Vitamin supplements have been both heralded and hyped over the years, only to ultimately fall from grace once research proves them to be little more than placebos in our quest for longer life or better health. But at least one substance may have true merit -- vitamin D.
Long considered just a supplement consumed with calcium for bone health, this humble vitamin may have untapped potential in fighting or preventing disease, suggests an explosion of new research. Not only has it shown promise in reducing the risk of, among other things, diabetes, pancreatic cancer, breast cancer and cardiovascular disease, but it also seems to improve infertility, weight control and memory.
Two advocacy groups have sprung up in the United States to promote the substance. Food industry executives are exploring ways to fortify more products. And PubMed, an international database of medical literature, shows that 2,274 studies referencing the vitamin have been published -- just this year.
"Vitamin D is one hot topic," says Connie Weaver, a professor of foods and nutrition at Purdue University in Indiana.
Next week, hope and hype may collide. An Institute of Medicine committee will convene in Washington to discuss whether the recommended daily intake of vitamin D and calcium should be increased. There, researchers overwhelmed by the vitamin's potential will square off against skeptics who say much more study is needed before people are urged to take vitamin D supplements. Getting the newly suggested amounts would be difficult otherwise.
The last time guidelines were issued on the vitamin was in 1997, long before an onslaught of scientific information suggested people are getting too little. Currently, the recommended daily intake is 200 to 600 international units with an upper limit of 2,000 IU.
Some researchers are advocating at least 600 IU a day, with an upper limit of 10,000 IU. Giving impetus to this push are the facts that many people seem to be deficient and that the nutrient appears to play a role in many conditions.
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FOR THE RECORD:
In Saturday's Section A, an article about vitamin D incorrectly referred to the substance in the skin as melatonin. It's melanin.
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Other scientists say it's too soon to urge everyone to take supplements. An influential report released in June by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality found little conclusive evidence to support increasing the recommended amounts.
"I think there is a consensus that we might benefit from higher vitamin D levels," says James C. Fleet, a professor of foods and nutrition at Purdue University and a longtime researcher on the vitamin and prostate cancer. "But the committee is going to ask whether there is existing scientific evidence that is strong enough to make a change."
Vitamin D has long been known to be crucial to bone and muscle health by improving calcium absorption in the intestines and the way calcium is regulated in bones.
More recent research shows that receptors for it are found in almost every organ and tissue system in the body, suggesting that deficiencies may affect many types of cell functions.
When exposed to sunlight, the skin makes the vitamin, but not everyone spends the five minutes a day or so outside that is necessary for synthesis -- and many more people today wear sunscreen to prevent skin cancer.
"A large portion of people fall into the at-risk category, and they would benefit from being brought out of that category," Fleet says. "The question is: Is the current requirement enough to keep most people out of the at-risk category?"
A study of 13,000 Americans, published in March in the Archives of Internal Medicine, found that 50% to 75% have suboptimal levels by current standards. A level of 20 nanograms per milliliter of 25-hydroxyvitamin D -- the form most commonly measured in blood -- has traditionally been considered sufficient.
Most people 50 and older aren't meeting the current recommendations, Weaver says.
The vitamin is found in relatively few dietary sources -- some fortified foods, such as milk and some cereals, and naturally only in some fatty fish, such as salmon. Three cups of fortified milk provide only 300 IU.
"The largest source is sunshine, but not everyone can depend on that," Weaver says. "The elderly, dark-skinned people, higher-latitude dwellers all have trouble getting enough from sun." In darker-skinned people, melatonin in the skin blocks absorption of the ultraviolet rays needed to make the vitamin; older people don't appear to synthesize it from the sun as well as younger people.
Some scientists argue that levels of 40 to 60 ng/mL would be far better for disease prevention. That would require daily intake much higher than the current 200 to 600 IU.
The July issue of the Annals of Epidemiology(09)X0007-4, devoted to vitamin D research, links the vitamin to lower risks of cancers of the breast, colon, ovaries and prostate. Animal and lab studies also demonstrate its importance in many of the cellular mechanisms that control cancer, such as cell growth, cell death, inflammation and DNA repair.
Five studies on colorectal cancer and breast cancer, taken together, showed that people with levels higher than 34 to 52 ng/mL had a 50% reduced cancer risk, says Cindy D. Davis, a researcher at the National Cancer Institute's Nutritional Science Research Group.
Such studies are not proof that the vitamin influences disease development, points out Dr. Karen E. Hansen, an assistant professor at the University of Wisconsin who studies bone health. "People with higher vitamin D may just be healthier for other reasons," she says.
But evidence linking higher blood levels to diabetes and cardiovascular disease is also mounting. A study in December in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology found that deficiency may increase the risk of cardiovascular disease. Other studies have tied lower levels to an increased risk of hypertension, diabetes, stroke and congestive heart failure.
Even for bone health, some studies suggest that about 700 to 800 IU a day are needed to prevent fractures in people over 50, Hansen says. She recommends 800 IU a day, with calcium, to her patients.
Meanwhile, studies show that the previous estimation of a toxic dose -- 2,000 IU a day -- is most likely too conservative. Toxic doses can lead to a dangerous level of calcium in the blood, high blood pressure and even kidney failure.
"It's likely they will increase their recommendation for all ages," Hanson said of the Institute of Medicine committee, which will release its report next year.
But not everyone is convinced the advice should be changed. In a report ordered by the federal government to assist the committee, researchers concluded there is a lack of strong evidence to support altering recommendations. The committee is not expected to change calcium recommendations.
"We did not find data that indicate a specific level of vitamin D intake is associated with adverse outcomes or beneficial health outcomes," said Dr. Thomas A. Trikalinos, co-director of the Tufts Evidence-based Practice Center, which prepared the report.
He said the report was meant to inform the committee and did not make recommendations.
"The report sees the totality of the evidence and tries to put everything into perspective," Trikalinos says.
Already, however, the American Society of Clinical Oncology has recommended a higher intake for breast cancer patients who are deficient.
In October, the American Academy of Pediatrics said children should get 400 IU a day, double the current recommendation.
In November, 18 University of California researchers issued a statement saying 2,000 IU is appropriate for most people.
"I think some of the more vocal advocates are pushing the medical community to move forward" before adequate research is completed, Fleet says.
Dozens of more scientifically rigorous studies are in progress that could help resolve the questions about how much people should consume.
"I think they held this [Institute of Medicine] meeting two to four years too early," Fleet says. "They are working without the big wave of vitamin D research that was initiated after people started pushing for it."
Sunday, August 2, 2009
Groups to challenge legality of closing 100 California state parks
Minority and low-income communities would suffer first and worst from a plan to cut the state budget by closing as many as 100 California state parks and beaches, according to a group of nonprofit health organizations and concerned citizens expected to file an administrative complaint with the U.S. Justice Department on Monday.
