Flame Retardants in Blood Drop after State Ban

A class of flame retardants that has been linked to learning difficulties in children has rapidly declined in pregnant women’s blood since the chemicals were banned in California a decade ago, according to a study led by researchers at UC San Francisco.

Blood levels of polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDEs), tested in patients at the UCSF-affiliated San Francisco General Hospital and Trauma Center fell by two-thirds since they were last tested three years ago and found to be the highest levels reported among pregnant women anywhere in the world.

Researchers said the dramatic decline was most likely the result of the statewide ban, as well as a voluntary national phase out. But they said the levels fell more quickly than expected, given how persistently these chemicals remain in the environment once they have been introduced.

“We were pleasantly surprised by the extent of the decline,” said Ami R. Zota, ScD, an assistant professor of environmental and occupational health at the George Washington University School of Public Health and Health Services, and the study’s lead author. Zota conducted the research while she was a postdoctoral fellow at UCSF’s Program on Reproductive Health. “Regulations can have an impact on people’s everyday lives.”

PBDEs were used in foam furniture starting in the 1970s to meet the state’s fire safety regulations, which are now being reviewed. Experiments in animals and also in human cells have shown that PBDEs damage the brain in utero. Researchers have found a strong relationship between an expectant mother’s exposure to the chemicals – even at low levels – and subsequent learning difficulties in her child, including worsened concentration and attention and lower IQ. The chemicals also can disrupt thyroid hormones in adulthood and during development. While much of the data is correlational, the researchers said there is enough evidence to raise serious concern that the chemicals are harmful to people.

PBDEs get into the body in different ways. They easily wear off foam and degrade into household dust, which gets ingested. The chemicals also find their way in through diets rich in fish, meat and dairy products, as PBDEs in the environment are persistent and can accumulate up the food chain. Nursing mothers also pass them to their babies through breast milk.

Previous research has shown that the PBDEs present in California house dust have fallen since the ban. But this is the first time that researchers have shown a decline in PBDEs in people since the chemicals were phased out.

San Francisco General Hospital, the city’s public hospital, serves vulnerable populations, who may be at higher risk for exposure to PBDEs because they are more likely to own older, cheaper furniture and live in poor housing conditions. The researchers compared a group of 25 women who came to the hospital from 2008 to 2009 to 36 women who came between 2011 and 2012. The first group had the highest reported levels of PBDEs of any group of pregnant women tested worldwide. But in just three years, overall levels fell by two-thirds.

Every woman tested from 2008-2009 had all five of the PBDEs measured by the researchers in her blood. But by 2011-2012, only one of the PBDEs was present in every woman tested. The researchers did not test the same women at both time points, but they did find that overall levels of all five PBDE’s were significantly lower in the second group.

Although PBDEs have been banned, furniture makers have substituted other chemicals, which may also be dangerous, as a way of meeting state fire safety standards. Chlorinated Tris, for example, is a suspected carcinogen listed on Proposition 65. Others, such as Firemaster 550, have not adequately been tested.

The findings were published online on Sept. 25 in Environmental Science & Technology.
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VIDEO: The Right to Breathe, 2011 Documentary: "While we doing this interview 15 people will die..."

Directed by award-winning documentary filmmaker Alexandre Philippe, this powerful 2011 documentary tells the story of the serious health effects of Southern California's air pollution. It's estimated that 15 people die everyday in the region as a direct cause of air pollution related illnesses. A sobering 20 minutes....

What a difference a freeway makes; highway closure improves air quality by 83%

In study findings announced today UCLA researchers report that air quality near the closed section of highway 405 last year improved within minutes, reaching levels 83 percent better than on comparable weekends.

 

Because traffic dipped all over Southern California that weekend, air quality also improved 75 percent in parts of West Los Angeles and Santa Monica and an average of 25 percent regionally — from Ventura to Yucaipa, and Long Beach to Santa Clarita.

 

The study was led by two professors at UCLA's Institute of the Environment and Sustainability: Yifang Zhu, who is also an associate professor of environmental health sciences at the UCLA Fielding School of Public Health, and Suzanne Paulson, who is also a professor of atmospheric and oceanic sciences.

While the researchers expected cleaner air, they didn't expect the improvement to be so dramatic.

 

"The air was amazingly clean that weekend," Paulson said. "Our measurements in Santa Monica were almost below what our instruments could detect, and the regional effect was significant. It was a really eye-opening glimpse of what the future could be like if we can move away from combustion engines."

 

The research gives a peek at what the air would look like in a healthier Los Angeles with a vast majority of hybrid and electric vehicles and shows how quickly less driving can improve key measures of air quality.

 

Taking measurements

The researchers measured ultrafine particles (less than 0.1 microns in diameter), which are key indicators of real-time traffic levels, and also fine particulate matter known as "PM2.5" (less than 2.5 microns in diameter), which includes tailpipe emissions and new particles created when the emissions interact with the atmosphere. PM2.5 can spread farther from the freeway and last longer than ultrafine particles, but both are pollutants with health risks. Exposure to near-roadway pollutants has been linked to increases in asthma, heart attacks, strokes, diabetes, low birth weight, pre-term births and other ailments, the researchers noted.

 

Zhu and Paulson found that when traffic dropped more than 90 percent on the closed 405, with only construction vehicles still on the move, ultrafine particles dropped by 83 percent. PM2.5 concentrations dropped 36 percent.

 

More broadly, ultrafine particles and PM2.5 levels dropped 75 percent across a swath of West Los Angeles near the I-405/I-10 interchange stretching from Santa Monica to Westwood. Elsewhere, they measured PM2.5 and found the air 31 percent cleaner in Ventura, 19 percent cleaner in Yucaipa, 30 percent cleaner in Long Beach, 23.2 percent cleaner in Santa Clarita and 19.9 percent cleaner in Northridge.

 

"There is no safe level of PM2.5 concentrations, where you would no longer observe health impacts, so any reduction is an improvement," Zhu said. "This study shows that with such dramatic traffic reductions, there are specific air-quality improvements. It gives policymakers and the public incentives to put more effort into reducing traffic emissions."

 

Diesel Exhaust and California Air Pollution; Air Purifiers a Must for Polluted State

One of the worst states to live in, in terms of pollution, is California. Indoor Air Quality (IAQ) Experts agree: if any state should be worried about its air quality, it is indeed this one—- and if any residents should use air purifiers, Californians should.

A new report released this week by the South Coast Air Quality Management District found diesel exhaust was the key driver for air toxics risk, accounting for more than 80 percent of the total air toxics risk in the overall Southern California area sampled. In areas where there is more truck traffic, the air quality is significantly worse.

A separate report issued by Cal State Northridge researchers states that particulate concentrations are on the rise in the east end of the San Fernando Valley.

California also has the worst rate of soot pollution in the United States, according to a 2006 report released by an environmental group.

The air quality reports and alerts that focus on California are abundant. Karen Hand, B. Chem. Eng and IAQ Expert with AllerAir says, “People who live in California must take measures to ensure that the air they breathe when they are indoors is at least safer than the air outdoors—- and that’s not necessarily the case if you don’t have an air purifier in your home.”

Hand recommends air purifier units like AllerAir’s Air Medic+ Exec, that combines a HEPA filter to remove 99.97% of particles, with a deep-bed carbon filter for additional protection against dangerous airborne chemicals.

For more information on air purifiers, you can contact any of AllerAir’s IAQ Experts at 888.852.8247.