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Chemicals in Baby Products Linked to Problems

Wednesday, March 5th, 2008

A new study brings to light a potentially dangerous link between chemicals used in ordinary products, such as baby shampoos and lotions, to reproductive problems in children. The chemicals, called phthalates, have been under attack by some environmental advocacy groups, according to a Feb. 4, 2008 AP News article, although experts are uncertain what dangers they might pose.

The study, which appears in the February issue of the journal Pediatrics, found elevated levels of phthalates in the urine of babies who recently had baby products applied to them. The federal government does not limit their use, even though California and some European countries will have restricted their use beginning in 2009. Although the Food and Drug Administration stated that this study “has no compelling evidence that phthalates pose a safety risk when used in cosmetics,” it has many parents paying closer attention to what products they are putting on their children.

“We really need to take a look at the number of products we use on a daily basis and figure out what we truly need,” said Stacy Malkan, spokeswoman for the Campaign for Safe Cosmetics and author of Not Just a Pretty Face: The Ugly Side of the Cosmetic Industry.

According to Malkan, these chemicals do not remain in the body for long periods of time. They can be flushed out within 24 hours. However, due to the ubiquitous use of the chemicals in thousands of personal care products used daily, we are continuously exposed to them.

Malkan said that phthalates are hormone disruptors and block the production of testosterone. This can cause problems in utero as well as through adulthood, causing a cascade of reproductive issues. The chemicals have been linked to undescended testicles, testicular tumors, low fertility and infertility. “This study directly correlates the phthalate level in babies with the use of personal care products,” Malkan said. “Reproductive toxins just do not belong in baby shampoos and lotions.”

Of the 163 babies between two and 28 months that participated in the study, 100 percent of them had at least one phthalate, and 80 percent had at least seven different types.

But many parents are stuck with their hands tied, because retail products aren’t required to list individual ingredients of fragrances, which are a common phthalate source.

A group of concerned mothers on a Babyfit.com message board have decided to take it upon themselves to learn more about the ingredients in the products they are using, and make drastic changes to ensure to the best of their ability that their children remain safe. After one mother posted a link to the Web site (www.cosmeticdatabase.com) , the floodgates opened up.

Some of the sentiments were:

“Between the BPA and the phthalates, I want to scream. This just is not fair to our children. I shudder to think about the possible harm I’ve already caused.”

“I have always tried to be cautious about what I put in and on my body, but this just takes it to a whole new level! Companies don’t even have to add these bad ingredients on their lists, so how are we to be sure?”

“We need to demand better of these companies. Most chemicals and preservatives are added because it is cheaper and increases shelf life. They aren’t necessary.”

“I just lost someone close to me to cancer and the statistics say 1 out of every 3 people will get cancer… Why? So we can buy cheap crap?”

“I had worked in an environmental lab for seven years before I quit to become a stay-at-home-mom. If you ladies saw what I saw, you would lose your minds.”

Every day, children are exposed to an average of 27 personal care ingredients that have not been found safe for kids, according to a national survey conducted in 2007 by Environmental Working Group (EWG), creator of (cosmeticdatabase.com) .

A search for Huggies Baby Lotion with Chamomile and Lavender reveals a wealth of information about the product, including but not limited to: its ranking (both as an average for the entire project and per ingredient), whether or not it does animal testing, and a list of concerns (cancer, endocrine disruption, allergies, developmental/reproductive toxicity) paralleled with each specific ingredient.
The ranking system is color-coded for easy viewing: products with a low hazard ranking are given a green 0-2, products with a medium hazard ranking are given a yellow 3-6, and products with a high hazard are given a red 7-10.

Huggies Baby Lotion with Chamomile ranks overall as a red 8, largely due to the fragrance component of the product, and does practice animal testing. According to the search, ingredients in this product are linked to: developmental/reproductive toxicity; violations, restrictions and warnings; allergies/immunotoxicity; neurotoxicity, endocrine disruption, and skin irritation - to name a few.