State officials hope to finalize a list of park closures by Labor Day. But the group led by the City Project, Concerned Citizens of South Los Angeles, Coastwalk California, the California Pan-Ethnic Health Network and the California Center for Public Health Advocacy contends that closing a third of the state's parks would violate laws prohibiting discriminatory impacts on recipients of federal and state funds.
“This issue must be resolved as soon as possible,” said Zoe Rawson, staff attorney for the City Project. “Access to open space is critical to the well-being and health of people who reside in densely populated urban environments such as Los Angeles."
“The values at stake are great," she said, "and include social cohesion, and the psychological and physical health of thousands of people who can’t afford to go to a gym."
The complaint will be submitted against California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, the California state legislature and the California Resources Agency, the group said.
"With the complaint we are seeking ultimately to prevent or mitigate state park closures," she said. "If we can't resolve this issue through the complaint process, the next step we will be considering is a lawsuit."
State officials hope to finalize a list of park closures by Labor Day. But the group led by the City Project, Concerned Citizens of South Los Angeles, Coastwalk California, the California Pan-Ethnic Health Network and the California Center for Public Health Advocacy contends that closing a third of the state's parks would violate laws prohibiting discriminatory impacts on recipients of federal and state funds.
“This issue must be resolved as soon as possible,” said Zoe Rawson, staff attorney for the City Project. “Access to open space is critical to the well-being and health of people who reside in densely populated urban environments such as Los Angeles."
“The values at stake are great," she said, "and include social cohesion, and the psychological and physical health of thousands of people who can’t afford to go to a gym."
The complaint will be submitted against California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, the California state legislature and the California Resources Agency, the group said.
"With the complaint we are seeking ultimately to prevent or mitigate state park closures," she said. "If we can't resolve this issue through the complaint process, the next step we will be considering is a lawsuit."
Tie your tubes and save the planet?
Environmentalists tend to avoid the topic of population control. Too touchy. But the politically incorrect issue is becoming unavoidable as the global population lurches toward a predicted 9 billion people by mid-century. Will there be enough food? Enough water? Will planet-heating carbon dioxide gas become ever more uncontrollable?
Now comes a study by statisticians at Oregon State University focusing on the elephant in the room. If you are serious about your carbon footprint, think: birth control.
The greenhouse gas impact of an extra child is almost 20 times more significant than the amount any American would save by such practices as driving a fuel-efficient car, recycling or using energy-efficient light bulbs and appliances, according to Paul Murtaugh, an OSU professor of statistics. Under current U.S. consumption patterns, each child ultimately adds about 9,441 metric tons of CO2 to the carbon legacy of an average parent--about 5.7 times a person's lifetime emissions, he calculates.
"Many people are unaware of the power of exponential population growth," Murtaugh said. "Future growth amplifies the consequences of people's reproductive choices, the same way that compound interest amplifies a bank balance."
Given how much less the average developing nation consumes per capita, the impact of a child born in the U.S., along with all his or her descendants, is more than 160 times that of a Bangladeshi child, the OSU research found. And the long-term impact of a Chinese child is less than one fifth the impact of a U.S.-born child. But as China, India and other developing nations hurtle toward prosperity, that is likely to change
Now comes a study by statisticians at Oregon State University focusing on the elephant in the room. If you are serious about your carbon footprint, think: birth control.
The greenhouse gas impact of an extra child is almost 20 times more significant than the amount any American would save by such practices as driving a fuel-efficient car, recycling or using energy-efficient light bulbs and appliances, according to Paul Murtaugh, an OSU professor of statistics. Under current U.S. consumption patterns, each child ultimately adds about 9,441 metric tons of CO2 to the carbon legacy of an average parent--about 5.7 times a person's lifetime emissions, he calculates.
"Many people are unaware of the power of exponential population growth," Murtaugh said. "Future growth amplifies the consequences of people's reproductive choices, the same way that compound interest amplifies a bank balance."
Given how much less the average developing nation consumes per capita, the impact of a child born in the U.S., along with all his or her descendants, is more than 160 times that of a Bangladeshi child, the OSU research found. And the long-term impact of a Chinese child is less than one fifth the impact of a U.S.-born child. But as China, India and other developing nations hurtle toward prosperity, that is likely to change
Causes of cancer clusters are hard to find
It has taken health investigators two years of research to designate Clyde, Ohio, a cancer cluster.
Their inquiry started soon after Donna and Dave Hisey's 13-year-old daughter was diagnosed with acute myelogenous leukemia.
While the Hiseys awaited the study results, disaster struck again. Their middle child, Tanner, developed lumps on his neck, and in August, he was diagnosed with a totally different form of leukemia, acute lymphoblastic T-cell leukemia. The cluster confirmation came in May, as Tanner underwent chemotherapy.
Now, says Donna Hisey, she checks her youngest child, Siera, every day for signs of illness. The sense of fear is ever-present. The need to know what caused the cancer is overwhelming. It has taken over their lives.
"Any time anybody gets sick, people freak out. Is it minor?" said Hisey, a line worker at the nearby Whirlpool plant. "We just want to know what caused this so nobody else gets sick."
It is not yet known whether The Acreage is a cancer cluster. The state is studying the possibility.
But as families anxiously await results of the state's study here, they're convinced the cluster exists and are deeply hungry to find out what is behind the illnesses in their community.
Could it have been something that leached into the groundwater from the nearby Pratt & Whitney plant decades ago? Something toxic or radioactive in the soil brought in to raise their houses above the marsh? Some solvent illegally dumped and buried? Or the pesticides used in the nearby orange groves and sugar cane fields?
A look at cancer cluster investigations elsewhere in the United States suggests that definitive answers will be difficult - but not impossible - to come by. In the process of searching though, communities like Clyde, Ohio, and The Acreage are learning truths about themselves and their surroundings that can be deeply unsettling.
According to one Acreage resident's unscientific tally, there have been at least eight cases of a brain tumor called glioblastoma multiforme between 2004 and 2009; five cases of a sometimes benign brain tumor called meningioma since 2003; and 17 other assorted brain and nervous system tumors since 1998 - all within the patch of 50,000 rural homes.
The exact case count is hard to say. State health officials are analyzing data from the national cancer registry over 12 years, data that's compiled whenever there is a cancer diagnosis. They will calculate the rate of the cancers they find in the local population, then compare it to national cancer rates. Results may take several weeks.
Meanwhile, state environmental officials are beginning to sample wells, while county leaders analyze soil at two schools.
"It's in the water. I know it's in the water. I really believe it," said Mack Purifoy, 58, who retired to his dream home in The Acreage four years ago with his wife and nephew. The home he paid $400,000 for has a Jacuzzi, an attractive new façade, and well water. And it's sitting empty. He refuses to live there. The former owner, he was told, died of cancer.
A year after moving in, his nephew developed lymphoma. A few months ago, doctors discovered a growth in his brain. They don't know yet if it's a cyst or a tumor, Purifoy said, only that it's growing. He's losing his sense of balance, and having trouble with his vision.
"I drank that water," he says, his voice tinged with anger.
