' Extensions of Remarks Hon. Henry A.Waxman
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September 9, 1987 EXTENSIONS OF REMARKS 23651 ' EXTENSIONS OF REMARKS ARE WE LOSING THE WAR estimates of the lifetime probability of get majority of these industrial chemicals has AGAINST CANCER? ting cancer for people born a different never been adequately, if at all, tested for times. For white males born in 1975 to 1985 chronic toxic, carcinogenic, mutagenic and for instance, the probability of developing teratogenic effects, let alone for ecological HON. HENRY A.WAXMAN cancer has risen from 30 to 36% and from 19 effects, and much of the limitedly available OF CALIFORNIA to 23% for dying from cancer. Such in industrial data is at best suspect. IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES creases in overall cancer rates are also re Occupational exposure to mdustria:l car flected in increasing rates for cancers of 9, cinogens 'has clearly emerged as a major risk Wednesday, Septe_,mber 1987 organs including lung, breast, colon, pros factor for cancer. 4 The National Institute Mr. WAXMAN. Mt. Speaker, just over 15 tate, testis, urinary bladder, kidney, and for Occupational Safety and Health years ago, the country declared a war on skih, malignant melanoma and lymphatic/ <NIOSH> estimates that some 10 million cancer. Today, cancer is still the m~jor killing hematopoietic malignances, including non workers are now expQsed to 11 high volwhe Hodgkin's lymphoma;3 lung cancer is re disease in the Industrialized world. With over carcinogens. Five to 10-fold increases in sponsible Jor about one-third of the overall cancer rates have been demonstrated in 900,000 new cases and 450,000 u.s: deaths recent increase in incidence rates. It should last year, cancer has now reached epidemic some occupations. Also persuasive .are Brit be stressed that some 75% Of all cancer ish data on cancer mortality by socio-eco proportions. deaths occur· in people over 55 years, and nomic class, largely defined by occupation, Last month, , tbe Subcommittee on Health that recent increases are largely restricted which show that the lowesf class, particu and the Environment received a very, impor.. to these ages. larly among males, has approximately twice tant statement from Dr. Samuel Epstein, pro • 1 Static cure rates the cancer mortality rate of the highest fessor of occupational and environmental The overall cancer "cure rate'', as meas class. medicine -at the University of Illinois Medical ured by survival for over five years follow Living near petrochemical. and certain Center. Dr. Epstein, one of our Nation's lead ing diagnosis, is currently 50% for whites other industries in highly urbanized com ing cancer re~earcher.s, provides answers to but only 38% for blacks. There is no evi munities increases cancer risks, as evidenced who's responsible for the rising cancer rates dence of substantia,l improvements in treat by clustering of excess cancer rates; high ment over the last few decades, during levels of toxic and carcinogenic chemicals and what we need to do about it. The state which five year survival and age-adjusted ment follows: are deliberately discharged by a wide range mortality rates for the major cancer killers, of industries into the air of surrounding LoSING THE WAR AGAINST CANCER: WHO'S To lung, breast and colon, besides for most communities. Fall-out from such toxic air BLAME AND WHAT To Do ABOUT IT-A PO other organs, have remained essentially un pollutants is also an important source of SITION PAPER ON THE POLITICS OF CANCER, changed. The only improvements have been contamination of surface waters; particular 1987 1 f for cancer of the cervix, and for relatively ly the Great Lakes. While there still are no <By Samuel S. Epstein, M.D.> rare cancers, such as testicular seminomas, r l regulatory requirements for reporting and THE FACTS Hodgkin's disease and childhood leukemias monitoring these emissions, unpublished Increasing cancer rates treated with radiation and/or chemothera government estimates indicate that they are py. Apart from immediate toxicity, such 11 Cancer is1 now the only major killing dis treatment, while effective, can increase the in excess of 3 billion pounds annually. ease in the industrialized world whose rates subsequent risk of developing a second Another example of run-away technol are sharply rising. 