If You Want to Read More About Endocrine-Disrupters

The Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel is featuring an ongoing investigative series on endocrine-disrupting chemicals. Here is an exerpt from Part 1, which relates a timetable for the EPA's inaction on the issue.

Congress unanimously passed two laws ordering the EPA to begin screening and testing chemicals and pesticides for endocrine disrupting effects by 1999...In the beginning, there was a groundswell of enthusiasm. Then-EPA administrator Carol Browner said in 1998 that her agency would begin fast-tracking efforts to screen these compounds by the end of that year...Officials identified the program as a top priority. Browner appointed the first panel of scientists to build a framework for how to screen the chemicals. She left the agency after the presidential election in 2000.

More than $80 million later, the government program has yet to screen its first chemical...Frustrated at the lack of action, a consortium of environmental, patient advocacy and labor groups filed a federal lawsuit, prompting the EPA to promise that screening would begin by the end of 2003...Annual federal funding for the endocrine disruptor screening program peaked at $12.6 million in 2000 and has dropped by about one-third...By April 2006, 10 years after the congressional order to begin the screening, progress stalled altogether.

Gerald LeBlanc, chairman of the committee charged with developing the screens, got a call from an EPA administrator, assuming that the two would be setting the committee's next meeting. Instead, LeBlanc was told the committee was being terminated. "They were not going to allow me to take this job to completion," said LeBlanc, toxicology professor at North Carolina State University.

Edward Orlando, a biology professor at Florida Atlantic University and a member of the last committee, said its abrupt dissolution came as a disappointment - not to mention a waste of public money.

Part 2, discusses the dangers of Bisphenol A. Here is an exerpt: Bisphenol A was developed in 1891 as a synthetic estrogen. It came into widespread use in the 1950s when scientists realized it could be used to make polycarbonate plastic and some epoxy resins to line food and beverage cans.

With the advent of plastic products such as dental sealants and baby bottles, the use of bisphenol A has skyrocketed. The chemical is used to make reusable water bottles, CDs, DVDs and eyeglasses. More than 6 billion pounds are produced each year in the United States.

In recent decades, increases in the number of boys born with genital deformities, girls experiencing early puberty and adults with low sperm counts, uterine cysts and infertility prompted some researchers to wonder whether the prevalence of bisphenol A could be interfering with human development and reproduction.

I recommend reading the full text of these stories. They are very well-researched and well-written. I look forward to Part 3!