Purifoy is dubious that investigators will ever really identify the source of the illnesses.
Once a cancer cluster is identified, under protocols from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, environmental investigators begin considering possible causes: sources of radiation, pesticides, fungicides, solvents, other chemicals.
Sometimes they find a cause. Often they don't. Frequently, politics trumps science.
In Cameron, Mo., last fall Missouri state officials told residents that the 70 brain cancer cases they identified in a four-county area over 12 years did not represent a cancer cluster.
Several months later, a lawsuit alleged that a leather tannery had been dumping highly dangerous chromium 6, the subject of the film Erin Brockovich, into waste sludge that was spread on farm fields in the region since the 1980s, The Kansas City Star reported. Subsequent sampling of farm fields did find low levels of the hazardous chromium 6, a proven carcinogen.
In eastern Pennsylvania, a single type of rare blood cancer, polycythemia vera, was found in dozens of people. A $5.5 million study is under way, and is considering seven waste coal power plants in the area and seven Superfund sites. At a congressional hearing in March, Democratic lawmakers blasted the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry, a sister agency to the CDC, for its shoddy review of the cancer cluster.
A report by the congressional committee's staff called the agency's handling of such cases a "clear and present danger" to public health.
"Time and time again ATSDR appears to avoid clearly and directly confronting the most obvious toxic culprits that harm the health of local communities throughout the nation," said the report by the Majority Staff of the Subcommittee on Investigations and Oversight of the Committee on Science and Technology. "Instead, they deny, delay, minimize, trivialize or ignore legitimate concerns and health considerations of local communities and well respected scientists and medical professionals."
In Clyde, Ohio, the investigation is being handled by the state, with input from federal officials, said Robert Indian, chief of comprehensive cancer control for the Ohio Department of Health.
They are broadening their research to study birth defects and miscarriages, he said. There have been 20 children with brain tumors in the area. The nature of the cancers, leukemias and brain tumors, suggests ionizing radiation, Indian said, although everything is being considered.
Not far from Clyde, Waste Management, Inc. operates a deep-well-injection site that has been collecting liquid pesticides and other hazardous chemical waste from throughout the nation. Called Vickery Environmental, the firm injects the waste 3,000 feet into a rock formation deep below farm fields, the company says.
Donna Hisey can't help but wonder if that's the source of the cancers. But she's been told the chemicals have not migrated. She wonders if it's true.
Her best advice to people in The Acreage is to stay involved, ask questions, and keep digging.
Purifoy is asking those questions, but he despairs that he will get an answer in his lifetime.
"We're all going to be dead by the time you all figure out what's going on," he told state environmental leaders at an emotionally charged community meeting on Thursday. "They are going to sweep it under the rug, and a lot of people are going to die, and that's just the way it is."
Hisey said she wants to trust the people who are investigating the Clyde, Ohio, cluster. She needs to be able to trust them. She prays about it often. Ultimately, she said, it's in God's hands.
"I don't know if they are ever going to find out what caused it or not. I would love for them to tell us an answer," Hisey said. "But if they put their best effort into it and they can't find it, then we will have to accept it. But at least we will know they tried."
Their inquiry started soon after Donna and Dave Hisey's 13-year-old daughter was diagnosed with acute myelogenous leukemia.
While the Hiseys awaited the study results, disaster struck again. Their middle child, Tanner, developed lumps on his neck, and in August, he was diagnosed with a totally different form of leukemia, acute lymphoblastic T-cell leukemia. The cluster confirmation came in May, as Tanner underwent chemotherapy.
Now, says Donna Hisey, she checks her youngest child, Siera, every day for signs of illness. The sense of fear is ever-present. The need to know what caused the cancer is overwhelming. It has taken over their lives.
"Any time anybody gets sick, people freak out. Is it minor?" said Hisey, a line worker at the nearby Whirlpool plant. "We just want to know what caused this so nobody else gets sick."
It is not yet known whether The Acreage is a cancer cluster. The state is studying the possibility.
But as families anxiously await results of the state's study here, they're convinced the cluster exists and are deeply hungry to find out what is behind the illnesses in their community.
Could it have been something that leached into the groundwater from the nearby Pratt & Whitney plant decades ago? Something toxic or radioactive in the soil brought in to raise their houses above the marsh? Some solvent illegally dumped and buried? Or the pesticides used in the nearby orange groves and sugar cane fields?
A look at cancer cluster investigations elsewhere in the United States suggests that definitive answers will be difficult - but not impossible - to come by. In the process of searching though, communities like Clyde, Ohio, and The Acreage are learning truths about themselves and their surroundings that can be deeply unsettling.
According to one Acreage resident's unscientific tally, there have been at least eight cases of a brain tumor called glioblastoma multiforme between 2004 and 2009; five cases of a sometimes benign brain tumor called meningioma since 2003; and 17 other assorted brain and nervous system tumors since 1998 - all within the patch of 50,000 rural homes.
The exact case count is hard to say. State health officials are analyzing data from the national cancer registry over 12 years, data that's compiled whenever there is a cancer diagnosis. They will calculate the rate of the cancers they find in the local population, then compare it to national cancer rates. Results may take several weeks.
Meanwhile, state environmental officials are beginning to sample wells, while county leaders analyze soil at two schools.
"It's in the water. I know it's in the water. I really believe it," said Mack Purifoy, 58, who retired to his dream home in The Acreage four years ago with his wife and nephew. The home he paid $400,000 for has a Jacuzzi, an attractive new façade, and well water. And it's sitting empty. He refuses to live there. The former owner, he was told, died of cancer.
A year after moving in, his nephew developed lymphoma. A few months ago, doctors discovered a growth in his brain. They don't know yet if it's a cyst or a tumor, Purifoy said, only that it's growing. He's losing his sense of balance, and having trouble with his vision.
"I drank that water," he says, his voice tinged with anger.
Purifoy is dubious that investigators will ever really identify the source of the illnesses.
Once a cancer cluster is identified, under protocols from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, environmental investigators begin considering possible causes: sources of radiation, pesticides, fungicides, solvents, other chemicals.
Sometimes they find a cause. Often they don't. Frequently, politics trumps science.
In Cameron, Mo., last fall Missouri state officials told residents that the 70 brain cancer cases they identified in a four-county area over 12 years did not represent a cancer cluster.
Several months later, a lawsuit alleged that a leather tannery had been dumping highly dangerous chromium 6, the subject of the film Erin Brockovich, into waste sludge that was spread on farm fields in the region since the 1980s, The Kansas City Star reported. Subsequent sampling of farm fields did find low levels of the hazardous chromium 6, a proven carcinogen.
In eastern Pennsylvania, a single type of rare blood cancer, polycythemia vera, was found in dozens of people. A $5.5 million study is under way, and is considering seven waste coal power plants in the area and seven Superfund sites. At a congressional hearing in March, Democratic lawmakers blasted the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry, a sister agency to the CDC, for its shoddy review of the cancer cluster.
