The Grand Inquest - A Call to Arms!

"Teamwork is the ability to work together toward a common vision. The ability to direct individual accomplishments toward organizational objectives. It is the fuel that allows common people to attain uncommon results." Andrew Carnegie

The idea behind this web project is to gather as much information as possible regarding possible sources of arsenic exposure so that we can (1) make informed decisions regarding products we purchase for ourselves and our families, and (2) use and dispose of these products in a safe manner.    This web page is only as good as its information.  And, as Andrew Carnegie said, "teamwork . . .is the fuel that allows common people to obtain uncomon results." To that end, I would like to issue a challenge:  I've begun emailing companies whose products I use to gather more information about the product's arsenic content.   I am challenging everyone to reach out to the manufacturers of the products you buy and do the same.  By working together, we can reach many more companies than any one of us alone. 
 
Thus far, I've sent inquiries to Johnson and Johnson, Ford, La-Z-Boy and the Gap.  A company will generally have contact information on its web page. You could contact the company via email, snail mail or telephone, depending on your preference. I will be posting the results of any inquiries on this page. I'll also compile a list of all of the companies contacted to avoid duplicating our efforts.  Please keep me apprised of all responses, including a manufacturer's failure to respond.

My inquiries to Johnson and Johnson, Ford, La-Z-Boy and Gap focused on the use of arsenic based microbials in their products, and went something like this:
To Whom It May Concern: I frequently purchase clothing and outerwear items from the Gap and its affiliates.  To better educate myself regarding the products I use and purchase, I would like to know which, if any, Gap products (including footwear and outerwear) contain arsenic based microbials. Examples include Oxybisphenoxarsine (OBPA), Vinyzene, Intercide ABF and Acticide. Please let me know if you have any questions. Regards, A. Sincare

An inquiry regarding the use of arsenic in meat would go something like this:
To Whom It May Concern: My family and I are loyal Thorn Apple Valley customers.  To better educate myself regarding the products I purchase for my family's consumption, I would like to receive information regarding Thorn Apple Valley's (including any supplier's) use of arsenic-based products in animal feed.  Examples include Arsanilic Acid, Roxarsone, Carbarsone and 4 Hydroxy 3 Nitrobenzenearsonic Acid, among others.   Please let me know if you have further questions.  Regards, A. Sincare

So, feel free to copy, paste and inquire away! If you are interested in a sample request for a different type of product, just ask.  I look forward sharing the results of the grand inquest!

Cheers and good luck!

Who's Down With OBPA?

I wouldn't be. Oxybisphenoxarsine - C24H16As2O3.  Also known as Vinyzene, Intercide ABF and Acticide, it is an arsenic based "biocide" put in many plastics as an antimicrobial. I'll give a laundry list of the "type" of products to which this substance is added; the list of specific products is vast, uncollected and would be too numerous to mention. It's in EVERYTHING.  OBPA is found in a variety of plastics, including PVC, shower curtains, bath mats and swimming pool liners; things that keep our feet toasty, such as carpets and rugs; comfy things to sit and sleep on, including car upholstery, marine upholstery, mattresses, and your sofa. It's in Polyurethane (think plastic containers, Lycra, Wellington Boots, insulation).  One book mentioning the wonders of polyurethane notes that when polyurethane's useful life is over it can be burned as fuel in municipal incinerators -meaning that this compound is also burned.  John Emsley, Molecules at an Exhibition: Portraits of Intriguing Materials in Everyday Life, 139.

The EPA recognizes that OBPA has a "high toxicity" (Anatole A. Klyoslov, Wood-Plastic Composites, 4); however,  the EPA allows use of this chemical because research, presented of course from the manufacturer, demonstrated that humans did not ingest it directly, the arsenic leached "slowly" from the compound, and it would impact minimally on the environment. However, research has demonstrated that the substance is particularly susceptible to leaching in areas of high precipitation. D. Nichols, Biocides in Plastics, 19-20.  Further, there does not appear to be much regulation regarding its use in consumer products that might hold substances meant for human consumption; OBPA has been found to leach from such products into the substance they contain, including a backpack with a water- carrying insert.  See  William R. Cullen, Is Arsenic An Aphrodesiac: The Sociochemestry of an Element.    So, where might one find excessive precipitation? The shower? The pool?  A boat? It is also subject to fungal degradation, which could transform the compound into a more toxic arsenic compound. Throw away those moldy shower curtains!

