this was a rarity.  Only 3 of the 78 publications (a measly 4%) mentioned the misconduct found during the inspection.

So what is the point of having these FDA inspections if the findings are essentially kept a big secret?  Just remember this little study the next time your doctor tells you about how clinical studies have shown that Drug X was safe and actually helped patients with your condition.

 

Cholesterol Lowering Drug (Jupiter) Trial Shenanigans

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ARE THE DATA FROM ASTRAZENICA, CRESTOR JUPITER TRIAL ON STATINS LOOKING FISHY?

Wow.  I really think if most of the American public knew the real story of what goes behind some of these trials we’d all be sickened.  In it’s essence, the Jupiter trial looked at the prevention of heart disease in patients who had NORMAL cholesterol, but elevated inflammation.  Essential understanding that the “cholesterol blame game” was going away and they needed to find a new lab value that they could use the drug for.

The study was stopped early and declared a rousing success.  Much fanfare was heard and the medical journals and editorials sung it’s praise.  Oops.  A little too soon.  A closer look at the data raises some serious suspicions.  Basically, the trial was stopped early when predetermined events occurred just 2 yrs into the trial.

Furthermore, when you look at a population, certain statistics are expected.  Here’s the quick details:

  • The study found that statin drugs did NOT protect against deaths from heart attack and stroke.
  • In the general population, cardiovascular deaths account for about 40% of the total number of deaths.  Of these heart attacks, around 50% of these are fatal.

But in the Jupiter trial?  Apparently miracles occurred.  Cardiovascular mortality accounted for under 20% (instead of 50%) of the deaths, and the fatality rate of these heart attacks was very low (instead of the expected 50%).  This raises serious questions about the validity of the data and suggests that funding of the trial may have had a strong influence on the interpretation of the data.

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The Polypill–One Pill to Control Them All?

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BRAVE NEW WORLD?

Hollywood and literature has been hyping the idea of a medicated, controlled society for as long as we can remember.  But it seems to hard to believe that society would give up it’s freedom of choice to surrender to this type of control.  Right?  There has been steady promotion of a “polypill” to prevent heart disease over the past decade.  The “polypill” originally included niacin, but I guess no one had enough money to make off of it so they replaced it with another blood pressure drug.

These researchers are suggesting that the use of a polypill could reduce society’s burden of cardiovascular disease.  The number of people they say should take them?  83 million.  83 million US residents should be medicated.  Wow.  The arrogance of medicine is appalling.  Forget that each of these drugs’ effectiveness is questionable.  Forget the side effects that would likely override any benefit.  Remember that lifestyle trumps EVERY application of this drug in human physiology.  Society is seemingly continually trying to medicate the population when lifestyle is the only answer.  This attitude sickens me.

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Paying More for Less; US Healthcare in a Nutshell

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health care spending
Kenishirotie/Dollar Photo Club

There has certainly been no shortage of discussion on who should pay for healthcare in this country.  But never once has anyone seemed to question whether or not who pays is the problem.

This is the exact topic that the entire Obamacare administration will be known for, for good or for ill.  To date, however, the discussion has been all about the financial side of health care and not the efficiency and efficacy of health care.

There are unquestionably people who believe that health care is a right and should be provided for everyone, regardless of financial means.  If they can’t pay for it, someone else who does have the money should foot the bill.  And if you’ve happened to fall into a discussion with someone who believes this way, it can be a difficult one.  I should know–I have a close family member who feels this way.

The argument that health care is a right is purely an emotional argument because when you try to look at it from a logical standpoint it just does not make sense.  I have said time and time again that we cannot afford healthcare for a population that is one of the sickest in the developed world and has a sense of entitlement that is second to none on this planet.

We want MRIs, ER visits, that new medication we saw on TV, we want very expensive and toxic cancer treatments that will provide additional life extension measured in weeks and we want it all without a wait.  Even worse, we want all of our medications in lieu of making simple lifestyle changes that would otherwise completely erase the need for that new fancy medication.

Our health care system is broken and it has nothing to do with who’s paying.  If we want to meet halfway, what about making the diabetic exercise routinely and avoid processed foods, refined carbs and hydrogenated oils in order to have his or her medications paid for?  Does this sound unreasonable?  It will to those who do not feel like personal responsibility should be a requirement for getting your healthcare paid for.

I had a patient in the other day who, prior to the Affordable Care Act, paid $3 or 4,000 a year in premiums for him and his wife (I can’t remember which one it was).  After Obamacare, they are still paying the same amount of money for the same coverage, but the REAL price tag on the premiums is something like $11,000.  He gets a massive subsidy to pay for his health insurance premiums.

Those of you who were never good at math would look at say how wonderful everything is under the Affordable Care Act because now this person can get insurance.  On the other hand, those of us who did pay attention in 4th grade are scratching our heads trying to figure out where the extra $7 or 8,000 went?  Who gets this extra money??  We all know who is paying for it–all of us.  But who is making the extra money??

I just don’t understand it.

Just in case you still don’t get my point, I bring you this particular study looking at life expectancies based on GMP of countries across the globe.  Here are some interesting points:

  1. It is clear that higher healthcare spending (as a percentage of GDP) does NOT lead to higher life expectancies.
  2. Among the 25 highest income states in the US there is also no correlation between higher spending and life expectancies.
  3. Among the 25 poorest states, higher spending actually leads to LOWER life expectancies.
  4. Colorado, the state that spends the least on healthcare, STILL spends more (again as a percentage of GDP) than the Netherlands on healthcare.
  5. To put it clearer, if the US controlled health care spending to match that of the next highest country, there would be an extra TRILLION dollars to spend elsewhere.

And remember, all of this spending is not getting us anywhere.  We are the most medicated country on the planet (we consume a massive 52.9% of the WORLD’S prescription drugs) and it’s getting us nowhere except more sick.