Canarsie, Brooklyn: Terminal Eyes New Beginning

Check out Terminal Eyes New Beginning, a multimedia package on the Brooklyn Terminal Market that Jessica Simeone, Robert Voris and I created for the NYCity News Service.

NYC HEALTH: Health Department Targets Deadly Cosmetics

By Heather J. Chin
September 25, 2008
(originally published at the CUNY Graduate School of Journalism blogs)

New York – City health officials stepped up their efforts to alert residents that some imported cosmetics threaten them with lead and mercury poisoning.

While federal and state standards already prohibit lethal cosmetics from entering the country, consumer demand keeps the supply steady, according to officials at the Board of Health during their quarterly meeting on Wednesday.

“The problem with global … products [is] that they are falling through the cracks,” said Dr. Nancy Clark, Assistant Commissioner of the department’s Bureau of Environmental Disease Prevention.

Specific deodorants, skin creams, aphrodisiacs and herbal remedies used by residents of Dominican, Indian and Chinese communities are on the list of products with poisonous ingredients. These cosmetics are imported from Asia, Latin America, Africa and the Middle East.

Tests done by NYC’s health department and by others around the country have shown these products to have lead and mercury levels as much as 6,000 times higher than limits recommended by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA). The FDA limit for lead levels is 10 parts per million; for mercury, it is 1 part per million.

At last month’s meeting, the board authorized the health department to find and remove dangerous cosmetics from store shelves, just as tainted food or drugs are.

These tools will come in the form of signs and fact sheets in the languages spoken by consumers, explained Ms. Paromita Hore, a risk assessment coordinator. “They’re often not aware” of the danger, she said, adding that use of the unhealthy products “is longstanding in their culture.”

At least in the Chinese community, such awareness efforts are welcome, says Gary Lee, the owner of a pharmacy in Chinatown that offers both U.S. name brands and popular Chinese medicines and herbs.

“[Officials] usually want to put pressure on the importer, not putting pressure on the shop,” he said. He notes that if a store has non-FDA approved drugs in stock, it is because they sell. “What [the consumer] wants, they make a request.”

For Indian Americans, kohl and surma – two skin products listed by the Health Department as being laced with high levels of lead – pose a great threat because they are so embedded in the culture.

“Loving kohl is one of the commandments for being desi,” writes Anu, an Indian American freelance writer on her blog, The Indian Make-Up Diva.

When ingested or absorbed through the skin, high levels of lead and mercury can pose a danger to brain function, as well as to blood and renal system function. These effects are particularly dangerous in children and pregnant women.

LOCAL NYC: Unionized Drivers Protest Union And DOE Bus Cuts

By Heather J. Chin
September 10, 2008

Long Island City – Hundreds of school bus drivers, transportation aides and parents rallied together on September 10th to protest new cuts to the number of routes and service quality to the city’s special needs students.

“We are highly trained professionals [and] highly motivated individuals,” stated Caravan Transportation bus driver Miqueal Vestres, who has driven special needs students to and from school for 28 years. “We do these jobs not for the money; we love what we do [and] care about the kids.”

Read the rest of this story and listen to audio of the rally here.

Pollution Triggers Children's Allergies, Diseases

(previously published here at www.thebulletin.us)

By: Heather Chin, The Bulletin

07/08/2008

Living near roads that are heavily trafficked and polluted increases a child's risk of developing physician-diagnosed asthma, allergies and atopic diseases (chronic skin diseases) by more than 50 percent, a new study finds.

The 17-month study by researchers from Germany's Center for Environment and Health at the Institute of Epidemiology was based on the idea, as described by the lead author Joachim Heinrich, Ph.D, that "[children] living very close to a major road are likely to be exposed not only to a higher amount of traffic-derived particles and gases but also to a more freshly emitted aerosols which may be more toxic."

The study's results were published in the second June 2008 issue of the American Thoracic Society's American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Medicine. In his summary, Dr. Heinrich considers them to "provide strong evidence for the adverse effects of traffic-related air pollutants on atopic diseases as well as on allergic sensitization."

This is the first study to report an association between allergic sensitization and pollution levels. Previous studies done in the United States found links between the two, but took into account various socioeconomic, environmental and behavioral factors that are also associated with life in urban areas, making a causal relationship between pollutant exposure and allergic risk impossible.

Socioeconomic variables in U.S. studies over the past two years include the effect of diesel exhaust particles on airborne allergenic particles, environmental variables include ozone levels, and behavioral factors include recreational time spent indoors instead of outdoors.

Researchers for this study, however, say that older European cities like Munich, where the study was conducted, have roads and buildings that are established in a way that makes it possible to eliminate a correlation with economic advantages or disadvantages.

Approximately 2,900 four-year-olds and over 3,000 six-year-olds who had been born and were enrolled in school in the metropolitan area of Munich, Germany, were examined over the course of the study. The children's long-term exposure to traffic pollutants were calculated as a function of the distance from their houses to the major roads at birth and at ages two, three and six. Control groups were used to account for individual circumstances such as pet ownership, pet allergies and number of siblings.

Parents filled out questionnaires about their child[ren]'s respiratory diagnoses and symptoms while children were evaluated for asthma, sneezing, wheezing and eczema. At age six, all of the children were tested for food allergies. In addition, the air in each of 40 identified points near high traffic areas was tested for smog, soot and other particulate matter, as well as nitrogen oxide (NO2) once per season between March 1999 and July 2000.

On top of the 50 percent greater risk of allergic sensitization, the results found strong positive links between the distance of the nearest road and diseases such as hay fever, asthmatic bronchitis, eczema and allergic sensitizations. Also, children who lived within half a block (50 meters/164 feet) to a busy street had the highest probability of getting symptoms, compared to children living further away.

Heather Chin can be reached at hchin@thebulletin.us

©The Evening Bulletin 2008