"The amount of lead allowed in toys and other children's products sold in the U.S. will soon be reduced to one of the lowest limits in the world. The move was praised by consumer advocates but denounced by critics worried about job losses and shuttered businesses."
"Last month's health warning from the Department of Health and Human Services' National Toxicology Program has set off a bruising battle with the makers of styrene, a chemical compound derived from crude oil."
"High blood levels of a man-made chemical used in non-stick coatings were associated with a raised risk of arthritis in a large new study of adults exposed to tainted drinking water."
"Consumers who switched from polycarbonate-plastic water bottles to metal ones in hopes of avoiding the risk that bisphenol A will leach into their beverages aren’t necessarily any better off, a new study finds."
People whose blood contains more of the chemicals (BPA and phthalates) found in household plastics are likelier to have impaired thyroid function, a new large-scale study confirms.
The DuPont company, which has touted its own safety and environmental record, turned down in 1988 a construction option for its Belle, WV, plant that could have protected workers and the community from deadly phosgene gas. One worker died in a series of three phosgene releases there in 2010.
"DuPont Co. rejected affordable plant and equipment upgrades, ignored near-miss incidents and violated the chemical giant's own widely touted safety guidelines in failing to prevent three January 2010 accidents that left one Belle plant worker dead, federal investigators said in a report issued Thursday."
"Tons of imported fish laced with chemicals banned from the U.S. food supply, including carcinogens, are routinely showing up in this country and, state officials say, winding up on American dinner plates."
"It's been a busy week for anyone following the national debates over hydraulic fracturing, or 'fracking,' the controversial method used to cut into shale rock to extract natural gas. In New Jersey, a strong bipartisan majority in both chambers of the legislature approved a bill banning fracking in the state as its neighbor to the north, New York, appeared ready to end its moratorium on the practice."
When some Baltimore residents worried about lead in remodeling dust tried to get help from state, local, and federal agencies, all they got was the run-around. Their experience shows the system for protecting people from lead-based paint is badly broken.
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