According to EWG, by law, the government cannot mandate safety studies of cosmetics products or their ingredients, and only 13 percent of the 10,500 ingredients in personal care products have been reviewed for safety by the cosmetic industry’s own review panel. For virtually every product on the market, safety decisions are made behind closed doors, guided by an industry-funded panel, without the benefit of peer-review or independent pre-market safety testing.

“Under federal law, companies can put virtually anything they wish into personal care products, and many of them do. Mercury, lead, and placenta extract - all of these and many other hazardous materials are in products that millions of Americans, including children, use every day,” said Jane Houlihan, Vice President of Research at EWG. “Mothers shouldn’t have to worry about what is in the baby lotion they use, and now they don’t have to. The new Skin Deep database provides information on nearly 25,000 personal care products so people can find out for themselves which products are the best choices for them and their families.”

About the author

Julie Hurley is a working mother of two children. She has a degree in journalism from Grand Valley State University in Michigan, and has an increasing interest in holistic living.
She is an Independent Distributor for the It Works product line, which features the Ultimate Body Applicator (www.itworks.net/juliehurley).
Julie is also training for her first 25k in May after picking up running in April 2007. Follow her training journey on her blog at: http://tinyurl.com/37t4yf.

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FBI head: Give telcos immunity

Wednesday, March 5th, 2008

Nick Julian

At the heart of President Bush’s plea to give telecommunications companies legal immunity is the contention that these companies were merely being patriotic corporate citizens when they facilitated the warrantless wiretapping of Americans.

FBI Director Robert Mueller undercut that argument Wednesday, telling Congress that the ‘good faith’ argument should have nothing to do with whether or not they are let off the hook in dozens of pending court cases.

“I would focus more on the downsides, substantial downsides, of not providing retroactive immunity as being the principal rational of the legislation, providing immunity,” Mueller told the Senate Judiciary Committee.

Mueller insisted that good faith of the companies was “important” but said he was unsure “where it fit into the calculus” behind trying to give companies legal immunity.

President Bush has previously said it was unfair the companies were being “sued for billions of dollars,” and Mueller’s testimony further clarifies the financial motive behind the companies’ push to be let off the hook. He did not elaborate on the “substantial downsides” that would come from a judicial review of the companies actions.

It wouldn’t be the first time the phone companies’ financial situation overlapped with US law enforcement and intelligence needs. At least one foreign intelligence wiretap was disconnected by a telephone carrier when the FBI failed to pay its bills, as the Associated Press reported earlier this year.

Mueller acknowledged the FBI had discovered “a line going down for a matter of days” because of an unpaid bill, but he said the investigation of which that wiretap was a part was not adversely affected.

Won’t rule out waterboarding American in ticking-bomb scenario

Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse probed Mueller on whether there would be a scenario in which the FBI would use waterboarding during an interrogation. The Rhode Island Democrat laid out a hypothetical situation in which the FBI had captured Timothy McVeigh just after the Oklahmoa City bombing and believed he had information on another bomb that was set to explode within an hour.

“Do you waterboard Timothy McVeigh?” Whitehouse asked.

Mueller demurred, saying he would “prefer not to answer hypotheticals,” although he acknowledged under further questioning that such a ticking time-bomb scenario could happen today.

“I would not know how I would respond,” Mueller said.

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Why governments can’t continue to ignore torture

Wednesday, March 5th, 2008

European judges have delivered a landmark ruling in the so-called ‘war on terror’, says Robert Verkaik, Law Editor, and it is one that we should all have reason to celebrate

Buried deep beneath the welter of publicity covering Prince Harry’s secret deployment to Afghanistan was the release of another piece of news concerning the Allies’ so-called “war on terror”. A judgment published last week by the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) delivered a devastating blow to Britain’s attempt to water down the prohibition on the use of torture by sending terror suspects to states which routinely abuse prisoners. The judges described as “misconceived” the British argument that there could be a justification for balancing the risk of torture against the threat posed to national security.

In an Italian case before the Strasbourg judges in which the British Government had intervened, Foreign Office lawyers had hoped to clear a lawful path for the Government’s policy of deporting terror suspects to Algeria and other states which have a history of using torture. The Government has relied on assurances from these countries that they will not use torture against suspects sent there by Britain.