A report by the congressional committee's staff called the agency's handling of such cases a "clear and present danger" to public health.
"Time and time again ATSDR appears to avoid clearly and directly confronting the most obvious toxic culprits that harm the health of local communities throughout the nation," said the report by the Majority Staff of the Subcommittee on Investigations and Oversight of the Committee on Science and Technology. "Instead, they deny, delay, minimize, trivialize or ignore legitimate concerns and health considerations of local communities and well respected scientists and medical professionals."
In Clyde, Ohio, the investigation is being handled by the state, with input from federal officials, said Robert Indian, chief of comprehensive cancer control for the Ohio Department of Health.
They are broadening their research to study birth defects and miscarriages, he said. There have been 20 children with brain tumors in the area. The nature of the cancers, leukemias and brain tumors, suggests ionizing radiation, Indian said, although everything is being considered.
Not far from Clyde, Waste Management, Inc. operates a deep-well-injection site that has been collecting liquid pesticides and other hazardous chemical waste from throughout the nation. Called Vickery Environmental, the firm injects the waste 3,000 feet into a rock formation deep below farm fields, the company says.
Donna Hisey can't help but wonder if that's the source of the cancers. But she's been told the chemicals have not migrated. She wonders if it's true.
Her best advice to people in The Acreage is to stay involved, ask questions, and keep digging.
Purifoy is asking those questions, but he despairs that he will get an answer in his lifetime.
"We're all going to be dead by the time you all figure out what's going on," he told state environmental leaders at an emotionally charged community meeting on Thursday. "They are going to sweep it under the rug, and a lot of people are going to die, and that's just the way it is."
Hisey said she wants to trust the people who are investigating the Clyde, Ohio, cluster. She needs to be able to trust them. She prays about it often. Ultimately, she said, it's in God's hands.
"I don't know if they are ever going to find out what caused it or not. I would love for them to tell us an answer," Hisey said. "But if they put their best effort into it and they can't find it, then we will have to accept it. But at least we will know they tried."
Scientists claim planet is heading for 'irreversible' climate change by 2040
CARBON dioxide levels are rising at a faster rate than the worst-case scenario envisaged by United Nations experts, with the planet heading for "catastrophic" and "irreversible" climate change by 2040, a new report claims.
The rise of greenhouse gases will trigger an unprecedented rate of global warming that will result in the loss of the ice-covered polar seas by 2020, much of our coral reefs by 2040 and see a 1.4-metre rise in the sea level by 2100.
The apocalyptic vision has been outlined in a paper by Andrew Brierley of St Andrews University, which is likely to influence the views of UN experts gathering in Copenhagen this December to establish a new protocol that will attempt to halt global warming.
Brierley and his co-author, Michael Kingsford of the James Cook University in Australia, examined the effect of carbon dioxide emissions on ocean habitats and marine organisms.
The scientists compared current carbon dioxide emissions with those forecast in 2007 by the Intergovernmental Panel of Climate Change (IPCC), the leading body for the assessment of global warming, which was established by the United Nations Environment Programme and the World Meteorological Organisation.
In 2007, the IPCC predicted a "worst-case scenario" that would see rapid industrialisation cause carbon dioxide in the atmosphere to increase by two parts per million each year. Parts per million (ppm) is a unit of concentration used to measure pollutants.
Brierley said atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration had increased from pre-industrial levels of 280 ppm to 385 ppm last year and was now rising at a rate of 2.5 ppm per year.
He described the outlook as "really quite nasty doom-and-gloom situation".
He added: "People have looked at how various economic situations, various developments in India and China might impact on carbon dioxide admissions and in 2007 they made a series of forecasts and if you take the worst-case scenario, carbon dioxide would be going up by two parts per million.
"This really august body, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, has said these are the worst-case scenarios for carbon dioxide increase and we are above that already. That's the thing that really frightens me."
In their paper, Brierley and Kingsford said that a carbon dioxide level of 450 ppm was the critical threshold beyond which catastrophic and irreversible change might occur.
Reaching that level would mean a global mean temperature rise of 2C above pre-industrial values. At present rates this threshold will be passed by 2040.
The authors added: "By 2040, some particularly sensitive marine ecosystems such as coral reefs and ice-covered polar seas could already have been lost and other unexpected consequences may arise."
Brierley said: "You can say no Arctic sea ice by 2020 – really, really soon. Certainly no summer sea ice in the Arctic by 2020."
The rise of greenhouse gases will trigger an unprecedented rate of global warming that will result in the loss of the ice-covered polar seas by 2020, much of our coral reefs by 2040 and see a 1.4-metre rise in the sea level by 2100.
The apocalyptic vision has been outlined in a paper by Andrew Brierley of St Andrews University, which is likely to influence the views of UN experts gathering in Copenhagen this December to establish a new protocol that will attempt to halt global warming.
Brierley and his co-author, Michael Kingsford of the James Cook University in Australia, examined the effect of carbon dioxide emissions on ocean habitats and marine organisms.
The scientists compared current carbon dioxide emissions with those forecast in 2007 by the Intergovernmental Panel of Climate Change (IPCC), the leading body for the assessment of global warming, which was established by the United Nations Environment Programme and the World Meteorological Organisation.
In 2007, the IPCC predicted a "worst-case scenario" that would see rapid industrialisation cause carbon dioxide in the atmosphere to increase by two parts per million each year. Parts per million (ppm) is a unit of concentration used to measure pollutants.
Brierley said atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration had increased from pre-industrial levels of 280 ppm to 385 ppm last year and was now rising at a rate of 2.5 ppm per year.
He described the outlook as "really quite nasty doom-and-gloom situation".
He added: "People have looked at how various economic situations, various developments in India and China might impact on carbon dioxide admissions and in 2007 they made a series of forecasts and if you take the worst-case scenario, carbon dioxide would be going up by two parts per million.
"This really august body, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, has said these are the worst-case scenarios for carbon dioxide increase and we are above that already. That's the thing that really frightens me."
In their paper, Brierley and Kingsford said that a carbon dioxide level of 450 ppm was the critical threshold beyond which catastrophic and irreversible change might occur.
Reaching that level would mean a global mean temperature rise of 2C above pre-industrial values. At present rates this threshold will be passed by 2040.
The authors added: "By 2040, some particularly sensitive marine ecosystems such as coral reefs and ice-covered polar seas could already have been lost and other unexpected consequences may arise."
Brierley said: "You can say no Arctic sea ice by 2020 – really, really soon. Certainly no summer sea ice in the Arctic by 2020."
African dream turns sour for orphan army
Nothing grows here in the shadows. There is only desolation in the tired soil at Paballo Marumo’s cracked and filthy feet. Her shoes, the thin plastic sandals worn by children across the townships of southern Africa, are gone. “Stolen!” she tells me in her language, Sesotho. At eight years old she sits hopelessly at the bottom of the rubbish dump hierarchy.
