Lead potection law makes a good start toward
safeguarding Michigan’s children

Bulls-eye drawn on lindane, dioxin, and pesticides as
MEC attacks Michigan’s public health threats

      Michigan’s children enter our world already under assault from pollutants in our air, water, land and food supply. Asthma-inducing smog, dangerous toxics in our waterways and harmful chemical residue in the food we eat are immediate threats to our children.
      The effects of childhood toxic exposure often continue through adulthood, eroding immune systems, lowering educational achievement and constraining economic development though lost productivity and high health care costs.
      MEC’s work with Lansing power brokers to establish safeguards for the public health—particularly children’s health—paid dividends in 2007.

Lead bills pass
      Working through the Michigan Network for Children’s Environmental Health (MNCEH), MEC helped obtain passage of the state’s first restrictions on lead in children’s toys and other products. Gov. Jennifer Granholm signed the bills into law, limiting lead to 600 parts per million in certain products.
      That’s a good start at putting the brakes on a potent neurotoxin that can cause devastating, permanent physical damage to children. But it’s not good enough. The American Academy of Pediatrics, for example, recommends a standard of 40 ppm.
      MEC will continue to work with the legislature, the public and through educational programs to lower the allowable threshold for lead in children’s toys and other products.
 
Lindane next?
      Lindane, another hazardous neurotoxin, has been banned for agricultural use in the U.S. and is outlawed in more than 50 countries. Yet, inexplicably, it is still permitted as a treatment for lice and scabies on children in Michigan.
      MEC and its allies pressed hard in 2007 to restrict this dangerous chemical’s use, and will continue to push the case in 2008. Pending legislation would allow its use on children only under a physician’s direct supervision.
      In addition to Lindane, legislative groundwork was laid in 2007 to ban the toxic flame retardant DECA (deca-bromindated-diphenyl-ether). Other, less-toxic types of flame retardants are available. MEC and the MNCEH are working to educate legislators, fire chiefs and public health agencies about safer options.

In the know: Pesticides
      The Michigan Environmental Council continues to fight against the widespread and indiscriminate application of harmful pesticides—especially in and near schools and daycare facilities where the chemicals move into the fragile developing bodies of children.
      More than 60 organizations and individuals supported the first annual “Know-tification” Day in 2007, raising awareness for parents and school officials about alternatives to toxic pesticide applications.
      MEC will continue to fight powerful industry interests who persist in blocking common-sense pesticide rules designed to keep children and pets safe from widespread applications.

Dioxin stalemate
      2007 saw moderate progress—and a continued push by MEC and its allies—in forcing Dow Chemical Co. to clean up its decades-old dioxin contamination of the Tittabawassee and Saginaw Bay watersheds. The hormone-scrambling carcinogen has contaminated the region’s food chain, with high concentrations in sport fish and wild game along the river systems.
Nearly a century after the dioxin first was released, 2007 saw the first removal of contaminated sediment from the river basin when Dow was ordered to remove the most toxic “hot spots.”