Environmental Health Perspectives articles from April 2004

Environmental Health Perspectives archives from April 2004

Ocean health and human health.(Guest Editorial)
April 1, 2004... Oceans cover 70% of the Earth's surface, and they profoundly influence many biological and physical processes of the planet. Moreover, 60% of the human population lives on or near the coast. Thus, it almost goes without saying that ocean health...

Grand Rounds in Environmental Medicine: information on MCS needed.(Correspondence)
April 1, 2004... In the "Preface" to Grand Rounds in Environmental Medicine: Cases from an Emerging Discipline, Howard Hu (2003) stated that Part of the value of Grand Rounds stems from the appreciation that in real life, patients rarely ...

The Simple Truth about multiple chemical sensitivity.(Correspondence)
April 1, 2004... Renee Twombly's news article "The Simple Truth about MCS" (Twombly 2003) ignores the plausible physiologic mechanism (described in the same issue of EHP) that answers each of the major questions about multiple chemical sensitivity (MCS) (Pall...

Multiple chemical sensitivity: response to Pall.(Correspondence)
April 1, 2004... Renee Twombly's news article (Twombly 2003) was not intended to be a comprehensive discussion of multiple chemical sensitivity. Rather, as per the standing format of the Science Selections portion of EHP, Twombly was assigned to summarize the...

Accuracy of declared conflicts of interest.(Correspondence)
April 1, 2004... Growing evidence shows that the findings and conclusions of researchers with financial conflicts of interest are significantly more likely to favor the interests of their for-profit supporters (Bekelman et al. 2003; Swaen and Meijers 1988), as...

Conflicts of interest: Gibson's response.(Correspondence)
April 1, 2004... I applaud Tweedale's effort to ferret out and expose true conflicts of interest in regard to health research. However, he is barking up the wrong tree when he suggests that conflict of interest was present in my study of perceived treatment...

Six Modern Plagues.(Correspondence)
April 1, 2004... In his generally positive review of my book, Six Modern Plagues and How We Are Causing Them (Walters 2003), Donald S. Burke (2004) neglected to mention that Six Modern Plagues goes out of its way re differentiate between fact and theory. I...

Hypothyroxinemia, iodine deficiency, and subtle changes in migration and cytoarchitecture.(Correspondence)
April 1, 2004... In the Guest Editorial in the September issue of EHP, Zoeller (2003) commented on an article by Lavado-Autric et al. (2003). Lavado-Autric et al. (2003) used the term "hypothyroxinemia" in this article to indicate that thyroxine ([T.sub.4]) or...

Hypothyroxinemia: Zoeller's response.(Correspondence)
April 1, 2004... Soldin addresses an important issue that was not fully developed in my editorial (Zoeller 2003a), specifically, the description of thyroid status in experimental animals designed to model human conditions. There are two separate issues in this...

Chemical safety requires local government action.(Correspondence)
April 1, 2004... In "REACHing for Chemical Safety," Brown (2003) described the European Union's proposed Registration, Evaluation, and Authorisation of Chemicals (REACH) legislation and the shocking ineffectiveness of the laws currently governing toxic...

Corrections.(Correspondence)(Correction Notice)
April 1, 2004... The November 2003 Forum article "New Data on Methylmercury and Fetuses" [Environ Health Perspect 111:A753 (2003)] incorrectly stated, in reference to methylmercury poisoning at Minamata Bay in the mid-1950s, "The hair mercury of pregnant women...

Are farmed salmon fit fare?(Food Safety)
April 1, 2004... In an analysis of salmon toxicants published 9 January 2004 in Science; a team led by environmental affairs professor Ronald Hites of Indiana University showed that farmed salmon contain significantly higher concentrations of 14 organochlorine...

Malaria and HIV: interplay of risk.(Reproductive Health)
April 1, 2004... Does infection with malaria increase the risk that a mother with HIV will pass the AIDS virus along to her newborn? Recent findings are equivocal, but the possibilities they raise are alarming. In the 21 November 2003 issue of AIDS, Heena...

Making beds for oysters.(The Beat)
April 1, 2004... In South Carolina and other states, oyster shells are now almost as popular as their succulent residents. These states collect oyster shells and then replant them in existing reefs to make a suitable habitat where young oysters can settle after...

Renewing the health of U.S.--Chinese relations.(The Beat)
April 1, 2004... In 1979, as part of U.S.--Chinese efforts to normalize diplomatic relations, the two countries signed a protocol agreeing to cooperate in the health sciences. In December 2003, they renewed that agreement, the U.S. Department of Health and...