“Gap! Gap! Gap!” comes the sudden cry from the 12-year-old leader of a destitute army of rag pickers patrolling the vast waste dump before us.
Paballo is the quickest off her feet, darting towards a trailer overflowing with the discarded remnants of Lesotho’s garment industry. In the twilight I can make out her tiny frame as she runs between burning pillars of denim and cotton.
When they reach the trucks, the youngsters plough headlong into the refuse as it pours from heavy loaders. With stern concentration they fight for scraps, sifting through filthy piles of garment industry waste and sweeping it into sacks.
Thousands of Gap and Levi’s labels, buttons and studs for stonewashed jeans and huge quantities of heavily dyed cotton and denim pile down over their heads, burying them up to their waists.
Gap’s decision to develop the production of jeans and T-shirts in Lesotho had heralded an era of opportunity for one of the world’s poorest nations but a Sunday Times investigation has exposed an unforeseen consequence of that commitment - the dumping of tons of waste, much of it dangerous, at unsecured municipal sites.
Over the past 12 months the child rag pickers have been attracted to garment dumps by the denim and plastic thrown away by a Taiwanese supplier whose clients include both Gap and Levi Strauss.
Such is the ubiquity of denim and cotton waste in Lesotho that garment refuse has replaced charcoal as cooking fuel. Alarmingly, for the two San Francisco-based firms, the waste dumped by their suppliers Nien Hsing and Formosa Textile - both part of the Nien Hsing Fashion Group - includes harmful chemicals, needles and razors.
Each day it is painstakingly picked over by children and mothers with ailing infants strapped to their backs in a community ravaged by HIV. Not only that, but Nien Hsing is leaking chemical effluent into a river from which cooking water is drawn.
Lesotho, largely isolated from the rest of the world as a landlocked kingdom surrounded by South Africa, has relied heavily on its garment industry to stave off economic collapse. Fuelled by demand in the West for cheap clothing, more than 50 Taiwanese-owned factories have grown up, shipping £500m of jeans, T-shirts and other items to British and American stores last year alone. In recent years the firms have prompted a wave of migration to Maseru from drought-hit rural areas. Today they provide about 40,000 textile jobs, 80% of them held by women.
Bono, the U2 singer, visited three years ago to boost Gap’s Product Red range, from which profits are ploughed into a fund set up by the star to combat diseases such as Aids. But despite the good intentions, the expansion of the industry has seen a sharp increase in unsecured waste. In trawls through the Ha Tsotsane and Ha Tikoe dumps in Maseru, The Sunday Times uncovered sacks bearing the names of several potentially harmful chemicals. Among these were sodium hydroxide, better known as caustic soda, which is used in the manufacture of textiles and can cause chemical burns; and calcium hypochlorite, a cleaning and bleaching agent which has been linked to lung problems, particularly in children.
The sacks were identified as belonging to Nien Hsing/ Formosa Textile Ltd, a supplier of both Levi’s and Gap denim.
The children of the dumps begin their day by hauling such sacks to “work” and using them to collect scraps of cloth.
Waste spilling from trucks includes countless pumice stones for stonewashed jeans, Gap zips and paperwork showing Gap orders to suppliers.
At regular intervals the workers dumping the refuse set fire to it. The burning is particularly intense when heavily treated and dyed cotton and denim and polyurethane bags are set alight. Many children living and working around the Ha Tsotsane site are evidently suffering from respiratory problems and weeping eyes. Others speak of skin complaints.
Thabiso Liaho, 11, and her sister Motselisi, 8, described a miserable routine that revolves around waiting for the trucks to arrive.
“Our father is gone. He died of Aids,” Thabiso said. “So we collect denim and plastic bags from the factories to sell to our neighbours. They burn the denim instead of firewood but when we use it there is thick black smoke and a horrible smell.”
Thabiso knows the hazards posed by chemicals but presses on regardless. “We itch all day and some of the sacks used to dispose the chemicals have powder that makes our hands and arms burn,” she added.
“One girl rubbed it in her eyes last month and started screaming. Sometimes we get rashes.
“The hardest thing for me is the burning. We work two dumps and they are always on fire because there is so much waste. At night we cough up black mucus and my sister wheezes in her sleep.”
The Sunday Times also found children of five handling tools such as needles, rusted and broken knives, fabric cutters and razors, all of which came in consignments from Nien Hsing.
Environmental campaigners in Lesotho are dismayed. “The world needs to know that some of the poorest people are being exploited and their environment destroyed for western firms,” said Jon Bumasaka of the Lesotho Environmental Justice Advocacy Centre.
“These firms tell the world they are helping Africa but look around you - look at the children picking through dangerous waste in the dumps. Is this Bono’s African dream for Gap? Or is it a hell for the poor people who have to live next to these factories?”
The dumps are not the only environmental problem facing Gap and Levi’s in Maseru. On the other side of a road leading from the Ha Tsotsane tip to the city centre, the rag pickers’ mothers and aunts emerge from hovels to draw foul-smelling cooking water from the Caledon River.
The river, like many tributaries across the city, is stained deep blue by effluent from the garment industry. But after a long day at the dumps the children bathe in it regardless.
Some of the effluent comes from a factory operated by Nien Hsing and Formosa Textile. The waste spills into water used by people every day. The situation is particularly bad around the factories run by Nien Hsing and Chinese Garment Manufacturers, which supplied Gap until 18 months ago when the retailer severed its ties because of “serious concerns”.
The streams around Nien Hsing’s site are known among local children as “Blue River”.
“The water has been this colour for as long as I can remember,” said Thabiso, in the one-room shack she shares with four younger siblings near the Ha Tikoe dump. Strapped to her back was the youngest, Leno-hang. Their mother is in hospital with Aids, a national disaster in a country with an HIV infection rate of 30%.
Around the Nien Hsing factories, sick women say the nearest “untainted” water is more than a mile away, an impossible distance for them to walk.
According to an environmental charter drawn up by Gap Inc, which has 3,149 stores worldwide and turned over $14.5 billion last year, the factories that supply it must have an environmental management system and an environmental emergency plan, including procedures to notify the authorities of an accidental discharge.
Tseliso Tsoeu, an environmental expert from Lesotho’s council of nongovernmental organisations, said the law was being broken by the foreign garment industry: “Our laws state that no person shall discharge any poisonous, toxic or chemical substance into our waters. So why is the government allowing our people to bathe in bright blue water stained with effluent and dyes? “ The Chinese and Taiwanese have come here and have basically done what they wanted. They make enormous profits from employing black Africans on behalf of respectable western companies who advertise the highest standards of production but in reality don’t really know what is going on here.”
In a statement yesterday, Dan Henkle, Gap’s senior vice-president of global responsibility, said the company had ordered an investigation as soon as it learnt of the allegations. It had placed Nien Hsing “on immediate notice until our investigation is complete and all issues are adequately addressed”, he said.
