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What is it about the media that leads newspaper editors to ignore scientists and turn to amateurs to guide the public on health risks? At the Seattle PI, the reason seems to be that, hey, it’s Mother’s Day – let’s hear from a mom on something.

The guest columnist turns out to be Allison Schrier, who finds protecting her two sons from chemicals “diffcult to manage.” The reason is, in Schrier’s opinion, that

“Major loopholes in federal law prevent the U.S. Food and Drug Administration or any other government agency from approving the safety of cosmetics and personal-care products, such as bubble bath, before they are brought to market. The result is that many products on store shelves contain chemicals linked to a variety of health effects, including those that can cause cancer, birth defects and reproductive harm.”

But may we suggest that the real reason is that Schrier hasn’t actually read the science on the chemicals in question?

For instance, she believes that phthalates are “reproductive toxins” and that bisphenol-A (BPA) is linked to breast cancer. Maybe in rodents at huge doses; but so far there is no evidence that they do the same to humans at the kind of levels we are exposed to.

Perhaps Schrier omitted to read the European Union Food Safety Authority’s recent review of BPA, which dismissed the science that activist groups have cited for the chemical’s supposed threat to human health?

And perhaps she also failed to look at the National Toxicology Program’s (NTP) ongoing risk assessments for phthalates, which found that there was “minimal concern” for adverse effects on reproductive systems, as human exposures were 1,000 to 10,000 times lower than rodent exposures.

Moreover the NTP’s Center for the Evaluation of Risks to Human Reproduction rejected the findings of a widely publicized study claiming an association between phthalate exposure in the womb and the anogenital index in baby boys (this was mistranslated by the media as “birth defects” – see STATS’ Toy Tantrums - The Debate Over the Safety of Phthalates).

Perhaps Schrier was alarmed by her participation in a biomonitoring study that, according to her byline, found she had “elevated levels of toxic chemicals in her body.” Biomonitoring is increasingly being used by environmental activists to raise the alarm on what they consider to be health risks.

However, the National Research Council’s Committee on Human Biomonitoring for Environmental Toxicants has warned that unless these studies are statistically rigorous, representative and eliminate confounding factors, they are largely meaningless. For most of the chemicals found, the risks are also un-interpretable based on the current state of the science.

The biomonitoring study which Schrier participated in – Pollution in People – tested just ten people.

The fact is that if Schrier really wants to protect her two sons, she should focus on whether they eat a balanced diet, exercise, take up smoking, binge drink, drive while under the influence of alcohol or drugs, or have unprotected sex. All of these factors have real, demonstrable effects on health, and account for much of the morbidity and mortality in the United States.

Meanwhile, the Seattle Post Intelligencer has a public responsibility to ensure that its guest columnists know what they are actually talking about. It's one thing to give one's opinion on what the facts mean, it's another to give one's opinion on what are the facts.

For more information:
See STATS Manufacturing Consensus on how a false consensus on the risks on bisphenol-A has been created by slanted news coverage.

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