2 In contrast, there have cancer by up to 100 t'imes. ogies is the hazardous waste crisis. From the been major reductions in deaths from car Increasing carcinogenic exposures disposal of under one million tons of haz diovascular disease, still the number one ardous wastes in 1940 to well over 300 mil killer in the U.S., probably because of a Cancer is an age-old and ubiquitous group lion tons annually in the 1980s, in excess of recent decline in smoking and attention to of diseases. Its recognized causes and influ one ton per person per year, the industries diet and exercise. ences are multifactorial and include natural involved-fossil fuel, metal mining and proc With over 900,000 new cases and 450,000 environmental carcinogens <such as a afla essing, nuclear, and petrochemical-have lit U.S. , deaths last year, cancer has now toxins and sunlight), lifestyle factors, genet tered the entire land mass of the U.S. with reached epidemic proportions with an inci ic susceptibility, and more recentlY industri some 50,000 toxic waste landfills, 20,000 of dence of one in three and a mortality of one al chemicals. apart from modem lifestyle in four. Analysis of overall cancer rates, factors, particularly smoking, increasing standardized for age, sex and ethnicity, has cancer rates reflect exposure to industrial " In 1978, a blue ribbon governmental commission demonstrated steady increases since the chemicals and run-away modem technol <under the auspices of then H.E.W. Secretary Cali· 1930s, with more recent sharp annual in ogies whose explosive growth- has clearly fano) estimated on the basis of the only available outpaced the ability of society to control exposure data, estimated that up to 38% of all can creases in incidence rates by some 2% and in cers in coming decades would reflect past and con morality rates by some 1%. Striking confir them. ln addition to pervasive ,changes in tinuing exposures to just six high volume occupa mation of these recent increases comes from patterns of living and diet, these poorly con tional carcinogens. In spite of the recognized limita trQlled technologies have induced profound tions of these estimates, both in the direction of and poorly reversible environmental degra overestimating exposure to certain of the named 1 Based on keynote presentations at the National dation, and have resulted in progressive con carcinogens, particularly asbestos, and failure to re ~afety and. Hel!lth Conference of the International tamination of air, water,, food and work flect a wide range of other possibly more significant Association of Machinists, Washington, D.C., places with .toxic and carcinogenic chemi exposures, their magnitude was surprisingly con March 9, 1987, the Fifth National Pesticide Forum firmed by industry consultants, Stallones. and of the National Coalition Against the Misuse of cals, with resulting involuntary exposures. Downs of the University of Texas School of Public Pesticides, Washington, D.C., March 21, 1987, and With the dawn of· the petrochemical era Health, in a .confidential report commissioned by the Conference on Global Develo11ment and Envi in the early 1940s, by when technologies in the American Industrial Health Council. · • ronment Crisis, Friends of the Earth <sahabat cluding fractional distillation of petroleum, • The Environmenta1 Protection Agency has di Alam>. fenang, ?,lalaysia, April 8, 1987. Copyright, catalytic and thermal cracking and molecu verted attention away from its faU,ure to regulate 1987, Samuel S. Epstein lar splicing became commercially estab such toxic emlssions, although so authorized by 2 Just by way of quantitative contrast, mortality lished, annual U.S. production of synthetic Sec. 112 of the 1970 Clean Air Act, by attempting to from AIDS <another eminently preventable dis shift responsibility to local and state agencies, and ease) althou~h highly alarming if not catastrophic, organic chemicals was about one billion by a barrage of poorly supportable claims that iS relatively low. About 33,000 cases, more than half pounds. By the 1950s, this had reached 30 indoor air~ polhltlon, from pollutants such as ciga already.. fatal, 'have been reported since 1981 when billion pounds, and by the 1980s over 400 rette smoking, radon and pesticides, is a more im the disease was first detected; additionally, it is esti bil1ion pounds annually. The overwhelming portant regulatory target than toxic air emissions. mated that 2-3 times as many Americans suffer In spite of this -near exclusionary emphasis . on from advanced symptoms of t]J.e AIDS-related com indoor air pollution, EPA still ref~es to ban the ple~ whfoh often progress~s to frank AIDS. RapidJy 3 It should, however, be noted that ther~ have continued use of" carcil)ogenic pesticides, notably inC!reasing numbers of cases, totalling so.me 270,000, been substantial decreases in rates for stomach and Chlordane and Aldrin used extensively for domestic 0 are projected by 1991. cervix ,' an~ less so; for r:,ectal cancer. termite treatment. c i ,') ). This "bull~t" symllol ide~tifies sta~ements ~r insertions whiCh are not spoken by a Member of t.l'te Senate on tpe floor . w; • .I f,I · ·Marter set in this typeface indicates words inserted or .appended, ' rather than spoken, by a Member of the House on the floor. 23652 EXTENSIONS OF REMARKS September 9, 1987 which are recognized as potentially hazard 1976 Toxic Substance Control Act, legisla there have been major recent increases in ous, 170,000 industrial impoundments tion which the industry had stalled for lung cancer rates in non-smokers; an in (ponds, pits and lagoons), 7 ,000 under years, and which is now honored more in creasing percentage of lung cancer is of a ground injection wells, not to mention some the breach than in the observance.