Gap accounted for 5% of Nien Hsing production. While an inspection in May had found no significant violations, its waste water was now deemed “unacceptable”.
Henkle added: “We will continue to act swiftly, decisively and thoughtfully in doing everything possible to protect the workers at the factories that make our products and the communities in which they live and work.”
Levi Strauss, which also sent an investigator to Lesotho, said it was “disturbed to see the local water is polluted”. A spokesman added, “It is clear the municipal landfill has not been secured”, and promised to protect the community and children.
It is a world away from the aims set out by Bono, whose visit to Lesotho in 2006 is still being talked about in the factories. The workers and their families recall how the U2 singer, sporting dark glasses imprinted with the word Red, walked among them, stroking children’s foreheads and cracking jokes.
At that year’s Davos economic forum in the Swiss Alps, he had persuaded some of the world’s most sought-after brands, including Armani, Apple and American Express, to develop special products under the Red umbrella.
The concept was simple: half the profits from Red-branded goods launched by him would go to the Global Fund to Fight Aids, Tuberculosis and Malaria. He was visiting southern Africa to unveil the next high-profile recruit to the cause: Gap Inc.
For Bono and Gap it was the perfect match. In Lesotho, one of the Aids capitals of the world, Gap had the factories and the local know-how to realise the rock star’s vision - an African factory making branded clothing for Product Red to be marketed from Cape Town to Tokyo.
As Bono toured Precious Garments, the firm slated to make clothes for Gap’s Product Red Range, he declared: “This is the face of transformation.” It was hoped that Product Red, in common with other brands made in Maseru, would help to liberate local people from poverty.
However, while Precious Garments continues to supply Gap, Red T-shirts are no longer made there. A spokesman said he was deeply concerned about the allegations and no Red clothing would be produced in Lesotho until they were resolved.
Although the garment industry has proved an undoubted financial lifeline to many, not all workers are well treated.
At the Nien Hsing factory, where Taiwanese managers oversee production of Gap jeans, a 26-year-old woman named Meluwan said she worked up to 200 hours a month for 30p an hour to support a family of seven.
“I am insulted on a daily basis,” she said. “The Taiwanese call me koko, mentally retarded. They also call me kaffir. It makes me so sad. I don’t know why they call me this.”
Other women accused supervisors of insulting them when they were late with orders.
A spokesman for Nien Hsing said the company was acting on the pollution allegations. “The blue water escaping into local rivers is something we are urgently looking at,” he said. “We are looking into claims that children are picking through our refuse. The first we knew about the child rag pickers was when Gap contacted us this week.” He refused to comment on the claims of abuse.
At the Ha Tikoe dump, Thabiso Liaho offered shelter from a bitter whistling wind in a home propped up by cardboard. “We have to get by looking after each other,” she said.
“The smoke from the dump fills our shack. We all have weeping eyes and running noses and itch after we work there looking for things to sell. The garment trucks come day and night. When we fetch water in the morning it is blue.” As I looked out towards the tip, the call went up again and the children ran towards the trucks.
Gap vows
Gap will conduct a thorough environmental assessment in Lesotho in partnership with an independent environmental organisation.
It will work with factory management to improve training and knowledge around waste handling/disposal.
It will convene a supplier summit in Lesotho to update policies, procedures and expectations.
‘While we’re proud of the progress we’ve made to date, we also understand that conditions are not perfect and that there is still a great deal more to be done to improve both environmental and factory working conditions in developing regions like Lesotho’ - Glenn Murphy, chairman and chief executive, Gap Inc
“Gap! Gap! Gap!” comes the sudden cry from the 12-year-old leader of a destitute army of rag pickers patrolling the vast waste dump before us.
Paballo is the quickest off her feet, darting towards a trailer overflowing with the discarded remnants of Lesotho’s garment industry. In the twilight I can make out her tiny frame as she runs between burning pillars of denim and cotton.
When they reach the trucks, the youngsters plough headlong into the refuse as it pours from heavy loaders. With stern concentration they fight for scraps, sifting through filthy piles of garment industry waste and sweeping it into sacks.
Thousands of Gap and Levi’s labels, buttons and studs for stonewashed jeans and huge quantities of heavily dyed cotton and denim pile down over their heads, burying them up to their waists.
Gap’s decision to develop the production of jeans and T-shirts in Lesotho had heralded an era of opportunity for one of the world’s poorest nations but a Sunday Times investigation has exposed an unforeseen consequence of that commitment - the dumping of tons of waste, much of it dangerous, at unsecured municipal sites.
Over the past 12 months the child rag pickers have been attracted to garment dumps by the denim and plastic thrown away by a Taiwanese supplier whose clients include both Gap and Levi Strauss.
Such is the ubiquity of denim and cotton waste in Lesotho that garment refuse has replaced charcoal as cooking fuel. Alarmingly, for the two San Francisco-based firms, the waste dumped by their suppliers Nien Hsing and Formosa Textile - both part of the Nien Hsing Fashion Group - includes harmful chemicals, needles and razors.
Each day it is painstakingly picked over by children and mothers with ailing infants strapped to their backs in a community ravaged by HIV. Not only that, but Nien Hsing is leaking chemical effluent into a river from which cooking water is drawn.
Lesotho, largely isolated from the rest of the world as a landlocked kingdom surrounded by South Africa, has relied heavily on its garment industry to stave off economic collapse. Fuelled by demand in the West for cheap clothing, more than 50 Taiwanese-owned factories have grown up, shipping £500m of jeans, T-shirts and other items to British and American stores last year alone. In recent years the firms have prompted a wave of migration to Maseru from drought-hit rural areas. Today they provide about 40,000 textile jobs, 80% of them held by women.
Bono, the U2 singer, visited three years ago to boost Gap’s Product Red range, from which profits are ploughed into a fund set up by the star to combat diseases such as Aids. But despite the good intentions, the expansion of the industry has seen a sharp increase in unsecured waste. In trawls through the Ha Tsotsane and Ha Tikoe dumps in Maseru, The Sunday Times uncovered sacks bearing the names of several potentially harmful chemicals. Among these were sodium hydroxide, better known as caustic soda, which is used in the manufacture of textiles and can cause chemical burns; and calcium hypochlorite, a cleaning and bleaching agent which has been linked to lung problems, particularly in children.
The sacks were identified as belonging to Nien Hsing/ Formosa Textile Ltd, a supplier of both Levi’s and Gap denim.
The children of the dumps begin their day by hauling such sacks to “work” and using them to collect scraps of cloth.
Waste spilling from trucks includes countless pumice stones for stonewashed jeans, Gap zips and paperwork showing Gap orders to suppliers.
At regular intervals the workers dumping the refuse set fire to it. The burning is particularly intense when heavily treated and dyed cotton and denim and polyurethane bags are set alight. Many children living and working around the Ha Tsotsane site are evidently suffering from respiratory problems and weeping eyes. Others speak of skin complaints.
Thabiso Liaho, 11, and her sister Motselisi, 8, described a miserable routine that revolves around waiting for the trucks to arrive.
