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Children's Health ALERT

Links to More Information on Children's Health and Incineration

• Children's Health and Incineration by Lois Kleffman, KEF
• Lisa Puchner--Press Statement

Children's Health Alert!
Incineration of chemical weapons puts children at greater risk for
chronic health problems. Alternative technologies, safer than incineration,
are available and can protect children's health.

U.S. children are at risk of chronic illnesses.

Do you think U.S. children are safe from long-term illnesses? Consider these facts from the Children's Health Environmental Coalition:

• The incidence of childhood cancer has risen 10.8% in the past decade, and 25% since 1970. (National Cancer Institute, 1993)
• Childhood asthma has nearly doubled in the past twenty years. (American Lung Association and CDC)
• Among children ages 1-14, cancer causes more deaths in the U.S. than any other disease. (American Cancer Society, 1996)
• There has been an increase in children's learning disabilities and attention deficit and other behavioral disorders. ("Raising Children Toxic Free," 1996)
• Ten million children under the age of 12 live within four miles of a toxic waste dump. (EPA, 1996)

Exposure to toxic compounds like heavy metals, PCBs and dioxins can cause cancer, birth defects, reproductive problems, immune system disorders and much more. Dioxins alone have been ranked as the most harmful chemicals ever known to humankind. Humans are exposed to such compounds primarily through the food we eat. For example, dioxins coming out of incinerator smokestacks are carried to soil, water and vegetation. Cows grazing in nearby fields eat contaminated grains. Humans eating beef, or drinking milk from dioxin-contaminated cows are also exposed to dioxins, at higher concentrations. Dioxins accumulate in the fatty cells of our bodies so that every time humans eat dioxin-contaminated food, the amount of dioxin in our bodies increases.

Children's biology and behavior make them more vulnerable than adults to health effects from toxic chemicals. Children breathe more air, eat more food and drink more water per pound of body weight than adults. Since their immune systems are less developed, children exposed to toxics are at a higher risk of immune system disorders. At the top of the food chain is a human mother's breast milk -- the first and most important food for an infant. The EPA calculates that an infant who breast feeds for a year will receive 4-12% of her lifetime exposure to dioxins! Babies are exposed to dioxins and other poisons even before they are born because persistent toxics in a mother's body can cross the womb's protective placental barrier.

Incinerators of all kinds release heavy metals, PCBs, dioxins and other persistent organic pollutants. The Army's chemical weapons incinerators, because of their unique "waste stream," are also capable of releasing live chemical agent out the smokestacks. Numerous documented chemical agent releases have occurred from chemical weapons incinerators in the Pacific on Kalama Island, and in Tooele, Utah.

The Army's method of measuring health effects from its incinerators has not been protective of public health, for adults or children. For example:

• the health risk assessment for the Utah incinerator ignored potential health effects to breastfeeding infants;
• "safe" chemical agent exposure standards were recently found by the National Research Council to be based on inaccurate data;
• chemical agent exposure standards were created for soldiers (i.e. healthy males), not the elderly, women or children;there are no planned studies to determine the long-term health effects of low-level exposure to chemical agents;
• most of the chemicals being released from the incinerator smokestacks are unidentified, with unknown health effects.

After years of grassroots pressure to develop safer alternatives to incineration, Congress mandated in 1996 the creation of a program which would seek out, develop and demonstrate alternatives to incineration for chemical weapons disposal. This program is called the Assembled Chemical Weapons Assessment (ACWA). Unlike incineration, each of the current ACWA candidates is capable of containing all hazardous by-products, so they can be proven safe before they are released into the environment. Chemical weapons stockpiles in Indiana and Maryland are already proceeding with non-incineration disposal technologies. Maryland's stockpile will be treated with a combination neutralization/ biodegradation method, and neutralization and Supercritical Water Oxidation will be used in Indiana.

• Write or call your local, state and federal elected officials. Tell them your children's health is important, and you want safe chemical weapons disposal technologies
• Share the information with school committees, church school classes, child care providers, and children's health care providers. Ask them to help support the movement toward safe disposal.
• Contact local individuals or organizations working for safe disposal of chemical weapons, and volunteer your time to help spread the word about safe alternative technologies!