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January 3, 2007
Wish I'd said that!
We recently (see the blog below) referred to a Time Magazine story on vinyl toys as a “scare story.” The Chicago Tribune was not nearly so polite. Columnist Dennis Byrne referred to it as “lunacy.” The story, as he defined it, “warned parents to throw out all pacifiers, teethers, sippy cups and vinyl toys to avoid poisoning their children with phthalates, a family of chemicals that makes plastics flexible.”
Mr. Byrne’s column reiterated key points of the “Dubious Data Awards of 2006,” an honor bestowed on the year’s “ten worst science stories” by the Statistical Assessment Service, or STATS. Both columns are fun to read, in a discouraging sort of way.
For Mr. Byrne’s column, which appeared on the op-ed page of the Trib, see http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/opinion/chi-0701010121jan01,1,3939998.story?coll=chi-opinionfront-hed.
For the original STATS column, see http://www.stats.org/stories/2007/2006_dubious_data_jan_2_07.htm.
Posted by Marian at 1:39 PM | Comments (0)
More good news from Europe
Good news! From the continent that has banned or restricted some phthalates? Yes, indeed.
Those bans and restrictions were voted by legislators, but when Europe’s health and science experts got together to review the safety of phthalates as they are used today, the news is very positive. Earlier this year, the safety reviews of two phthalates were published: the review of DINP, the primary phthalate used in toys, found risk “unlikely” for children and even newborns; DIDP, another phthalate used in vinyl for wiring and auto interiors (but not toys), was found unlikely to pose a risk for consumers, including infants and newborns.
Now it is BBP’s turn – butyl benzyl phthalate, which is used in vinyl flooring, and is one of those suffering some European legislative restrictions. The final draft of the EU risk assessment – a safety review that the EU’s health and safety experts are behind -- was released in early December. Its findings are remarkably uniform: “no concern” for workers; “no concern” for consumer exposure (including children) from baby equipment and toys. Yes, you heard that right! When reviewers combined exposures to children from all sources, including toys, infant formula, air, and other indirect environmental sources, they found “no concern.” (BBP is rarely if ever used in toys in the United States.)
To give you an idea how closely the reviewers looked, they studied levels of oral exposure to kids from sucking on such things as baby equipment. The European way of stating safety levels is to compute a “margin of safety,” or MOS. Its scientists look at actual exposure levels, and then compute how many times higher the exposure would have to be to reach a risk level. Based on the exposure levels they measured in children, they determined the MOS for fertility effects to be 105,000; for developmental effects, the MOS was 53,000. So, according to the EU’s evaluation, exposures would have to be not 10, 100, or 1,000 times greater than actual to reach a risk level – but 53,000 to 105,000 times higher.
We hope that those who seem to make a career (or a news story) out of criticizing phthalates will take notice of what the real experts say.
Posted by Marian at 1:25 PM | Comments (0)