States fail to control smoking.(The Beat)
April 1, 2004... Many states came up short in the American Lung Association's annual review for 2003 of state tobacco control laws, the association announced in January 2004. The review covered four areas: tobacco prevention and control programs, smoke-free air...

Going green saves over time.(Sustainable Development)
April 1, 2004... Making buildings that are easy on the environment doesn't have to be hard on the wallet, according to an October 2003 report commissioned by the Sustainable Building Task Force, which represents more than 40 California. government agencies. The...

The air law payoff.(Regulations)
April 1, 2004... Major federal regulations are giving back more dollars in benefits than they cost, and U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) air regulations account for the biggest share of those benefits, concludes a 2003 review by the White House Office...

MSU-MDCH BLL Test Program.(ehp net)
April 1, 2004... Lead poisoning causes significant public health problems, including learning disabilities, behavioral problems, and even death. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, blood lead levels (BLLs) above 10 micrograms per...

Fighting fishing pirates.(The Beat)
April 1, 2004... Under the auspices of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, five maritime countries have established the Ministerial Task Force on Illegal, Unreported, and Unregulated (IUU) Fishing to help stop the growing problem of...

From Arsenal to preserve.(The Beat)
April 1, 2004... The Rocky Mountain Arsenal outside Denver, Colorado, which once produced about 60% of U.S. chemical weapons, is now a Superfund site undergoing decontamination and looking forward to a new role as a wildlife preserve. The arsenal came a step...

Breast cancer in white women.(The Beat)
April 1, 2004... More than 1 million breast cancer cases and nearly 600,000 deaths occur worldwide annually. U.S. breast cancer death rates have decreased, but since the early 1990s, white women have had a slight increase in the incidence of large tumors (over...

Reaching across the border with the SBRP.(NIEHS News)
April 1, 2004... The border between Mexico and the United States is an artificial line dividing a geographical region that is otherwise ecologically, economically, and culturally integrated. Despite its artificiality, the border between Mexico and the United...

Health lessons from reality TV.(beyond the Bench)
April 1, 2004... EnviroMysteries: Breaking the Mold is the creation of a partnership between Maryland Public Television and the Community Outreach and Education Program of the Environmental Health Sciences Center at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public...

Breast cancer: estrogen suppression by compounds found in red wine and grape seeds.(Headliners: NIEHS--supported research)
April 1, 2004... Eng ET, Ye J, Williams D, Phung S, Moore RE, Young MK, Gruntmanis U, Braunstein G, Chen S. 2003. Suppression of estrogen biosynthesis by procyanidin dimers in red wine and grape seeds. Cancer Res 63:8516-8522. Many epidemiologic studies...

Eating away at a global food source: the state of the oceans, Part 1.(Focus)(Cover Story)
April 1, 2004... Consumer demand for seafood has skyrocketed since the 1970s. Total fish consumption worldwide jumped from almost 50 million metric tons in 1976 to 95.5 million metric tons in 1990, according to the 2002 State of World Fisheries and Aquaculture...

Imperfect protection: NEPA at 35 years.(Spheres of Influence)
April 1, 2004... Passed by Congress even before the establishment of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) first gave notice of national concern about the human impact on the air, land, and water. The 1969...

Low water consumption: a new goal for coal.(Innovations)
April 1, 2004... There are, according to estimates by the U.S. Geological Survey and other organizations, some 980 billion metric tons of coal buried worldwide. Taken at face value, that coal could supply the energy needs of the world for many years. But while...

Passing along pesticides: lymphoma rises in children of applicators.(Science Selections)
April 1, 2004... A growing body of scientific evidence suggests there may be an association between parents' exposure to pesticides and cancer in their children. In this issue, Kori Flower of the University of North Carolina--Chapel Hill School of Public Health...

When PCBs act like thyroid hormone: mysterious mimicry in the fetal brain.(Science Selections)
April 1, 2004... Children exposed to relatively high levels of polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) can have deficits in general intellectual ability, poor short-term memory, and short attention span. Some researchers propose that this may be caused by the ability...

Gill damage in Puget Sound fish: industrial chemicals associated with DNA changes.(Science Selections)
April 1, 2004... Chemical pollutants in parts of Puget Sound appear to be damaging the DNA of fish that live there, according to findings published this month by Donald C. Malins of the Pacific Northwest Research Institute Biochemical Oncology Program and...

