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(CNN) - Routine contact with plastic bottles, toys, food cans,
cosmetics and flame retardants containing "endocrine-disrupting
chemicals" results in ingestion, leading to a toxic buildup and
potentially a variety of medical conditions.

Routine exposure to these chemicals adds up to annual costs in
excess of $340 billion -- a whopping price tag that comes in the
form of poor health, increased medical bills and lost income,
according to researchers at NYU Langone Medical Center.

The largest single cost comes from chemical effects on
children's developing brains, said Dr. Leonardo Trasande, an
associate professor at NYU Langone and lead investigator of the
study.

Obviously, costs are not the main concern of families with
growing children. According to Trasande, a few simple steps will
limit exposure to endocrine-disrupting chemicals in the home.

"Families can eat organic; they can avoid the use of pesticides
in their homes to get rid of unwanted creatures; they can avoid
aluminum can food consumption; they can avoid microwaving
plastic and machine-dishwashing plastic containers," Trasande
said, noting that it is important to avoid plastic bottles with
the numbers 3, 6 and 7 on the bottom.

Another easy fix for families is to "simply air out their homes
every couple of days," Trasande said. This helps remove chemical
dusts from electronics and other materials, especially flame
retardants.

Chemicals and our hormones

By mimicking the body's natural sex steroid hormones, endocrine-
disrupting chemicals interfere with the function of hormones.
Increasing evidence over the past three decades shows how
exposure to these chemicals has negative effects on human
health, including neurobehavioral disorders, reproductive
disorders, and obesity and diabetes, according to Trasande and
his co-authors.

These chemicals include bisphenol A (BPA), which lines food cans
made of tin; phthalates, which are used when manufacturing
cosmetics and plastic food containers; polybrominated diphenyl
ethers (PBDEs) found in the flame retardants added to furniture
and packaging; and pesticides such as chlorpyrifos and
organophosphates.

For the new study, appearing in?the journal Lancet Diabetes &
Endocrinology, the NYU team reviewed the levels of endocrine-
disrupting chemicals in blood and urine samples provided by
volunteers participating in the National Health and Nutrition
Examination Survey. Five thousand people have participated in
this survey each year since 1999.

After collecting this data, Trasande and his colleagues used
advanced computer models to estimate the total cases of disease
that would result from exposure to the levels of endocrine-
disrupting chemicals they observed. The researchers also
calculated the consequences of disease caused by chemicals: lost
income, in addition to health care bills.

The grand total? Annually, it costs the United States $340
billion. Yearly exposure to highly toxic fire-resisting PBDE
chemicals and pesticides accounted for nearly two-thirds of this
total endocrine-disrupting chemical disease burden, said
Trasande.

Worst of all, most of this financial burden resulted from
neurological damage in unborn children.

"Typically, when policy discussions are had about regulation,
the arguments are one-sided," Trasande said, noting that
everyday people hear about the costs to manufacturers, but they
never hear about the benefits -- and cost savings -- involved in
regulating the use of damaging chemicals.

This new analysis is intended "to facilitate a transparent
dialogue about the real and substantial tradeoffs for human
health that we make by failing to act to protect against the
chemicals of greatest concern," said Trasande.

As such, it should come in handy for the days ahead.

Chemical policy decisions in the works

In June, President Obama signed into law a reboot of the Toxic
Substances Control Act, "the major law that reviews chemicals
for their safety and decides whether they should be allowed for
use in the broad environment," including in personal care
products, furniture and electronics, explained Trasande.

"That law presumed that chemicals are innocent until proven
guilty," he said.

The June reboot, known as the Frank R. Lautenberg Chemical
Safety Act, means "the Environmental Protection Agency is on a
fast timeline to deal with the requirements associated with that
action," said Frankie Wood-Black, principal at Sophic Pursuits
Inc., a boutique consulting firm specializing in environmental
and safety regulatory compliance and an instructor at Northern
Oklahoma College.

"All of us in the regulatory world" are interested in the EPA's
timing, actions and priorities, said Wood-Black.

With the EPA articulating new policy, "there is an opportunity
here to ensure effective implementation of the law," Trasande
said.

Andrea Gore, a professor of pharmacology and toxicology at the
University of Texas at Austin, explained how last year, Trasande
and his team estimated costs based on predictions of exposures
to endocrine-disrupting chemicals in the European Union.

"It is important that they did a similar study in the US,
because it shows that costs of endocrine-disrupting chemicals to
health are an international problem," Gore said, adding that the
chemicals people are exposed to differ around the world, so
"learning about exposures in one part of the world can inform
decisions in other places that may be considering whether or not
to allow or ban a chemical."

Gore was not involved in the new study, though she is a co-
author in a couple of the studies cited by Trasande.

According to Michele La Merrill, an environmental toxicologist
and assistant professor at University of California-Davis, the
authors used a definition of endocrine disruption that reflects
the views of the Endocrine Society, a 100-year-old global
membership organization representing professionals from the
field.

"These authorities have a broader definition of endocrine
disrupting-chemicals than that used by the US EPA," said La
Merrill, who did not participate in the research. "This exposes
a weakness in the archaic US EPA definition and indicates a need
for the US EPA to include endocrine-disrupting effects they
currently do not consider, such as obesity."

http://www.news4jax.com/health/researcher-chemical-toxicity- costs-us-340-billion-per-year
 

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