September 2005

Executive Summary | News Release

Download the full report. (PDF, 149 KB)

Many of the products in our homes and offices, from television sets, computers, and other electronics to carpet and upholstery, are manufactured with added chemical flame retardants known as PBDEs (polybrominated diphenyl ethers). These chemicals leach out into our homes and environment. Over the past several years, public health researchers have sounded the alarm that PBDEs are accumulating in our environment and in our bodies, where they can cause serious health problems, especially for fetuses and young children. These concerns were chronicled in the first �Body of Evidence� report, released in the spring of 2004 by the U.S. PIRG Education Fund and Environment California Research and Policy Center.

In little more than one year since the first �Body of Evidence� report, two of the three commercial mixes of PBDEs known as Penta and Octa, have been taken off the market. Today, the Deca commercial mix is the only PBDE remaining on the market in North America.

Unfortunately, Deca is by far the most widely used type of PBDE in use, so the health threat posed by PBDE exposure persists. Studies about PBDEs continue to emerge and many of them focus primarily on Deca. These studies contradict assertions made by bromine chemical manufacturers, the industry responsible for Deca�s production. This industry has consistently denied the existence of risks associated with Deca. This report is an update to the Body of Evidence Report, intended to chronicle the emerging science about the health and environmental impacts of Deca.

The studies reviewed in this report document the following facts:
� Deca is accumulating in the dust in our homes and offices;
� Deca is moving through the food chain;
� Deca is accumulating in food sold in American supermarkets;
� Deca is accumulating in our bodies, as shown in samples of blood and breast milk;
� Deca is likely breaking down into more toxic, previously banned forms of PBDEs; and
� Deca is hazardous to our health.

Exposure and possible health impacts of PBDEs
In general, exposure to PBDEs has been known to cause several health impacts including impaired learning and memory, delayed onset of puberty, male and female reproductive effects, cancer, and impaired immune system function. Three key studies by the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, the National Toxicology Program under the U.S. EPA and by researchers at Stockholm University in Sweden, have found an association between Deca exposure and health impacts including liver tumors and neuro-toxicity.

The most common routes of exposure to PBDEs are through common household products. Because PBDEs are an additive chemical they tend to come off during the lifetime use of these products subsequently traveling through indoor and outdoor air, water, household dust. Various studies show how exposure to Deca may cause adverse health effects in developing children.

PBDEs, including Deca, continue to accumulate in our homes
Deca is present at high levels in a variety of consumer products that are found indoors where we spend more than 80% of our time. Three new studies by researchers at the University of Toronto, the National Institute of Standards and Technology, and the University of Texas have shown that Deca is present at significant levels in indoor and outdoor window films, in dust found in our homes, and even in food that we purchase at our supermarkets.

PBDEs, including Deca, continue to accumulate in our bodies
In the past year, two significant papers by the Northwest Environment Watch and a researcher at Indiana University have shown evidence of the increasing accumulation of Deca in human blood and breast milk across the U.S. The first study looks at body concentrations of women from the Pacific Northwest and the second is a meta-analysis of the most recent literature on PBDE body burdens, including Deca, and how the concentrations are increasing and doubling every five years.

Deca breaks down into Penta, Octa
While the chemical industry argues that Deca is the safest of the three commercial mixes because it is more stable and less readily absorbed, three separate studies described in the first Body of Evidence report demonstrated that it degrades in sunlight to lower brominated forms of PBDEs that have previously been found toxic. More recently, additional data has emerged from the Swiss Federal Institute for Materials Science and Technology and Indiana University to support the notion that Deca indeed breaks down�either by natural environmental processes or when metabolized�into lower brominated PBDE congeners that are predominantly found in the now prohibited Penta and Octa mixtures.

PBDEs, including Deca, continue to accumulate in the environment
Data from a study conducted by researchers in Minnesota show evidence of the accumulation of PBDEs, and in particular Deca, in landfill leachates, sludge from wastewater treatment plants, and sediment samples collected downstream from wastewater plant effluent discharges in six of the state�s river basins. Last year, scientists from the University of Wisconsin announced even more evidence that PBDEs are building up in our environment, and in fact in one of our most treasured natural resources, Lake Michigan. This is yet another route of exposure to human beings who eat Lake Michigan fish, and poses a serious threat to the Great Lakes ecosystems. If PBDE concentrations continue unabated, scientists worry this chemical will surpass PCBs, or polychlorinated biphenyls, as Lake Michigan�s main contaminant.

Deca: The PCBs of our generation
Thirty years ago more than 1.5 billion pounds of the chemical PCB was manufactured in the U.S. and used on a variety of products that consumers were exposed to on a daily basis. Concern over its cancer-causing potential, endocrine disrupting effects, and persistence in the environment led to Congress enacting the Toxic Substances Control Act of 1976 that called for the phase out of its manufacture, processing and sale. Today, 26 years after PCBs were taken off the market they are still a health concern due to their persistence in the environment.

PCBs and PBDEs are chemically similar to each other�belonging within the same family of chemicals. Both are persistent, bio-accumulative, and have a variety of toxic effects. Notably, the EPA warns that the different health effects of PCBs may be interrelated�recognizing that changes in one system may have significant impacts on other regulatory systems of the human body.

The Burden of Proof
In the U.S. alone, tens of thousands of industrial chemicals are on the market with little or no information about their potential health impacts. Despite significant evidence of harm to public health, inadequate resources and legal authority prevent regulatory agencies from taking protective action.

U.S. chemicals policy should ensure that manufacturers and industrial users ensure the safety of their products before putting them on the market, so that agencies can protect public health before damage is done.

Based on the experience of PCBs, a rational U.S. chemicals policy would require that chemicals be proven safe before they are placed on the market, as is the case with pharmaceuticals. Instead, chemicals are put on the market, and the public bears the burden of determining whether or not they are safe, an endeavor that is expensive, takes years, and inevitably means the damage is done before precautions can be taken. Consequently, we find ourselves today in a similar predicament with PBDEs. There is more data available now about Deca and its growing contamination than there was about PCBs at their peak. The longer Deca stays on the market, the more it will accumulate and the longer it will take for it to dissipate.

Safer means of fire-proofing products are widely available
Some of the nation�s and the world�s biggest electronic and furniture companies are proving that the highest fire safety standards can be met without exposing our children, firefighters and ecosystems to PBDEs. For example, Apple, Dell, IBM, Motorola, Panasonic, Phillips, and Sony now produce PBDE-free products. Alternative flame retardant chemicals and materials are available to manufacturers today, including safer alternatives for all applications.

Conclusion
The most effective policy solution to protect public health is to prohibit the use of Deca as a flame-retardant chemical immediately. Regulatory agencies and public officials should require chemical companies to evaluate the safety of chemicals by looking at what is already known about their environmental and health hazards and what is not known about their safety�not the other way around.