Division of Extramural Research and Training fourth annual scientific retreat.(NIEHS Extramural Update)
April 1, 2004... The NIEHS Division of Extramural Research and Training held its fourth annual scientific retreat 4-5 December 2003 in Southern Pines, North Carolina. Unlike previous DERT scientific retreats, this meeting revolved around a single topic: systems...

Strategic partnering to evaluate cancer signatures.(Fellowship, Grants, & Awards)
April 1, 2004... The National Cancer Institute (NCI) invites investigators to form strategic partnerships that will bring together the multidisciplinary expertise and resources needed to determine how the information derived from comprehensive molecular...

Revolutionary genome sequencing technologies: the $1,000 genome.(Fellowships, Grants, & Awards)
April 1, 2004... The purpose of this request for applications (RFA) is to solicit grant applications to develop novel technologies that will enable extremely low-cost genomic DNA sequencing. Current technologies are able to produce the sequence of a...

Calendar.(Announcements)(Calendar)
April 1, 2004... May 3-7 May, Mon-Fri. U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) Environmental Monitoring and Assessment Program (EMAP) Symposium 2004. Newport, Rhode Island. Information: Brian D. Melzian, Ph.D., EMAP Co-Chair, U.S. EPA (NHEERL),...

Pediatric Environmental Health, 2nd edition.
April 1, 2004... Pediatric Environmental Health, 2nd edition by Ruth A. Etzel and Sophie J. Balk, eds. Elk Grove Village, IL:American Academy of Pediatrics, 2003. 721 pp. ISBN: 1-58110-111-2, $44.95 paper. In 1999 the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP)...

New books.(Announcements)
April 1, 2004... A Small Dose of Toxicology: The Health Effects of Common Chemicals Steven G. Gilbert New York:Routledge, 2004. 280 pp. ISBN: 0-41 5-31168-3, $35.95 Agricultural Development Policy: Concepts and Experiences Roger D. Norton Hoboken,...

Structural changes in gill DNA reveal the effects of contaminants on Puget Sound fish.
April 1, 2004... Structural differences were identified in gill DNA from two groups of English sole collected from Puget Sound, Washington, in October 2000. One group was from the industrialized Duwamish River (DR) in Seattle and the other from relatively clean...

Polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) exert thyroid hormone-like effects in the fetal rat brain but do not bind to thyroid hormone receptors.
April 1, 2004... Polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) are ubiquitous environmental contaminants routinely found in human and animal tissues. Developmental exposure to PCBs is associated with neuropsychologic deficits, which may be related to effects on thyroid...

Screening for estrogen and androgen receptor activities in 200 pesticides by in vitro reporter gene assays using Chinese hamster ovary cells.
April 1, 2004... We tested 200 pesticides, including some of their isomers and metabolites, for agonism and antagonism to two human estrogen receptor (hER) subtypes, hER[alpha] and hER[beta], and a human androge receptor (hAR) by highly sensitive...

Effects of organochlorine contaminants on thyroid hormone levels in arctic breeding glaucous gulls, Larus hyperboreus.
April 1, 2004... Studies on glaucous gulls (Larus hyperboreus) breeding in the Barents Sea have reported that high blood levels of halogenated organic contaminants in this species might cause reproductive, behavioral, and developmental stress. However,...

The protective effect of [delta]-aminolevulinic acid dehydratase 1-2 and 2-2 isozymes against blood lead with higher hematologic parameters.
April 1, 2004... Previous studies have suggested that [delta]-aminolevulinic acid dehydratase (ALAD) types 1-2 or 2-2 are protective against the toxicity of blood lead (PbB) when zinc protoporphyrin (ZPP) levels are low because of differential binding of lead...

Reproductive effects of occupational DDT exposure among male malaria control workers.
April 1, 2004... To assess potential effects of human DDT [1,1,1-trichloro-2,2-bis(p-chlorophenyl)ethane] exposure, we evaluated the reproductive history of 2,033 workers in the antimalaria campaign of Mexico. Data on occupational exposure to DDT and...

Prenatal lead exposure, [delta]-aminolevulinic acid, and schizophrenia.
April 1, 2004... Schizophrenia is a severe mental disorder of unknown etiology. Recent reports suggest that a number of environmental factors during prenatal development may be associated with schizophrenia. We tested the hypothesis that environmental lead...