Arsenic and Viruses

Here is an interesting article about the the effect of arsenic on the body's immune response to viruses. The full article is on MBL's web page: http://www.mbl.edu/news/press_releases/pdf/h1n1_arsenic.pdf.

For Immediate Rease, May 20, 2009

Scientists Link Influenza A (H1N1) Susceptibility to Common Levels of Arsenic Exposure
MBL, WOODS HOLE, MA—The ability to mount an immune response to influenza A (H1N1) infection is significantly compromised by a low level of arsenic exposure that commonly occurs through drinking contaminated well water, scientists at the Marine Biological Laboratory (MBL) and Dartmouth Medical School have found.
Joshua Hamilton, the MBL's Chief Academic and Scientific Officer and a senior scientist in the MBL's Bay Paul Center; graduate student Courtney Kozul of Dartmouth Medical School, where the work was conducted; and their colleagues report their findings this week in the journal Environmental Health Perspectives.

"When a normal person or mouse is infected with the flu, they immediately develop an immune response," says Hamilton, in which immune cells rush to the lungs and produce chemicals that help fight the infection. However, in mice that had ingested 100 ppb (parts per billion) arsenic in their drinking water for five weeks, the immune response to H1N1 infection was initially feeble, and when a response finally did kick in days later, it was "too robust and too late," Hamilton says. "There was a massive infiltration of immune cells to the lungs and a massive inflammatory response, which led to bleeding and damage in the lung." Morbidity over the course of the infection was significantly higher for the arsenic-exposed animals than the normal animals.

Respiratory infections with influenza A virus are a worldwide health concern and are responsible for 36,000 deaths annually. The recent outbreak of the influenza A H1N1 substrain ("swine flu")--which is the same virus that Hamilton and his colleagues used in their arsenic study--to date has killed 72 people in Mexico and 6 in the United States.

"One thing that did strike us, when we heard about the recent H1N1 outbreak, is Mexico has large areas of very high arsenic in their well water, including the areas where the flu first cropped up. We don't know that the Mexicans who got the flu were drinking high levels of arsenic, but it's an intriguing notion that this may have contributed," Hamilton says.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency considers 10 ppb arsenic in drinking water "safe," yet concentrations of 100 ppb and higher are commonly found in well water in regions where arsenic is geologically abundant, including upper New England (Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Maine), Florida, and large parts of the Upper Midwest, the Southwest, and the Rocky Mountains, Hamilton says.

Arsenic does not accumulate in the body over a lifetime, as do other toxic metals such as lead, cadmium, and mercury. "Arsenic goes right through us like table salt," Hamilton says. "We believe for arsenic to have health consequences, it requires exposure day after day, year after year, such as through drinking water."

Arsenic exposure not only disrupts the innate immune system, as the present study shows, it also disrupts the endocrine (hormonal) system in an unusually broad way, which Hamilton’s laboratory discovered and first reported in 1998.

"Most chemicals that disrupt hormone pathways target just one, such as the estrogen pathway," he says. "But arsenic disrupts the pathways of all five steroid hormone receptors (estrogen, testosterone, progesterone, glucocorticoids, and mineralocorticoids), as well as several other hormone pathways. You can imagine that just this one effect could play a role in cancer, diabetes, heart disease, reproductive and developmental disorders–all the diseases that have a strong hormonal component."

At this point, Hamilton thinks arsenic disrupts the innate immune system and the endocrine system through different mechanisms. "Arsenic may ultimately be doing a similar thing inside the cell to make these effects happen, but the targets are likely different," he says. The proteins that mediate hormone response are different than the proteins that mediate the immune response. "We don't yet know how arsenic disrupts either system at the molecular level. But once we know how it affects one system, we will have a pretty good idea of how it affects the other systems as well."

Presently, Hamilton's lab is focused on understanding the unusual "biphasic" effect that arsenic has on the endocrine system. At very low doses, arsenic stimulates or enhances hormone responses, while at slightly higher doses (still within the range found in drinking water), it suppresses these same hormone responses.

"Why we see that dramatic shift (from hormone enhancement to suppression) over such a narrow dose range is quite fascinating and totally unknown," Hamilton says. "Our principal focus is to figure out this switch. We think that will help us understand why arsenic does what it does in the body."

Hamilton, who joined the MBL in 2008, was formerly a faculty member in the Department of Pharmacology and Toxicology at Dartmouth Medical School. He was also founding director of the Center for Environmental Health Sciences at Dartmouth, an associate director at Dartmouth's Norris Cotton Cancer Center and directed the university's NIH Superfund basic research program for 11 years. He continues to collaborate as a member of Dartmouth’s Toxic Metals Research Program. Courtney Kozul, who conducted the present study, is a graduate student in Hamilton's research group who is completing her doctorate at Dartmouth Medical School in the Program in Experimental and Molecular Medicine.

