line

GREENPEACE REPORT POINTS TO VINYL PLASTICS AS MAJOR SOURCE OF HORMONE-DISRUPTING POLLUTANTS

Greenpeace press release April 25, 1996.

EU'S CLEAN BILL OF HEALTH FOR BABY MILK IS A SHAM, SAYS GREENPEACE

Greenpeace press release June 7, 1996.

line

An answer of the Chlorophiles

Origin: Press release of Greenpeace USA on April 25, 1996, again asking for a ban on PVC, at the release of their new 'scientific' report, 'Taking Back Our Stolen Future'. The original report could be found at the Greenpeace UK Science pages.
The second press release could be found at their archives. This is a reaction on the fact that very small amounts of phthalates were found in baby food in the UK.

PVC AND DIOXINS

We repeatedly have told Greenpeace that PVC is only a very small contributor to the dioxin emissions in any country, be it during production, use, recycling or incineration. For more details, see our sources of dioxins page. The amount of dioxins found in the environment, is mainly from bad incineration, where the amount of chlorine in the input plays NO role in the amount of dioxins emitted. See our chlorine input and dioxin emissions page.

PVC, PHTHALATES AND HORMONAL CHANGES

We here give you the summary of the reaction of the UK Department of Health on the press coverage on phthalates found in baby food. The complete text could be found at the Greenpeace Science pages.

Estimates of average dietary intakes of total phthalates range from. 0.1 to 0.8 mg/person/day and high level (97.5th percentile) dietary intakes of total phthalates range from 0.4 to 1.6 mg/person/day. These are considerably below the Tolerable Daily Intakes set for some of these chemicals. The Department of Health has advised that there are unlikely to be any health risks to consumers from these dietary intakes of individual phthalates. This advice takes account of all available information on the possible effects of phthalates, including recent studies concerning oestrogenic activity.

Greenpeace - again - makes a mix of truth and nonsense to mislead the reader, to point to their real target: the ban of PVC.
The phthalates of concern found in babyfood (dibutylphtalate DBP and benzylbutylphtalate BBP) are nearly not used in PVC, they are used in printing inks and in glues, used for stickers on packages. DBP is also a natural product, found in sellery... Greenpeace instead points only to PVC, where DEHP (diethylhexylphtalate) is the main plasticiser. But even with DBP and BBP, some hormonal properties have been seen when lower doses are directly injected in the blood. This can NOT be compared to ingestion. Even then, the amounts found in babyfood are far lower than those which gave problems in rats.

The toxicity of the plastifier DEHP is about ten times less than of alcohol (see chlorine and hormonal changes. It has some toxic, carcinogenic properties at a very high dose on rats, equivalent to several hundreds grams a day for an adult human. No hormonal properties were seen for DEHP.

No such properties are seen on the low doses (about 0.1 grams a year) a human ingests by using soft PVC... Primates (apes and humans) have a complete different metabolism. PVC, including DEHP, is the only thoroughly tested plastic which may be used for bloodbags and other medical supplies, because no influence whatsoever was found and PVC conserves blood much longer than any other material, including glass.

line

All this evidence can be found (or will be found when ready) on the Chlorophiles pages and in the scientific reports, where the Chlorophiles pages are based on.

line

You are at level one of the Chlorophiles answer pages.

Created: June 8, 1996.
Last update: February 22, 2002.

Welcome page

To the Home Page of the Chlorophiles.

PVC and the Düsseldorf Airport fire

Phthalate esters in medical devices

Before you react on this reaction on Greenpeace, please read the page on Greenpeace and chlorine, maybe you will understand why.

For all other comment on the Chlorophiles pages:

chlorophiles@pandora.be