1 Environmental Toxins
Introduction
The toxins in the environment accumulate in the seas, air, and ground. These toxins come from all sources, not just industrial plants. Some of these toxic substances are even available in very minute amounts in our food, laundry, cleaning agents, and even construction materials. There must be stricter guidelines in regulating these environmental toxins and widespread awareness to all nationalities to help address the growing side effects of toxic accumulation on earth. There are a lot of organizations that help promote awareness and give practical ways on how to reduce toxins at a household level. Everyone must be actively participating for these measures to happen. Without prompt action, these have detrimental effects on our health and environment.
Topic Overview
The advances in research, industrial technology, and progress bring about several changes in the chemical composition of the environment. Industrial plants are the most obvious contributors to environmental toxins, but chemicals are now in everyday items nowadays. These environmental toxins must be appropriately handled and disposed of to not misplace them in our seas, air, and ground. Glossary 2
Innovators and Ideas
The reviewed article was a profile of Philip Landrigan, entitled “Philip Landrigan: Children’s health crusader.” Angela Pirisi wrote this article published in The Lancet, Vol 365 last April 9, 2005.
The article talks about Philip Landrigan, together with Herb Needleman, and all of his contributions to providing a safer environment for everyone, especially the children. His work had outlawed leaded gasoline almost worldwide. Philip Landrigan is an expert on environmental health and pediatrics. He was the first to document the effects of lead poisoning on American children, which eventually resulted in having a US government mandate to remove lead from gas and paint in 1976. With the reduction of lead, there was a 40% decrease in blood lead levels in every American child. He also helped persuade the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to create the Environmental Epidemiology Unit, known today as the National Center for Environmental Health (Pirisi, 2005).
The author also showed comparisons of Landrigan’s work to different countries worldwide. The article also emphasized that Europe has stricter regulations regarding industrial chemical poisoning in everyday items. It took 20 years in the making to phase out leaded gasoline through the work of Landrigan (Pirisi, 2005).
The new points represented in this article include the fact that there seems to be minimal to no change if there is no external push from policies. With the help of these policies, new research and laws exist that help improve our response to the environmental crisis of toxins. An example of this is the Food Quality Protection Act (1996) which addresses child vulnerability to food chemicals (Pirisi 2005).
Overall, the work of Philip Landrigan has contributed signif