Low Level Death
Bill Long 9/9/08
A Changing View of Danger
The rhetoric of living, getting sick and dying is changing in America. From the early the 1970s until a few years ago, images of toxicity and poison have dominated our language of illness. Surely it was because of Earth Day in 1970, the passage of the various environmental statutes and finally, the horrendous disaster in Prince William Sound Alaska nearly 20 years ago, when the Exxon Valdez dumped 10.8 million gallons of Prudhoe Bay crude oil into the sea that so filled our imaginations that we began to use the language of toxicity to describe life. People not only lived in "toxic" communities, but they had a "toxic" series of relationships, a "toxic work place" or even a "toxic church." Indeed, so powerful were images of toxicity that they began to crowd out the fair-haired child of psychological language to describe our problems. Oh, we still could have "stress" or experience "dysfunction" in various contexts, but this language began to appear downright wimpy next to the minatory language of toxicity.
Times Change
Even though we continue to identify and clean up contaminated "Superfund" cites, in the past decade we have become aware of another danger in the environmental realm that has caused us to speak differently. We are not so much concerned about complete, immediate and utter obliteration (remember "MAD"--mutually assured destruction?) or massive contamination as we were a generation ago. Rather, we have begun to be concerned with low level contamination and the ways that seeping, creeping, serpiginous, pervasive infiltration of sub-toxic levels of dangerous chemicals not only pollutes our waterways and damages our land but also can stealthily kill us. In short, we have become concerned about the hidden dangers of long-term exposure to low intensity contamination.
Two quick examples will show our our concerns have changed. Almost everyone with a cell phone now knows that some prominent neurosurgeons will never again place one of these phones next to his/her ear--for fear that the low level of radiation exposure will some day turn cancerous. Or, from the education arena, evidence is gathering that those cute little "white boards" which replaced the supposely dirty "blackboards" of an earlier generation, and were supposed to bring a "clean" classroom, actually may be sending off harmful chemicals, both through the surface of the board and the markers used on the board. We aren't concerned that a teacher will keel over while lecturing and utter these last words, "The magic marker did it..." We are concerned, however, that low levels of chemicals are being released even in our "clean environments" and these chemicals may eventually kill us.
Three Recent Studies
With the changing of metaphors comes a new focus in scientific study. Increasingly we are concerned with trying to identify and quantify the nature of the low level toxic threats all around us. These studies can sometimes conclude the obvious, but the combined weight of this kind of thinking means that we are changing the way we speak and look at dangers in our society. Three studies I have recently come across emphasize this "low level" danger:
1. A study that might send chills into the heart of any parent who lives near smokestacks was a 2005 article entited "Environmental mercury release, special edication rates and autism disorder: an ecological study of Texas." In it, Dr. Raymond Palmer, et al. were interested in correlating the levels of environmentally-released mercury, released mainly through fossil fuel (usually coal) combustion by electrical utilities and from municipal and medical waste incineration, with rates of special education and autism in nearby school districts. Perhaps not surprisingly, but frighteningly nevertheless, they found:
"On average, for each 1000 lb of environmentally released mercury, there was a 43% increase in the rate of special education services and a 61% increas in the rate of autism."
As with almost all studies they conclude that there needs to be further research to calibrate these findings more precisely. The numbers are not surprising in general but when you see them in "black and white," you are taken aback. Of course there has to be some effect to having all that coal smoke belch into the atmosphere, we know. But having someone actually measure it makes us wonder what else may be affecting little Johnny or Bethy (hm..maybe little Aaron and Reagan, in this generation..)
2. Then there is this article from the August 23, 2007 online Science Daily, which gives some reasons for the dramatic increase in cases of childhood asthma. Inhalers, the omni-present sign of that condition, were almost non-existent when I was growing up in the 1950s/1960s. But I noted in the late 1990s/2000s, when my kids were in high school, that their fellow athletes would sometimes run off the field and head straight for their inhaler. What had happened? Were these kids just not "tough" like we were forty years ago? But, of course that isn't what is happening. As the article argues (it is a summary of the report that appeared in a 2007 edition of the journal Thorax),
"Researchers found that children who carried variations in two genes and lived within 75 meters of a major road were up to nine times more likely to develop asthma than children who lived further away."
Another study in 2007 concluded that living near a highway affected lung development in children. The authors concluded:
"children who lived within 500 meters of a freeway, or approximately a third of a mile, since age 10 had substantial deficits in lung function by the age of 18 years, compared to children living at least 1500 meters, or approximately one mile, away."
There is a little of the "Duh!" factor here, but by measuring this "duh" factor, we have quantifiable expressions of a problem that needs some attention. Again the message is the same: continual bombardment from non-toxic levels of chemicals can mess up a person's life--big time.
3. Finally, an online article just released yesterday argued that exposure to air pollution can hinder heart function. Continuous exposure to microscopic air pollution particles impair the heart's signalling pathways, which may lead to inadequate blood flow to the heart and inflammation of the heart muscle.
Conclusion
Many more studies could be cited that argue similar points. If you didn't catch it, it is that long-term exposure to low (non-toxic) levels of lots of chemicals (which ones? for how long?) can not only diminish your quality of life, but can endanger your health and, perhaps, even kill you. That is the image for our time. Learn to live with it.
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