Word: pvc
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...plastic products raising the loudest alarms are made of a material known as polyvinyl chloride, or PVC. To make PVC pliable, manufacturers treat it with softeners known as phthalates (pronounced thalates)--loosely bound chemicals that easily leach out of the plastic. In the U.S. millions of IV bags made of PVC are used annually. If the liquids the bags contain pick up stray phthalates, they can be transfused straight into the veins of patients. Animal studies suggest that phthalates can damage the liver, heart, kidneys and testicles, and may cause cancer. "We don't know the toxicity mechanism," says Charlotte...
Preliminary as these findings are, groups like Brody's have seen enough. Some hospitals in Europe have switched to PVC-free IV bags and tubes, and U.S. activists are calling for the same step here. PVC manufacturers object, insisting that their products are safe and arguing that animals in plastic studies are given far higher levels of PVC than a human would ever absorb. In at least one experiment, however, rats were deliberately given low PVC doses and still showed ill effects. Abbott Laboratories, a PVC maker, admits there is too little data to draw hard conclusions; with some...
Household products are less of a concern. Consumers can look for wraps made of polyethylene instead of PVC. To play it even safer, food should never be microwaved in any plastic wrap since this speeds adipate migration. Plastic bowls marked microwavable are probably safer than those that aren't; glass or china bowls are even better. Beyond that, there's little any consumer can do. "Industry develops these products for their physical characteristics," says Peter Orris, a professor of internal medicine at Cook County Hospital in Chicago, "but it doesn't always test them for human toxicity...
Currently, Jem operates with a staff of 60 employees and approximately 50,000 feet of warehouse space in the States in addition to a small London office. The company now has two labels of its own (PVC and Visa) and handles those Stiff, Radar and Virgin artists not picked up by a major label...
BIRTH DEFECTS. The Ohio department of health has found that women in three communities with PVC plants-Painesville, Ashtabula and Avon Lake-bore more children with birth defects and other malformations than women in other communities in the state; laboratory research has shown that vinyl chloride can cause chromosomal damage in humans. Anesthetic gases also appear to be teratogenic, or capable of causing birth defects. Russian, Danish and U.S. studies all show a high miscarriage rate among women anesthesiologists and operating-room nurses...