“Our father is gone. He died of Aids,” Thabiso said. “So we collect denim and plastic bags from the factories to sell to our neighbours. They burn the denim instead of firewood but when we use it there is thick black smoke and a horrible smell.”
Thabiso knows the hazards posed by chemicals but presses on regardless. “We itch all day and some of the sacks used to dispose the chemicals have powder that makes our hands and arms burn,” she added.
“One girl rubbed it in her eyes last month and started screaming. Sometimes we get rashes.
“The hardest thing for me is the burning. We work two dumps and they are always on fire because there is so much waste. At night we cough up black mucus and my sister wheezes in her sleep.”
The Sunday Times also found children of five handling tools such as needles, rusted and broken knives, fabric cutters and razors, all of which came in consignments from Nien Hsing.
Environmental campaigners in Lesotho are dismayed. “The world needs to know that some of the poorest people are being exploited and their environment destroyed for western firms,” said Jon Bumasaka of the Lesotho Environmental Justice Advocacy Centre.
“These firms tell the world they are helping Africa but look around you - look at the children picking through dangerous waste in the dumps. Is this Bono’s African dream for Gap? Or is it a hell for the poor people who have to live next to these factories?”
The dumps are not the only environmental problem facing Gap and Levi’s in Maseru. On the other side of a road leading from the Ha Tsotsane tip to the city centre, the rag pickers’ mothers and aunts emerge from hovels to draw foul-smelling cooking water from the Caledon River.
The river, like many tributaries across the city, is stained deep blue by effluent from the garment industry. But after a long day at the dumps the children bathe in it regardless.
Some of the effluent comes from a factory operated by Nien Hsing and Formosa Textile. The waste spills into water used by people every day. The situation is particularly bad around the factories run by Nien Hsing and Chinese Garment Manufacturers, which supplied Gap until 18 months ago when the retailer severed its ties because of “serious concerns”.
The streams around Nien Hsing’s site are known among local children as “Blue River”.
“The water has been this colour for as long as I can remember,” said Thabiso, in the one-room shack she shares with four younger siblings near the Ha Tikoe dump. Strapped to her back was the youngest, Leno-hang. Their mother is in hospital with Aids, a national disaster in a country with an HIV infection rate of 30%.
Around the Nien Hsing factories, sick women say the nearest “untainted” water is more than a mile away, an impossible distance for them to walk.
According to an environmental charter drawn up by Gap Inc, which has 3,149 stores worldwide and turned over $14.5 billion last year, the factories that supply it must have an environmental management system and an environmental emergency plan, including procedures to notify the authorities of an accidental discharge.
Tseliso Tsoeu, an environmental expert from Lesotho’s council of nongovernmental organisations, said the law was being broken by the foreign garment industry: “Our laws state that no person shall discharge any poisonous, toxic or chemical substance into our waters. So why is the government allowing our people to bathe in bright blue water stained with effluent and dyes? “ The Chinese and Taiwanese have come here and have basically done what they wanted. They make enormous profits from employing black Africans on behalf of respectable western companies who advertise the highest standards of production but in reality don’t really know what is going on here.”
In a statement yesterday, Dan Henkle, Gap’s senior vice-president of global responsibility, said the company had ordered an investigation as soon as it learnt of the allegations. It had placed Nien Hsing “on immediate notice until our investigation is complete and all issues are adequately addressed”, he said.
Gap accounted for 5% of Nien Hsing production. While an inspection in May had found no significant violations, its waste water was now deemed “unacceptable”.
Henkle added: “We will continue to act swiftly, decisively and thoughtfully in doing everything possible to protect the workers at the factories that make our products and the communities in which they live and work.”
Levi Strauss, which also sent an investigator to Lesotho, said it was “disturbed to see the local water is polluted”. A spokesman added, “It is clear the municipal landfill has not been secured”, and promised to protect the community and children.
It is a world away from the aims set out by Bono, whose visit to Lesotho in 2006 is still being talked about in the factories. The workers and their families recall how the U2 singer, sporting dark glasses imprinted with the word Red, walked among them, stroking children’s foreheads and cracking jokes.
At that year’s Davos economic forum in the Swiss Alps, he had persuaded some of the world’s most sought-after brands, including Armani, Apple and American Express, to develop special products under the Red umbrella.
The concept was simple: half the profits from Red-branded goods launched by him would go to the Global Fund to Fight Aids, Tuberculosis and Malaria. He was visiting southern Africa to unveil the next high-profile recruit to the cause: Gap Inc.
For Bono and Gap it was the perfect match. In Lesotho, one of the Aids capitals of the world, Gap had the factories and the local know-how to realise the rock star’s vision - an African factory making branded clothing for Product Red to be marketed from Cape Town to Tokyo.
As Bono toured Precious Garments, the firm slated to make clothes for Gap’s Product Red Range, he declared: “This is the face of transformation.” It was hoped that Product Red, in common with other brands made in Maseru, would help to liberate local people from poverty.
However, while Precious Garments continues to supply Gap, Red T-shirts are no longer made there. A spokesman said he was deeply concerned about the allegations and no Red clothing would be produced in Lesotho until they were resolved.
Although the garment industry has proved an undoubted financial lifeline to many, not all workers are well treated.
At the Nien Hsing factory, where Taiwanese managers oversee production of Gap jeans, a 26-year-old woman named Meluwan said she worked up to 200 hours a month for 30p an hour to support a family of seven.
“I am insulted on a daily basis,” she said. “The Taiwanese call me koko, mentally retarded. They also call me kaffir. It makes me so sad. I don’t know why they call me this.”
Other women accused supervisors of insulting them when they were late with orders.
A spokesman for Nien Hsing said the company was acting on the pollution allegations. “The blue water escaping into local rivers is something we are urgently looking at,” he said. “We are looking into claims that children are picking through our refuse. The first we knew about the child rag pickers was when Gap contacted us this week.” He refused to comment on the claims of abuse.
At the Ha Tikoe dump, Thabiso Liaho offered shelter from a bitter whistling wind in a home propped up by cardboard. “We have to get by looking after each other,” she said.
“The smoke from the dump fills our shack. We all have weeping eyes and running noses and itch after we work there looking for things to sell. The garment trucks come day and night. When we fetch water in the morning it is blue.” As I looked out towards the tip, the call went up again and the children ran towards the trucks.
Gap vows
Gap will conduct a thorough environmental assessment in Lesotho in partnership with an independent environmental organisation.
It will work with factory management to improve training and knowledge around waste handling/disposal.
It will convene a supplier summit in Lesotho to update policies, procedures and expectations.
‘While we’re proud of the progress we’ve made to date, we also understand that conditions are not perfect and that there is still a great deal more to be done to improve both environmental and factory working conditions in developing regions like Lesotho’ - Glenn Murphy, chairman and chief executive, Gap Inc
Half of all the fruit & veg you buy is contaminated
ALMOST HALF of the fresh fruit and veg sold across the UK is contaminated with toxic pesticides, according to the latest scientific surveys for the government.
