Toxic Burn Pits Make Troops Sick

New Public Database Reveals First-Hand Accounts of How Toxic Burn Pits Are Making U.S. Troops Sick

Nora Eisenberg, AlterNet:

"Two months in, everyone was coughing up black stuff. Three months, in my black stuff started to include blood."

Cancer, pulmonary disease, multiple sclerosis, sleep apnea, heart disease: Iraq and Afghanistan combat veterans have suffered all these and more from toxic fumes spewing from burn pits on American bases. The Disabled American Veterans now has information on 182 sick veterans in a database developed by Assistant National Legislative director, Kerry Baker. Forty-eight have developed lymphoma, leukemia or other cancers; and 16 veterans in the database have died. And on March 30th, a group of seven lawmakers asked Secretary of Defense Robert Gates to attend to these findings as well the findings from an independent scientific consultant, which found a serious danger that veterans may become ill from burn pit fumes.

As early as 2006, the DoD had been informed by Air Force Bioenvironmental Engineering Flight Commander Darrin Curtis that the pit was an acute health hazard. Though the Department of Defense has admitted that samples at the large burn pit at Balad contain Acetaldehyde, Acrolien, Arsenic, Benzene, Carbon Monoxide, Ethylbenzene, Formaldehyde, Hydrogen Cyanide, Hydrogen Fluoride, Phosgene, Sulfur Dioxide, Sulfuric Acid, Toluene, Trichloroethane, Xylene, and other chemicals, to date, it has insisted the pit presents no known dangers. The letter to Gates -- signed by Senators Russ Feingold, D-Wis.; Evan Bayh, D-Ind; and Ron Wyden, D-Ore.; and Representatives Tim Bishop, D-N.Y.; Steve Cohen, D-Tenn.; John Hall, D-N.Y.; Maurice Hinchey, D-N.Y.; and Carol Shea-Porter, D-N.H. -- urged vigilance, citing the protracted and painful lessons from Agent Orange.

Rep. Bishop's office has developed a website in which veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan can tell their stories. In just a few days, many stories of negligence and suffering have emerged, adding to a tragic saga. [snip]

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More first-hand reports from veterans can be found on the online Military Times.

Veterans who are suffering health problems they believe are connected to burn pit fumes should report their condition to Kerry Baker at 202-314-5229, to add to the database.

Get The Lead Out

EPA Plans to Restrict Toxic Airborne Lead

Environment News Service:

For the first time in 30 years, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is proposing to further reduce the amount of lead in the air.

While leaded gasoline is history, about 1,300 tons of lead a year is emitted into the air from smelters, iron and steel foundries, and general aviation gasoline, the EPA estimates.

Once it is airborne, lead can be inhaled.

Or, after it settles out of the air onto surfaces, lead can be ingested - the main route of human exposure. Once in the body, lead is rapidly absorbed into the bloodstream and can affect many organ systems.

* * *

Children are particularly vulnerable, the EPA has said repeatedly. Exposures to low levels of lead early in life have been linked to effects on intelligence, learning, memory and behavior.

To protect public health, the EPA proposed Thursday to tighten the primary standard by up to 93 percent.

* * *

Under the new rule, monitors for lead would be required near large sources of lead emissions and in urban areas with more than one million people.

Some environmentalists say the new EPA lead standard is not strict enough. Avinash Kar, project attorney with the public health program of the Natural Resources Defense Council called the proposal "long overdue but flawed."

"According to EPA projections, emissions of 60 pounds of lead from a single pollution source could cause a median loss of up to three IQ points in children," said Kar. "Thousands of children across the United States live near lead plants emitting more than 60 pounds of lead every year. In fact, some plants emit tons of lead annually."

"By proposing a limit stricter than the current standard that was set in 1978, EPA is making progress in limiting lead exposure," he said, "but this standard still falls short of what's needed to protect the public."

* * *

Exposure to lead is associated with a broad range of health effects, including harm to the central nervous system, cardiovascular system, kidneys and immune system.

Lead also can cause toxic effects in plants and can impair reproduction and growth in birds, mammals and other organisms.

EPA is proposing that the secondary standard, to protect the environment, be identical to the primary standard.

* * *

The EPA will accept public comment for 60 days after the proposal on lead is published in the Federal Register. The agency will hold two public hearings on June 12, 2008 - one in St. Louis and one in Baltimore.

EPA must issue a final decision on the lead standard by September 15, 2008.

Find details about the proposal and public hearing information at: EPA.gov.

Corporate Air Polluters

Top Corporate Air Polluters Named

World Wire:

Researchers at the Political Economy Research Institute (PERI) at the University of Massachusetts today released the Toxic 100, an updated list of the top corporate air polluters in the United States.

“The Toxic 100 informs consumers and shareholders which large corporations release the most toxic pollutants into our air,” said James K. Boyce, director of PERI's environment program. “We measure not just how many pounds of pollutants are released, but which are the most toxic and how many people are at risk. People have a right to know about toxic hazards to which they are exposed. Legislators need to understand the effects of pollution on their constituents.”

The Toxic 100 index is based on air releases of hundreds of chemicals from industrial facilities across the United States. The rankings take into account not only the quantity of releases, but also the relative toxicity of chemicals, nearby populations, and transport factors such as prevailing winds and height of smokestacks.

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Users of the web-based list can view the details behind each company’s Toxic Score, including the names and locations of individual facilities owned by the corporation, the specific chemicals emitted by those facilities, their toxicities, and their contributions to the company's overall score.

A new feature of the website is a look-up tool that allows users to access detailed information on all 7,000 companies with facilities in the EPA database as well as the Toxic 100 list of top polluters.

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The Toxic 100 index tackles all three problems by using the most recent Risk-Screening Environmental Indicators (RSEI) data developed by the EPA. In addition to the TRI data, the RSEI data include toxicity weights and the number of people at risk. PERI researchers added up facility-by-facility RSEI data released by the EPA to construct corporate rankings.

“In making this information available, we are building on the achievements of the right-to-know movement,” Boyce explains. “Our goal is to engender public participation in environmental decision-making, and to help residents translate the right to know into the right to clean air.”

More information: PERI's Corporate Toxic Information Project.

Celebrate the Earth Day

Carl Sagan: "The Pale Blue Dot"

"Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the Universe, are challenged by this point of pale light. Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity, in all this vastness, there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves."

"Look again at that dot. That's here. That's home. That's us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every 'superstar', every 'supreme leader', every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there — on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam. [...] There is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly with one another, and to preserve and cherish the pale blue dot, the only home we've ever known."

Giants of the Arctic

Canada's Arctic supports our planet's largest remaining pristine ecosystems. It's home not only to polar bears, but also to species such as caribou, narwhal and beluga whales, arctic char, seabirds, seals, and musk oxen.

But this magnificent wilderness is now threatened by major pressures: climate change, toxic pollution, mining, and oil and gas development.

Ice Bear. Giant of the Arctic. To the Inuit, Nanuk. By whatever name, the polar bear is a symbol of the Arctic world.

Help safeguard the polar bear's Arctic home. Adopt a polar bear for yourself or someone you love.