News Room
For Immediate Release: January 8, 2002	Contact: Muchtar Ramsey, PennPIRG (202) 270-8626 David Masur, PennPIRG (215) 732-3747
CHEMICALS IN TAPWATER PUT OVER 5,000 PREGNANCIES AT RISK OF MISCARRIAGE, BIRTH DEFECTS IN PITTSBURGH AREA Government Lacks Data on Where Birth Defects and Miscarriages Occur Pittsburgh-A report published by PennPIRG, a public interest advocacy organization, and the Environmental Working Group, documents that thousands of Pittsburgh women are at risk of having pregnancies end in miscarriage or of having children with birth defects because of chemical byproducts that occur in drinking water as a result of chlorination. The study further reports that Pennsylvania is among 41 states that lack an adequate system for tracking birth defects to determine where the toxic chemicals are impacting health and that no states adequately track miscarriages. "Pennsylvanians are participating in a massive experiment under terms that are an unacceptable trade-off, and even worse, our government doesn't have the information to know what the impacts are," said Muchtar Ramsey, Field Organizer for PennPIRG. "Chlorine rids our water of dangerous pathogens, but creates toxic contaminants at the same time. However, no one's tracking how many pregnancies end in miscarriage or how many babies are born with birth defects just because their mothers used tap water." Chlorine added to water interacts with organic matter, particularly the soil and plant material that comes from agricultural run-off, to create hundreds of toxic chlorination byproducts (CBPs). At least ten major epidemiological studies have shown an elevated risk of birth defects and miscarriages for women drinking chlorinated tap water. The U.S. EPA has estimated that CBPs cause 9,300 cases of bladder cancer nationwide every year, and studies have linked CBPs to a dozen other internal cancers, including brain and breast cancer. "The health risks associated with chlorination byproducts in our drinking water are significant and severe," said David Masur, PennPIRG Director. "The government's failure to even track these health effects, much less strictly regulate the byproducts in our water, is an abdication of responsibility." The report estimates that nationally, 137,000 pregnancies are at risk of miscarriage or birth defects every year because of exposure to toxic chlorination byproducts, and that more than 16 million people in 1,258 communities have been served water contaminated at levels higher than a new legal limit going into effect this month. A handful of large cities put the largest numbers of people at risk - Washington, DC suburbs, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh suburbs, and San Francisco, but more than 1,100 small water systems also reported potentially dangerous contaminant levels. Despite the clear indication that Americans' health is being affected by chlorination byproducts, the U.S. has no consistent system for tracking exposures to chemicals like CBPs or for tracking when and where birth defects, miscarriages, and other effects occur. Tracking diseases has been a cornerstone of protecting health from infectious diseases, but tracking is a tool that has not yet been applied to diseases with potential environmental impacts. Only nine states have active, well-funded birth defects surveillance systems in place. Ten states and Washington, DC, have no birth defects surveillance system at all. Not a single state has an active, well-funded system to track miscarriages. "Citizens, policymakers, and health care providers are blindfolded when it comes to protecting our health from toxic hazards like chlorination byproducts," said Ramsey. PennPIRG and the Environmental Working Group called for immediate action to clean up the lakes and rivers that provide tap water by reducing the soil erosion and the nutrient and animal waste runoff from farms and feedlots that increase the need for chlorination, but also recommended a more ambitious effort to address the long-term health threats of chlorination byproducts. The groups recommend the creation of a nationwide health tracking network, coordinated by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), that would monitor Americans' exposure to potentially health-impacting pollution and would track birth defects, miscarriages, and other environmentally-impacted health conditions like cancer and asthma. In December, Congress appropriated $17.5 million dollars for pilot environmental health tracking projects. The President will submit his budget to Congress in February and has the opportunity to increase funding for next year so that environmental health tracking can begin to be expanded nationwide. A coalition of public interest groups including PennPIRG and Pennsylvania Public Health Association are recommending that funding be increased to $100 million. PennPIRG is a statewide, non-profit, non-partisan public interest organization with 13,000 members throughout Pennsylvania. PennPIRG works to preserve our environment, protect consumer's and the public's health, and promote democracy. This report and other PennPIRG reports can be found on the PennPIRG web page at pennpirg.org