The River Network and the Alliance for a Clean and Healthy Vermont recently released their Body Burden Study: A Study of Toxic Chemicals in Residents of the Green Mountain State. Six volunteers were tested for several known environmental toxins and the results pretty clearly stated that people are way overexposed to many toxins.
According to the report:
- They found at least three of the four categories of toxic chemicals in every person tested
- They detected a minimum of 35 of the chemicals tested.
- Participants had an average of 40 of the chemicals tested in their bodies.
- They found twenty kinds of flame retardants (PBDE’s) in all subjects.
- They detected Bisphenol A, the chemical used in plastic bottles, in the urine of all of the subjects.
- 50% of the participants had Bisphenol A levels above the median level reported by the CDC.
- They found mercury present in the hair of 4 of the 6 participants.
- Seven types of organochlorine pesticides were found in the blood of all participants, including DDT— banned in 1972—in the bodies of 5 of the 6 participants.
- They found forms of the banned pesticide chlordane in the blood of all participants.
Katy Farber wrote an interesting recap of her personal experience with the study (she was one of the participants tested) over at Enviroblog.
If you were tested, what do you think they'd find in your body?
