M9.4 Heavy Metals

Lead poisoning has a way longer history than I initially thought. It's crazy to think that although child lead poisoning was first described in the United States in 1914, it was not banned as a component of house paints until 1978. That's 64 years of high exposure to most of the country's population and I find that unacceptable. As a comparison, Australia banned the use of lead in house paints in 1920, only a few years after it was identified as the cause for lead poisoning.
Similarly, in the Nigeria article, the author describes a public health reaction to the high reported levels of lead in the population of a village near a gold mine. It seems that this was handled with the necessary urgency and it yielded positive results.


Comments

  1. Sandy TanNovember 9, 2018 at 10:25 AM

    Hi Hugo,
    I was also surprised to learn that it took America that long to ban lead. I am just thinking about all the health issues and deaths that could have been prevented if the American government acted faster. With the growth of public health field, I hope we get to the point where the government takes immediate action when there is evidence of a chemical or compund being hazardous, even if it maybe a small amount.

    ReplyDelete
  2. USF MPH ClassNovember 16, 2018 at 6:14 PM

    Hi,
    It is amazing how lazy or long a process can be to get things banned or restricted in the US. I wonder if we put money and business ahead of public health more often than not? Probably do. Dan

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

M7.8 Topic of Interest: Radiation Exposure in Medical Imaging

Image
The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has a branch dedicated to radiation safety called Center for Devices and Radiological Health (CDRH). This division has radiation safety programs that enforce requirements and encourage the safe use of radiation-emitting devices. These programs' goals are to keep professionals and the public informed about the risks of radiation exposure as well as ways to reduce such exposure and thus reduce the health risks associated with it. They do this by making sure that manufacturers make safe products, that users are educated about how to safely use devices that emit radiation, that users are educated about the risks of radiation exposure, and that regulators are able to obtain appropriate information about the use of such devices.
Read more

M3.4 Air Pollution

I currently live in Pinole, California, zip code 94564. After inputting this in the scorecard.org website, it provided the following information about Contra Costa county: Who and what are the top polluters in your zip code? Shell, Tesoro Refining, and Chevron are the top three polluters in Contra Costa county, each with around 1 million pounds of pollution released. What percent of the homes in your zip code have lead-based paint? 1% of houses in Contra Costa county are at high risk for lead hazard. Are there Superfund sites in your zip?  (In your BLOG, make sure to tell us what a Superfund Site is) Superfund sites are sites that produce the worst kind of toxic waste. In Contra Costa county, there are three: Concord Naval Weapons Station (CNWS), GBF, Inc., and United Heckathorn. However, Contra Costa county ranks among the 20% cleanest counties in all the country when it comes to number of superfund sites. What can you tell us about the Superfund sites that ...
Read more

M2.2 Personal Care Products

For this assignment, I decided to look up the shampoo and deodorant I use on the Safe Cosmetics Database website. The results were surprising, as both of these products actually had moderate overall hazard scores (5 and 3, respectively), while I was hoping they would have low scores. There is a high concern for the fragrance in my deodorant, Old Spice Red Zone Collection Pure Sport, that could cause allergies, irritation, organ system toxicity, and ecotoxicology. The real surprise came when I looked up my shampoo, Dove Men+Care 2in1 Formula Fresh & Clean. This product, like the deodorant, has the same fragrance component, but additionally, it contains the chemical DMDM Hydantoin, which is a known formaldehyde releaser, and has a hazard score of 7 alone. This made me take the decision to drop this brand from my daily use. While the components of every product is information that is available to everyone, what is not conveniently available is the hazard associated with each ingredien...
Read more