Showing posts with label mercury free environment. Show all posts
Showing posts with label mercury free environment. Show all posts

Friday, July 1, 2011

The Council of Europe Calls for "Restricting or Prohibiting the Use of Amalgams"





The Council of Europe calls for “restricting or prohibiting the use of amalgams”

The Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe adopted a resolution on 27 May 2011 urging its 47 member countries to start “restricting or prohibiting the use of amalgams as dental fillings.”

Deputy Jean Huss, Luxembourg’s representative to the Council of Europe (not to be confused with the European Union), drafted the meticulously researched report that explains two major reasons behind this call to action:

  1. Amalgam is a health threat: “...amalgams are the prime source of exposure to mercury for developed countries, also affecting embryos, foetuses (through the placenta) and children (through breastfeeding). Exposure to mercury can seriously affect the health of patients and dental professionals…”
  2. Amalgam is an environmental threat: “...between 60 and 90 tonnes of mercury from dental surgeries are released into and contaminate Europe’s atmosphere, surface waters and soil every year.”

The Council of Europe’s ground-breaking resolution will have a favorable impact on the ongoing mercury treaty negotiations. With this resolution, the Council of Europe joins the growing international call for the amalgam phase-out that is already endorsed by the African region, the Arab League, and the United States government. (The Council of Europe's report observed that the U.S. position itself is “likely to change the global debate on amalgams.”)

Thank you to Marie Grosman, who testified before Monsieur Huss and the Council of Europe Sub-Committee on Health in preparation for this report and the resulting resolution. Marie is the life science lecturer who leads the mercury-free dentistry movement in France along with the group Non Au Mercure Dentaire. She also serves as Vice President for Europe, World Alliance for Mercury-Free Dentistry, the coalition that represents our cause on the international front.

Charlie

Charles G. Brown
National Counsel, Consumers for Dental Choice
President, World Alliance for Mercury-Free Dentistry
1 July 2011


Thursday, January 6, 2011

Why Do They Want to Throw Dr Andrew Wakefield Under the Bus?

There's a lot of buzz this week regarding Dr Andrew Wakefield and the controversy over the vaccine studies that were published by the BMJ (British Medical Journal). All of the sudden (and mysteriously) some of his supporters have withdrawn their endorsement of the findings regarding thimerosal and autism.

What's to debate?

Some people are stuck on labeling diseases, creating names for new diseases, or just have a jones for 'labeling' in general. Any way you slice it, disease is disease. Illness is illness. Pollution is pollution.

Plain and simple:
• There's no doubt that mercury (Hg) is the #1 most hazardous non-radioactive substance on earth.
• There's no doubt that mercury is a health risk and environmental hazard.

These facts have been acknowledged/reported/confirmed by US EPA, FDA, US Geological Survey and other global agencies and research organizations. Scandinavian countries have long banned the use of mercury dental amalgam. The US trails, even after the December 2010 FDA hearings which were specifically called to address mercury.

Want more? Here's the link to International Hazard Classifications for Mercury (Canada, US, EU):

And a link to a Lab Safety Bulletin from the Chemical Control Centre, University of Windsor:

According to US FDA, "Thimerosal is a preservative that has been used in some vaccines since the 1930's, when it was first introduced by Eli Lilly Company. It is 49.6% mercury by weight and is metabolized or degraded into ethylmercury and thiosalicylate. As a vaccine preservative, thimerosal is used in concentrations of 0.003% to 0.01%.
A vaccine containing 0.01% thimerosal as a preservative contains 50 micrograms of thimerosal per 0.5 ml dose or approximately 25 micrograms of mercury per 0.5 mL dose."

So, the FDA admits to allowing a known, documented hazardous substance and neurotoxin to be injected into unsuspecting citizens. Thimerosal has been around since the 1930's. I find it hard to believe that some pharmaceutical giant somewhere can't come up with a better, safer preservative. So here's more about the many ways thimerosal (mercury) makes you, and the environment, sick....

Thimerosal Toxicology

Thiomersal is very toxic by inhalation, ingestion, and in contact with skin (EC hazard symbol T+), with a danger of cumulative effects. It is also very toxic to aquatic organisms and may cause long-term adverse effects in aquatic environments (EC hazard symbol N). In the body, it is metabolized or degraded to ethylmercury (C2H5Hg+) and thiosalicylate.

Cases have been reported of severe poisoning by accidental exposure or attempted suicide, with some fatalities. Thiomersal rapidly dissociates to release ethylmercury after injection; that the disposition patterns of mercury are similar to those after exposure to equivalent doses of ethylmercury chloride; and that the central nervous system and the kidneys are targets, with lack of motor coordination being a common sign.

