Chapter 3: America Demands Protection

In Chapter 3: "America Demands Protection" of David Michaels "Doubt is Their Product" the topic of the environmental movement and how pesticides and other chemicals affected and continue to affect our environment is discussed.

In the world we live in today, the environment is a very hot topic, no pun intended. With global warming on the rise, as well as the "Going Green" movement many of the issues that were brought up in the 1960's and 1970's are reoccurring.

A key player in the birth of the environmental movement is said to be Rachel Carson who authored, Silent Spring in 1962. This book outlined the deadly effects of the pesticide dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane or DDT as it is commonly referred to as.

In June of 1969, when the Cuyahoga River outside of Cleveland, OH caught fire, government was left to do nothing else. President Nixon enacted the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and supported the creation of the Occupational Health and Safety Administration (OSHA). DDT was later banned in 1972 by the EPA in regard to the Clean Air Act. The 1970's were beginning to look up, with the environmental movement charging ahead.

However, OSHA began to realize that enforcement of regulations was quite difficult. Thousands of toxic chemicals were being using by industry and to regulate all of them or to be sure industry was abiding by the regulations was near impossible. "Right now (2008) OSHA has enough inspectors to visit every workplace under its jurisdiction every 133 years". This is just plain ridiculous. Especially when the U.S. government was asking them to demonstrate a significant risk with each chemical and then set regulation based off of that risk, known as the "benzene decision". Wouldn't it be easier for industry to inform OSHA what was a safe level and then go from there? One would think, but there are a few issues with that (a) There is a good chance industry would suggest regulations for chemicals that would benefit them and not necessarily their employees and (b) "Industry has no legal obligation to inform employees" in the first place. There lays a whole other problem. Honestly, I think the U.S. government was clearly giving our friends at OSHA unrealistic expectations to complete.

Another industry player during this time was those involved with the plastic industry, or vinyl chloride. This was the new wave of the future, dangerous or not. This story progresses much like others we've talked about this far. Industry develops a product or chemical, tests it, finds it to be harmful to human health by means of industry-paid research, and decides to censor the information and "sits on it". Meanwhile employee health deteriorates and industry is left masking the truth to save their company. Same old story.

A few questions I'd like to pose based off this chapter:

1. Toward the end of the chapter, Michaels talks about how there is a dilemma for industry in the event of a hazardous product or chemical being used by their employees: thousands of jobs being lost due to potential regulation or no longer producing the product, or the health of the employees being affected. Do you feel this is a valid claim? Economy vs. health? What are the two sides to the claim?

2. When testing vinyl chloride for hazardous effects in regard to acroosteolysis or even cancer, the Europeans found some concrete evidence to the later. Why would they insist that the U.S. sign an agreement to not release any information without their consent? Do they feel the U.S. industry may not release the entire truth or is there something else behind that?

3. Finally, what are your feelings on OSHA's task to regulate and enforce limits on all toxic chemicals and that the U.S. government wanted proof of a significant risk before posing a standard? Is this too much demand of a small organization that can visit every site only once every 133 years?!? Who really should be helping to set and enforce these regulations?

(You don't have to answer all questions in your blog, just food for thought).