Nearly every orange, 94% of pineapples and 90% of pears sampled were laced with traces of chemicals used to kill bugs. High proportions of apples, grapes and tomatoes were also tainted, as were parsnips, melons and cucumbers.
Alarmingly, as much as a quarter of the food on sale in 2008 - the date of the latest figures - was found to contain multiple pesticides. In some cases, up to ten different chemicals were detected in a single sample.
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Experts warn that the "cocktail effect" of so many different chemicals endangers health. They also point out that some of the pesticides are not only cancer-causing but also so-called "gender-benders" - chemicals that disrupt human sexuality.
The revelations about the widespread contamination of conventionally-produced food have also prompted renewed attacks on the government's Food Standards Agency.
The FSA published a report last week casting doubt on the health benefits of eating organic food, which is mostly produced without pesticides.
Over 4000 samples of more than 50 kinds of food on sale to the public in 2008 have been tested by scientists for some 240 pesticides.
Detailed reports for the government's Pesticide Residues Committee show that 46% of all the food samples were found to contain detectable levels of pesticides. Just over 25% contained more than one pesticide.
In 57 cases the levels of contamination were so serious that they breached the government's safety limits. They included 13 samples of beans in pods, and 10 yams, as well as potatoes, spinach and chilli peppers.
There were hardly any types of fruit and veg found to be completely free of contamination, although the vast majority of organic food tested was clean. As well as fruit and vegetables, smoothies, whole-grain breakfast cereals, oily fish and wine all contained pesticides (see accompanying table).
Hundreds of pages of tables released by the Pesticide Residues Committee show that many of the contaminated products were bought at well-known supermarkets in Scotland. They include an iceberg lettuce, a courgette and a packet of Cheerios from a Tesco store in Glasgow.
Asda was found to be selling parsnips in Glasgow, Chinese leaves in Edinburgh and apricots in Aberdeen, all with pesticides. Baby food and oranges from Sainsbury's in Glasgow were contaminated, as were white bread and bagels at Morrisons in Aberdeen.
Government scientists say that the residues would be "unlikely" to damage the health of those that eat them. But this is disputed by a growing body of experts concerned about the impact of mixtures of different chemicals.
"Researchers are concerned about the possible adverse health effects of very low-level exposures to mixtures of chemicals," said professor Andrew Watterson, head of the Occupational and Environmental Health Research Group at the University of Stirling.
Watterson pointed out that several of the pesticides found on food were thought to be carcinogenic. Others were suspected of being endocrine disruptors, meaning that they could cause sex changes.
He also criticised the Food Standards Agency (FSA) for failing to include the impact of pesticides in last week's report on organic food. "Why did the FSA apparently frame the recent research project to exclude the human and environmental health impacts of so-called food contaminants?" he asked.
The FSA report reviewed previous studies and concluded that there were "no important differences" in the nutrition content of organic food compared to conventionally-farmed food.
But the FSA has since come under fire. The Soil Association's Scottish director, Hugh Raven, said: "Many consumers buy organic food because they're worried about pesticide residues.
"The FSA itself recommends buying organic food if you want to avoid residues. Yet they were specifically excluded from this study."
The FSA accepted that the report only examined the nutritional content of food, and did not deal with pesticides. "It's a fact that conventional production methods permit the use of a wider range of pesticides than organic," said an FSA spokeswoman.
"The FSA is neither for nor against organic food. Our interest is in providing accurate information to support consumer choice."
Nearly every orange, 94% of pineapples and 90% of pears sampled were laced with traces of chemicals used to kill bugs. High proportions of apples, grapes and tomatoes were also tainted, as were parsnips, melons and cucumbers.
Alarmingly, as much as a quarter of the food on sale in 2008 - the date of the latest figures - was found to contain multiple pesticides. In some cases, up to ten different chemicals were detected in a single sample.
advertisement
Experts warn that the "cocktail effect" of so many different chemicals endangers health. They also point out that some of the pesticides are not only cancer-causing but also so-called "gender-benders" - chemicals that disrupt human sexuality.
The revelations about the widespread contamination of conventionally-produced food have also prompted renewed attacks on the government's Food Standards Agency.
The FSA published a report last week casting doubt on the health benefits of eating organic food, which is mostly produced without pesticides.
Over 4000 samples of more than 50 kinds of food on sale to the public in 2008 have been tested by scientists for some 240 pesticides.
Detailed reports for the government's Pesticide Residues Committee show that 46% of all the food samples were found to contain detectable levels of pesticides. Just over 25% contained more than one pesticide.
In 57 cases the levels of contamination were so serious that they breached the government's safety limits. They included 13 samples of beans in pods, and 10 yams, as well as potatoes, spinach and chilli peppers.
There were hardly any types of fruit and veg found to be completely free of contamination, although the vast majority of organic food tested was clean. As well as fruit and vegetables, smoothies, whole-grain breakfast cereals, oily fish and wine all contained pesticides (see accompanying table).
Hundreds of pages of tables released by the Pesticide Residues Committee show that many of the contaminated products were bought at well-known supermarkets in Scotland. They include an iceberg lettuce, a courgette and a packet of Cheerios from a Tesco store in Glasgow.
Asda was found to be selling parsnips in Glasgow, Chinese leaves in Edinburgh and apricots in Aberdeen, all with pesticides. Baby food and oranges from Sainsbury's in Glasgow were contaminated, as were white bread and bagels at Morrisons in Aberdeen.
Government scientists say that the residues would be "unlikely" to damage the health of those that eat them. But this is disputed by a growing body of experts concerned about the impact of mixtures of different chemicals.
"Researchers are concerned about the possible adverse health effects of very low-level exposures to mixtures of chemicals," said professor Andrew Watterson, head of the Occupational and Environmental Health Research Group at the University of Stirling.
Watterson pointed out that several of the pesticides found on food were thought to be carcinogenic. Others were suspected of being endocrine disruptors, meaning that they could cause sex changes.
He also criticised the Food Standards Agency (FSA) for failing to include the impact of pesticides in last week's report on organic food. "Why did the FSA apparently frame the recent research project to exclude the human and environmental health impacts of so-called food contaminants?" he asked.
The FSA report reviewed previous studies and concluded that there were "no important differences" in the nutrition content of organic food compared to conventionally-farmed food.
But the FSA has since come under fire. The Soil Association's Scottish director, Hugh Raven, said: "Many consumers buy organic food because they're worried about pesticide residues.
"The FSA itself recommends buying organic food if you want to avoid residues. Yet they were specifically excluded from this study."
The FSA accepted that the report only examined the nutritional content of food, and did not deal with pesticides. "It's a fact that conventional production methods permit the use of a wider range of pesticides than organic," said an FSA spokeswoman.
"The FSA is neither for nor against organic food. Our interest is in providing accurate information to support consumer choice."
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