But last week the ECHR said: “the concepts of risk and dangerousness do not lend themselves to balancing . . . [t]he prospect that he may pose a serious threat to the community . . . does not reduce in any way the degree of risk of ill treatment that the person may be subject to on return.”

Amnesty International described the ruling as a landmark case and welcomed the re-affirmation of the absolute prohibition of torture and other inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment. Ian Seiderman, Amnesty International’s senior legal adviser, said: “This judgment should serve as a reminder to all states: not only are they not allowed to commit torture themselves, but they are forbidden from sending anyone to countries where they would be at risk of torture or other ill-treatment.”

The human rights campaign group Liberty also welcomed the decision. Liberty’s Director, Shami Chakrabarti, said: “If the Grand Chamber had watered down the absolute prohibition against torture there would have been no putting this genie back in the bottle. It would have been a green light for extraordinary rendition and even the direct use of torture as an interrogation technique.”

In the case before the court, the Italian authorities sought to deport Nassim Saadi, a Tunisian national, to Tunisia under the “Pisanu Law” which was originally adopted in 2005 as “an urgent measure to combat terrorism”. The Italian authorities argued that he posed a security risk to Italy. But the court found “substantial grounds had been shown for believing that there is a real risk” that Saadi would be subjected to torture or ill-treatment if he were deported.

The Government says it is considering the ruling but did not think that it would lead to a change in policy over the deportation of terror suspects who could not stand trial in this country. Since the terror attacks of 9/11, the judiciary has largely managed to hold the line against repeated government attempts to restrict human rights in its pursuit of the “war on terror”.

So in a week when Britain’s media lifted the news blackout on the secret deployment of another brave soldier to Afghanistan, we should also celebrate a ruling that upholds the very democratic values which our government says we have been fighting to protect.

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Met Police chief calls for European DNA database

Wednesday, March 5th, 2008

Sir Ian Blair says scheme would have obvious benefits for crimefighting

Computing

Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir Ian Blair has called for the UK’s controversial DNA database to be extended across Europe to help bridge the intelligence gap caused by the removal of many of the EU’s internal borders.

He made the proposal at the first pan-European Serious Organised Crime Conference in Liverpool yesterday, claiming also that a Europe-wide automated fingerprint recognition and search system would have “obvious” benefits.

Bair told delegates that the welcome introduction of the Eurodac system for identifying asylum seekers was “a move in the right direction” but only applied to illegal immigration and asylum applicants.

“To extend such a system to include fingerprints taken from criminals EU-wide would be a huge step forward and would go some way to addressing the intelligence loss that the removal of borders has created,” he said.

Tory shadow home secretary David Davis said everybody would welcome the reasonable use across borders of DNA and other biometric data to identify criminals.
But he warned that the government needs to improve its data security first.

“It would be best, before we got to that stage, if we improved our data security so that we didn’t leave four thousand DNA records on a shelf for a year, and didn’t take the risk of losing the entire population’s records - in the way we did with the HMRC disks debacle,” said Davis.

“National and international security comes down to the gritty business of doing the day-to-day job well and using technology properly and safely, and is not just about blue skies ideas.”

Meanwhile the Lords European Union Committee called on the government to speed up its proposed e-Borders system, which is not due for full implementation until 2014.

In a report on EU border controls, the committee found it “astonishing” that although there was an elaborate system of temporary or limited entry into the UK, “there is no way in which the Borders and Immigration Agency can know whether these time limits and conditions are being complied with because there is no routine recording of entries into or departures from the UK.”

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30,000 children’s DNA on police database

Wednesday, March 5th, 2008

By Christine Sexton

THE DNA profiles of more than 30,000 Essex children are being kept on a police database.

Figures released in response to a Freedom of Information request also reveal that 12,345 of those young people are under 15.

The news comes after it was reported how the profile of a 13-year-old boy from Benfleet boy was being kept on the DNA database, despite police admitting he had been wrongfully arrested.

