Dangers in low levels of toxic chemicals

Posted on Apr 03, 2009 by Susie Collins in Blog, Research

Expert says there may be no safe dose of certain chemical compounds.

60 Second Science reports some chemicals may be more dangerous at low doses. Critics site bad science on this issue, but the assertion that there is danger in low doses of toxic chemicals, and in the mixing of low doses of certain chemicals, is not news to people with Multiple Chemical Sensitivity. While people with MCS can have dangerous physical reactions to an exposure of any amount of a toxic chemical, what makes us the “canaries” in our toxic environment is that we often have adverse reactions to extremely low levels of toxic chemicals; in fact you could argue this is the signature mark of MCS.

It’s nice to see toxicology finally catching up with us.

60 Second Science reports:

The basic premise of safety testing for chemicals is that anything can kill you in high enough doses (even too much water too fast can be lethal). The goal is to find safe levels that cause no harm. But new research suggests that some chemicals may be more dangerous than previously believed at low levels when acting in concert with other chemicals.

“Some chemicals may act in an additive fashion,” Linda Birnbaum said this week at a conference held at the Columbia Center for Children’s Environmental Health at Columbia University. “When we look one compound at a time, we may miss the boat.”

Birnbaum, director of both the National Institute for Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS) and the National Toxicology Program in Washington, D.C., noted that some chemicals, such as those that mimic human hormones, may combine with other hormonelike chemicals at low doses to produce big effects.

Link to full report.

Thanks, Linda!