Enhancing effect of the endocrine disruptor para-nonylphenol on the generation of reactive oxygen species in human blood neutrophils.
April 1, 2004... Although para-nonylphenol (NP) is known as an endocrine disruptor, the immunologic effect of NP has been poorly analyzed. We found that NP from 5 to 50 [Micro] caused a dose-dependent stimulatory effect on the generation of reactive oxygen...

Is the association of airborne particles with daily deaths confounded by gaseous air pollutants? an approach to control by matching.
April 1, 2004... Although particulate air pollution has been associated with increased numbers of daily deaths in dozens of cities around the world, issues still remain about the association. Some have questioned the complex modeling used to control for season...

Blood organic mercury and dietary mercury intake: National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey, 1999 and 2000.
April 1, 2004... Blood organic mercury (i.e., methyl mercury) concentrations among 1,709 women who were participants in the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) in 1999 and 2000 (1999-2000 NHANES) were 0.6 [micro]g/L at the 50th percentile...

Phthalate exposure and pulmonary function.
April 1, 2004... Exposure to phthalates is widespread because of their use in plastics, cosmetics, and other consumer products. Phthalate exposure has been associated with adverse respiratory outcomes in children. With urinary phthalate measures, we assessed...

Sensitivity of the immature rat uterotrophic assay to mixtures of estrogens.
April 1, 2004... We have evaluated whether mixtures of estrogens, present in the mix at doses that are individually inactive in the immature rat uterotrophic assay, can give a uterotrophic response. Seven chemicals were evaluated: nonylphenol, bisphenol A...

Ambient endotoxin concentrations in P[M.sub.10] from Southern California.
April 1, 2004... Concentrations of endotoxin in urban air pollution have not previously been extensively characterized. We measured 24-hr levels of P[M.sub.10] (particulate matter < 10 [micro]m in aerodynamic diameter) and the associated endotoxin component...

Personal exposure meets risk assessment: a comparison of measured and modeled exposures and risks in an urban community.(Article)
April 1, 2004... Human exposure research has consistently shown that, for most volatile organic compounds (VOCs), personal exposures are vastly different from outdoor air concentrations. Therefore, risk estimates based on ambient measurements may over- or...

Arsenic-induced enhancement of ultraviolet radiation carcinogenesis in mouse skin: a dose-response study.
April 1, 2004... The present study was designed to establish the form of the dose-response relationship for dietary sodium arsenite as a co-carcinogen with ultraviolet radiation (UVR) in a mouse skin model. Hairless mice (strain Skh1) were fed sodium arsenite...

Understanding sex differences in environmental health: a thought leaders' roundtable.(Workgroup Report)
April 1, 2004... Under the auspices of the Society for Women's Health Research, a thought leaders' roundtable was convened at the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences in October 2002 to discuss recent advances in environmental health research,...

Urban air pollution and mortality in a cohort of Norwegian men.
April 1, 2004... We investigated the association between total and cause-specific mortality and individual measures of long-term air pollution exposure in a cohort of Norwegian men followed from 1972-1973 through 1998. Data from a follow-up study on...

Asbestos-induced peritoneal mesothelioma in a construction worker.(Grand Rounds)
April 1, 2004... Occupational and environmental asbestos exposure continues to represent a public health problem, despite increasingly restrictive laws adopted by most industrialized countries. Peritoneal mesothelioma is a rare and aggressive asbestos-related...

Cognitive deficits and magnetic resonance spectroscopy in adult monozygotic twins with lead poisoning.(Grand Rounds)
April 1, 2004... Seventy-one-year-old identical twin brothers with chronic lead poisoning were identified from an occupational medicine clinic roster. Both were retired painters, but one brother (J.G.) primarily removed paint and had a history of higher chronic...

Molecular evidence of an interaction between prenatal environmental exposures and birth outcomes in a multiethnic population.
April 1, 2004... Inner-city, minority populations are high-risk groups for adverse birth outcomes and also are more likely to be exposed to environmental contaminants, including environmental tobacco smoke (ETS), benzo[a]pyrene (BaP), and other polycyclic...

Cancer risk and parental pesticide application in children of agricultural health study participants.
April 1, 2004... Parental exposure to pesticides may contribute to childhood cancer risk. Through the Agricultural Health Study, a prospective study of pesticide applicators in Iowa and North Carolina, we examined childhood cancer risk and associations with...

Reporting pesticide assessment results to farmworker families: development, implementation, and evaluation of a risk communication strategy.
April 1, 2004... The collection of environmental samples presents a responsibility to return information to the affected participants. Explaining complex and often ambiguous scientific information to a lay audience is a challenge. As shown by environmental...