In September 2004 –with an update in August 2005--Sightline Institute (formerly Northwest Environment Watch) and several regional groups released a study with information on the levels of toxic flame retardants, called PBDEs, in 40 women in British Columbia, Montana, Oregon, and Washington, as assessed by testing human milk.

The August 2005 update was a new analysis of the study results conducted by California/EPA scientists, who compared levels of PCBs and PBDEs found in the women. The following information is designed to help breastfeeding specialists answer questions that pregnant or lactating women may have about the study.

For additional information, please contact:
Kim Radtke, Healthy Mothers, Healthy Babies, 206-281-8032, kimr@withinreachwa.org
Elisa Murray, Sightline Institute, 206-447-1880 ext.111, elisa@sightline.org

What are PBDEs?
PBDEs (or Polybrominated Diphenyl Ethers) are a family of flame-retarding chemicals used in computer plastics, furniture foams, textiles, and other products. There are 209 different kinds of PBDEs, but only a few are used commercially.

What are PCBs?

PCBs (or Polychlorinated Biphenyls) are a family of chemicals once used in a variety of industrial applications but banned in North America in the late 1970s because they were found to pose health risks. Until then, they were widely used in such applications as electrical equipment, hydraulic fluid, and plastics, and they may still be present in equipment today.

Why should we care about PBDEs and PCBs?
PCBs and some forms of PBDEs are potentially dangerous to, and accumulate readily in, living things, including humans. Although banned decades ago, PCBs are still present in our bodies and the environment. PBDE levels in people and the environment have been rising rapidly in recent years, particularly in North America, where the use of PBDEs is highest.

What are the health risks from the two chemicals?
PCBs are known to interfere with the body’s hormone systems, and can cause a range of adverse effects on health. PCBs can impede children’s mental development and cause a range of effects on the immune system, reproductive system, and nervous system.

PBDEs are chemically similar to PCBs, and, not surprisingly, show similar toxic effects in laboratory studies. PBDEs cause learning, memory, and behavior problems in laboratory animals. PBDEs have also been found to affect thyroid hormones and other bodily functions in laboratory studies.
Scientists have found that PBDEs and PCBs work in similar ways, and may even act together to impair development. Both PCBs and PBDEs degrade slowly in the environment, and build up in living things, magnifying in concentration as they move up the food chain.

Why test breastmilk for these chemicals?

Testing human breastmilk is a good way to determine PCB and PBDE levels in people's bodies. Breast milk is high in fat, and both chemicals collect in fat—which makes it possible to run comprehensive tests with a small amount of milk. Breastmilk can provide a useful picture of the exposure of the population at large, and particularly of the exposures of reproductive-aged women and young children.

What did the study show?
The study tested the breastmilk of 40 first-time mothers in British Columbia, Montana, Oregon, and Washington. It found the presence of PCBs and PBDEs in all of the women tested. The levels of PBDEs detected were 20 to 40 times higher than the levels found in Japan and Europe. The study also showed that some of the women had higher levels of PBDEs than PCBs in their bodies, suggesting that the toxic flame retardants may be overtaking PCBs as a major environmental health concern. See www.sightline.org/pollution for the full results of the study and new analysis, which will be released on August 25, 2005.

Should women continue to breastfeed?
While the presence of toxic chemicals in humans’ fetal environment and milk signals the urgent need to reduce community exposure to these pollutants, the weight of the evidence indicates that breastfeeding remains the healthiest option for mothers and babies. There are several reasons for this:

• The greatest risk from exposure is during in utero development, not through breastfeeding. Suspending breastfeeding would not address the core problem: community (and thereby maternal and fetal) contamination.
• As noted by the Surgeon General and other health authorities, breastfeeding is one of the most important contributors to infant health in the US. Breastfeeding promotes neurological development in babies and strengthens their immune systems. Breastfeeding decreases the risk of childhood infections of the bloodstream, ears, lungs, urinary system, and gut, as well as chronic diseases such as obesity, diabetes, and food sensitivities. The health risks of not breastfeeding infants outweigh the estimated risk from exposure to common levels of toxins in human milk.

• Breast-fed children do appear to have higher body levels of certain toxic chemicals. High concentrations of PCBs in breastmilk, for example, seem to reduce the resistance to infection that breastmilk ordinarily provides. However, while these contaminants may diminish the benefits of breastfeeding, they do not negate them.
• Breastfeeding reduces the incidence of anemia and certain cancers in women, potentially tempering some of the damage that pollution poses to women’s health.

The findings of this study should not discourage women from breastfeeding. Women deserve the ability to choose to nourish and protect their children by breastfeeding, without having to fear that environmental pollution has compromised the value or safety of their milk. The real solution is to pass policies that will reduce the levels of these toxic chemicals in the environment to safeguard babies in the womb and protect breastmilk. A variety of regional groups, including the Washington Toxics Coalition and the Toxic Free Legacy Coalition in Washington; Oregon Environmental Council; Reach for Unbleached in BC; and Women’s Voices for the Earth in Montana are seeking state policies that will eliminate the release of persistent toxic chemicals that are long-lived in the environment and build up in our bodies and breastmilk.

In 2003, the US Environmental Protection Agency announced an agreement to remove the two most troubling forms of PBDE from the market in the United States. This action is likely to limit the use of PBDEs throughout North America. However, it allows for the continued manufacture of a third form of PBDEs—deca—that is widely used in computers and consumer electronics.

Regional groups are seeking bans on the use of all forms of PBDEs and other persistent chemicals. Washington and Oregon have banned two of the most-toxic forms of PBDEs, but not a third type (deca), which is the most commonly used form of the chemical. Both states also have formal statewide strategies to phase out persistent toxic chemicals, including mercury, dioxins, and PCBs.

Sweden was the first country to phase out some of the most toxic forms of PBDEs, followed by the European Union, which initiated a phase-out that will be completed by the end of 2005.

What else can be done?
Northwest jurisdictions can take several steps. First, they should ban all forms of PBDEs from commerce, including deca-PBDE, and develop programs and recommendations for removing products that contain PBDEs from homes and workplaces. Second, Northwest jurisdictions should conduct comprehensive screens of human blood and breastmilk for chemical contaminants, both as an early warning system for emerging toxic threats, and as a means to monitor progress in cleaning up existing pollution. Finally, the United States and Canada should require industrial chemicals to undergo more rigorous scrutiny for health effects and the potential to collect in the bodies of humans and wildlife before the compounds are used widely in commerce.