This research was funded by the Dartmouth Toxic Metals Research Program Project by a grant from NIH-NIEHS and its Superfund Basic Research Program (grant P42 ES007373).

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The MBL is a leading international, independent, nonprofit institution dedicated to discovery and to improving the human condition through creative research and education in the biological, biomedical and environmental sciences. Founded in 1888 as the Marine Biological Laboratory, the MBL is the oldest private marine laboratory in the Americas.

Hazardous Mining Waste in Grandma's Garden - since 1956

That's right. It's called Ironite - and has been sold in lawn and garden stores, as well as in big box retailers, such as Home Depot, WalMart and Target. Studies by scientists, including a study commissioned by the Dallas Morning News shows that the levels of arsenic and lead in this product would normally be required to be disposed of as hazardous waste. But a loophole in the law for the mining industry exempts them from the requirement. What is more, the company is not even required to list arsenic or lead as an ingredient on the product. It touts its product as an "environmentally friendly" alternative to chemically produced fertilizers. As per usual, the company claims that the forms of arsenic and lead in its products are "non-toxic." I'll cover the apparent sources of these claims in a later post. The study by the Dallas paper found that Ironite contained 2,677 parts per million of lead and 3,972 parts per million of arsenic. Here is a link to a more detailed article: http://www.dirtdoctor.com/organic/garden/view_question/id/120/. Our more enviromentally friendly and apparently less corporate-influenced friends to the north have banned the substance from use.

An EPA study debunked the manufacturer's claims that its product contained arsenopyrite, instead containing an arsenic compounds it called Scorodite (FeAsO4·2H2O) and arsenate sorbed to iron oxides. http://www.epa.gov/nrmrl/lrpcd/wm/projects/135367.htm At anyrate, none of it sounds particularly desireable for the tomato patch, or where little johnny or fido might be able to ingest it. Lastly, of course, in the rain these substances leach into the ground water.

This Little Piggy

For the next example, it isn't even necessary to leave the barnyard. The use of arsenic laced feed isn't limited to our feathered friends. Hogs and swine are also given 3 Nitro 4 Hydrophenylarsonic Acid with their morning slop. In addition to Roxarsone, other variations of the compound called Carbarsone, Arsalinic Acid or Nitarsone may also be given. Like chickens, pigs are given this arsenic compound mainly to increase their growth rate. Although they excrete a large amount of the substance in their waste, some remains in the tissue. Further, while regulations require withdrawal of the substance a certain number of days before slaughter, a Canadian study found high rates of human error in the process (and thereafter Canada banned use of the substance).

Carbarsone has an interesting history of its own. Chauncey D Leake, a pharmacologist, began using the compound in the early 1930's to treat trichomonas vaginalis infections and intestinal amoebis. Its use fell by the wayside, however, because, as with most organic arsenicals ever used to treat human disease, it had unfortunate neurological and gastric system side-effects, including death. For a list of the side-effects, see Irving S. Rossoff, Encyclopedia of Clinical Toxoligy, 198 (2002).

Of course, the industry also touts the safety of these substances in hogs and swine, which of course becomes the ham in your sandwich and bacon with your eggs. Still hungry?

Which Came First?

In the course of my self-study, I've learned about so many fascinating and creative uses of arsenic. But to pay homage to the catalyst of my pursuit, I'll begin with the use of arsenic in a favorite barnyard animal - the chicken.

Arsenic is fed to chickens and turkeys mainly as a growth promoter. Sold under name-brands such as Roxarsone and Carbarsone, it is also known as 3 Nitro -4 Hydrophenylarsonic Acid. Although approved by the FDA in 1944, the use of Roxarsone increased dramatically as chicken consumption rose and the chicken industry consolidated in the 1970's and beyond. Roxarsone is such a wonderful product because, instead of waiting for the little creatures to grow up normally, chickens fed Roxarsone grow to "broiler" size in record time! And after all this time, scientists are still scratching their heads at the biological basis behind these magic properties. The industry touts this as "organic arsenic," which means only that it is a carbon-based compound. I'll save the history of organic arsenic, and the industry claims that this substance is "non-toxic" for a later post. Although much of the arsenic is excreted in the waste, some remains in the tissue, which of course becomes your chicken nugget. Mmmm. Arsenic, it's what's for dinner.