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Posted on November 17, 2009, 23:34, by schneider.


The worst nightmare a mother can confront could be the knowledge that she’s poisoning the baby in her belly and there is little she can do about it.

Nine women from California, Oregon and Washington found out that was just what happened, but they learned it after their babies were born.

They were participants in a first-of-its-kind study that tested their blood and urine during their second trimester of pregnancy to find out whether their unborn offspring were being exposed to toxic chemicals found in common consumer products.

The study concluded that children spend their first nine months in an environment that exposes them to known toxic chemicals.

“Our tests measured levels of five chemical groups, including phthalates, mercury, perfluorinated compounds or bisphenol A, and the flame retardant tetrabromobisphenol A,” said Erika Schreder, staff scientist for the Washington Toxics Coalition, one of the three West Coast environmental health organizations who conducted the study.

Thirteen toxic chemicals were found in the bio-fluids of the pregnant women and that research has proven that exposure to some of these chemicals has been linked to serious health problems like asthma, childhood cancers, diabetes, infertility and learning disabilities.

However, the report does not offer a correlation between the levels of the chemicals found in the mothers and any health problems the newborns were expected to encounter.

“We cannot say with certainty whether these particular babies were harmed by the toxic exposures in the womb because of the complexity of their exposures…,” Schreder told me in an interview.

“We do know that they were exposed during the very most vulnerable time in their lives to chemicals associated with cancer, learning disabilities, and infertility,” she added.

Most of the mothers were stunned and angered at the results of the testing.

Amanda Estrada-Guzman, a nurse from Richland, Wash., said “The results were shocking and eye opening. I was scared and worried how this will affect my baby.”

Alma Feldpausch, an environmental scientist from Seattle said that “I would indeed expect our government agencies to work to reduce these chemicals.”

Kim Radtke, a program manager in a Seattle breast feeding advocacy program, said “Babies deserve to grow and develop in a healthy environment, in utero and out.”

The three groups that produced the report and other public health and environmental activists across the country say that to adequately protect not just pregnant women, but all of the public, immediate steps must be taken by the government beginning with the passage of laws that protect the most vulnerable.