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to Winter Spring News | WINTER/SPRING
2007
Endocrine Disruptors — What’s It All About?
Why should we be reading about, interested in, and
frankly focused on endocrine disruptors? Because they
affect our health and the health of our children. The endocrine
system controls the functions of our body. It coordinates
and regulates growth, behavior, and reproduction.
In order to have our body function properly, we depend
on a complex integrated and timed series of events, one of
which the delivery of hormones to organs, is vital. When
the delivery or timing is disrupted, the results can be devastating
and permanent. People must think of the body as
a whole system that is interconnected within itself.
What are endocrine disruptors? They are man-made, synthetic
chemicals and natural phytoestrogen that act on the
endocrine system and block or interfere in some way with
the natural “instructions” or messages of hormones to cells.
When these messages are disrupted, it can affect physical,
behavioral, or brain development, temperature regulation,
reproduction, etc.
The most damaging endocrine disruptors are man-made
synthetic chemicals to which we are routinely exposed
every day. Products we have been led to believe were
tested for safety to our health, include health and beauty
aides, such as cosmetics, sunscreens, perfumes, soaps and
pesticides.
More and more public health advocates are providing product
information which we need to know as consumers, before
we make a purchase. Sharing information on particular products
or categories of products that interrupt the body’s ability
to grow and function normally is a powerful tool.
We need to push for policy reforms. Better labeling laws
(public’s right to know); tighter controls on polluters, incentives
for the private sector to produce safe and sustainable
products are only a few necessary reforms.
We need to acknowledge the complexities of human
growth and development, and encourage increased funding
for scientific research and environmental health studies.
Please take the opportunity to visit the following website
www.endocrinedisruption.org
Resource websites:
Prevention Is The Cure, Inc. -
www.preventionisthecure.org (Toxic Triggers)
Neighborhood Network -
http://neighborhood-network.org (Organic Landscapers List)
Environmental Working Group -
www.ewg.org (Body Burden)
Paul Goettlich -
www.mindfully.org/Pesticide/EDs-PWG-16jun01.htm (What are endocrine disruptors?)
Sandra Steingraber, Ph.D. -
www.steingraber.com (Living Downstream)
Dr. Theo Colburn -
www.ourstolenfuture.org (Our Stolen Future)
Grassroots Environmental Education -
www.grassrootsinfo.org
Huntington Breast Cancer Action Coalition -
www.hbcac.org
Great Neck Breast Cancer Coalition -
www.greatneckbcc.org
Citizen’s Campaign for the Environment –
www.citizenscampaign.org
Citizen’s Environmental Coalition –
www.cectoxic.org
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