The boy’s mother, who is considering legal action to have his profile removed, said: “The Government has already proved what a bad record it has on keeping such sensitive information, so I don’t trust them with this.”

Since 2003, police have been able to retain DNA taken from anyone over the age of ten arrested for a criminal offence, whether or not they go on to be convicted for it.

Under-18s now make up a quarter of the 120,946 samples to be added to the Essex database since it started in 1995.

Essex Police are unable to say how many children on their database were eventually found to be innocent of the offence they were accused of.

Prior to 2001, police had to destroy samples from people subsequently proved innocent, but an amendment to the Police and Criminal Evidence Act in 2003 gave police the right to take and retain the DNA profile of anyone they arrested over the age of ten.

Some argue the database has helped police to solve recent high-profile crimes, such as the murder of 18-year-old Sally Anne Bowman by Mark Dixie, and the deaths of five Ipswich prostitutes at the hands of Steve Wright.

Both men are now serving lengthy jail sentences.

But others fear it is the latest infringement of civil liberties. A European court test case arguing samples should be destroyed if no charges are brought may help to clarify the issue.

Closer to home, the mother of the Benfleet boy is determined to have his DNA removed from the database. He was released without charge for throwing pebbles into a road near his school.

A woman who had had her car vandalised filmed the act, believing the boy might have been reponsible for the damage.

Despite him later being exonerated, his DNA still remains on the database.

The boy’s mother, who does not want to be identified to protect her son, said she was considering mounting a legal battle to get it removed.

She said: “It happens all the time.

“I don’t think people realise how many children there are on the database now.

“I don’t think it would work having everyone on the database because it would take so long to eliminate everyone’s DNA from a crime scene.”

However, the man in charge of taking samples for the Essex database is adamant it is the “best crime fighting tool” in the police armoury to date.

Tom Harper, scientific support manager and head of forensic investigations, said: “We will take a sample from everyone arrested and we will retain that forever, but there are exceptional circumstances where they can be removed.

“Where it has been found there was no original offence, for example, if we go to a scene of a suspicious death and we arrest people in connection with it, but then on post mortem it is found to be a natural death, then there would have been no offence committed.”

Mr Harper said the UK’s DNA database was now “the envy of the world”.

He added: “A few countries have a DNA database, like the US, but that is not across the whole country.

“Where someone is found not guilty, that’s where the problems happen, because they feel they haven’t committed an offence. But the law is very clear.

“Say during an investigation we find evidence of criminal damage and we arrest someone on suspicion of criminal damage, then provided that arrest is lawful and the offence happened, we should retain the samples.”

Mr Harper believes people are worrying needlessly about having their DNA on record and says it is not akin to having a criminal record.

He said: “We don’t give this information out.

“It is owned by the police and managed by the Forensic Science Service.

“I can’t sit in my office and access this, I have to go to the FSS.

“There is a tremendous benefit in terms of crime detection. It gives us thousands of leads on crimes each year. To have a national DNA database of everyone would be quite useful.

“At the moment we probably have about 5 per cent of the country on the database, but to increase it by another 95 per cent would require a big increase in the administrative system.

“If people are not committing crimes, they have nothing to worry about.”

Human rights groups such as Liberty are calling for a national debate.

Spokeswoman Mairi Clare Rodgers said: “Taking the DNA of every man, woman and child is expensive and impractical, yet it is impossible to have no DNA database.

“We need a sensible debate to find a fair and proportionate solution which will satisfy civil rights as well as crime prevention concerns.”

The national picture

BY the end of 2005, about 200,000 samples nationally had been retained that would have been destroyed before the change in legislation.

Of these samples, 8,000 matched with DNA taken from crime scenes, involving nearly 14,000 offences, including murders and rapes.

Under-18s make up 23 per cent of all arrests. There are no legal powers to take a DNA sample from anyone under ten without the consent of a parent or legal guardian.

About a million people who have not been convicted of any offence, including at least 100,000 children, are now estimated to be on the national DNA database. Many others have been acquitted, or have been convicted of relatively minor offences (including begging, being drunk and disorderly, or taking part in an illegal demonstration) but will remain on the database for life.

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