Fecal excretion accounts for most of the elimination from the body. Ethylmercury clears from blood with a half-life of about 18 days in adults. Ethylmercury clears from the brain in about 14 days in infant monkeys. Inorganic mercury metabolized from ethylmercury has a much longer clearance, at least 120 days; it appears to be much less toxic than the inorganic mercury produced from mercury vapor, for reasons not yet understood.

Risk assessment for effects on the nervous system have been made by extrapolating from dose-response relationships for methylmercury. Methylmercury and ethylmercury distributes to all body tissues, crossing the blood-brain barrierand the placental barrier, and ethylmercury also moves freely throughout the body.


FACT: All forms of mercury are toxic.


Here's a clip from Annette Fuentes' feature, Eli Lilly and Thimerosal:
"Thimerosal is an organic compound that is 49.6 percent ethylmercury. Eli Lilly and Co., the Indianapolis-based drug giant, developed and registered thimerosal under its trade name Merthiolate in 1929 and began marketing it as an antibacterial, antifungal product. It became the most widely used preservative in vaccines.

Thimerosal cannot be used with live-cell vaccines, such as MMR (measles, mumps, rubella) or polio, because it would kill the vaccine.

The only research looking into the safety of thimerosal was done in 1930 by Eli Lilly-sponsored doctors, who injected it into 22 patients with meningitis. The human experiments failed to prove that thimerosal was nontoxic.

Nonetheless, researchers H.M. Powell and W.A. Jamieson published a study in September 1931 in the American Journal of Hygiene that stated thimerosal had a “low order of toxicity” for humans, without mentioning that the human subjects were ill and subsequently died. Internal Lilly documents from the time, however, revealed that the company’s researchers were worried about Merthiolate’s “burning qualities” when used on the skin.

By 1935, Eli Lilly’s Jameison had further evidence of thimerosal’s toxicity when he received a letter from a researcher who had injected it into dogs and saw severe local reactions, leading him to state: “Merthiolate is unsatisfactory as a preservative for serum intended for use on dogs.”



Here's a not-to-be-missed video featuring Holly Riley, and what she endured and learned through vaccinating her child:


The bottom line:
• The number of cases mentioned in these studies are global, and include the largest populations from underdeveloped regions of the world where famine and malnutrition prevail.

• When the body receives whole food nourishment, pure water and adequate rest and exercise, it is naturally (and is better) able to fend off bacterial and viral infections. Vaccines do not replace a balanced lifestyle, nor should they be accepted as the mode of first line prevention.

• When people self-treat their daily lifestyle needs by optimizing their health choices, the cost of health care will plummet, and allopaths (medical doctors) and surgeons will be free to do what they are trained to do best....save lives -- not over-or-wrongly prescribe pharmaceuticals.

Opportunity
Join Autism One, Autism Research Institute, Generation Rescue, National Autism Association, SafeMinds, Schafer Autism Report, Talk About Curing Autism, Unlocking Autism and the Members of the Autism Collaboration by supporting Dr Andrew Wakefield here:

OC

Friday, December 10, 2010

A Big Win for Safer Seafood -- and Another Step Toward a Mercury-Free Environment

Olin Corporation announced today that it will phase out the use of mercury in its chlor-akali manufacturing process in it's Charleston, Tennessee facility by the end of 2012. The company also plans to turn its Augusta, Georgia plant into a bleach plant and distribution center, discontinuing chlor-alkali manufacturing, and thus, mercury use.

The Tennessee facility is the largest mercury-based factory left in the US. Built in 1962, Olin Coprp's factory has consistently been the largest mercury emitter in the entire state of Tennessee. The factory, which produces chlorine and caustic soda, discharges mercury directly to the Hiwassee River and is likely the primary cause of the fish consumption advisory on that portion of the river.

Oceana has been working since 2005 to convince mercury-based chlorine plants to convert to cleaner technology. Since then, two factories have closed and three others are in the process of converting or have already converted to mercury-free technology.

There are now only two remaining plants using mercury -- Ashta Chemicals in Astabula, Ohio and PPG Industries in Natrium, West Virginia.

Mercury released to the environment from these plants end up in our waterways and ultimately the oceans, where it builds up in fish and other wildlife through a process known as 'bioaccumulation', where animals higher on the food chain, such as tuna and swordfish, carry the most mercury.

We all know that people exposed to mercury can experience health hazards, such as delayed neurological development in children. Both the FDA and the EPA have advised women of childbearing age and children to not eat certain types of fish due to high levels of mercury.

That said, we still wonder why FDA still allows the practice of dental mercury amalgam, as these deceptive "silver fillings" are placed only inches from the brain.

Congratulations, Oceana! Keep up the good fight!

OC