Tim Kaine on Regulating Toxic Chemicals

Here's Senator Kaine's official reply to the e-mail I sent to his office in June. Official comment: I wish this letter had included a few links...The "Lautenburg Act" was originally signed into law in 2016; its nickname is a memorial to Senator Lautenburg (D-NJ), who spent the last years of his life (2013-2015) working to get relatively minor improvements made to the existing TSCA, notably requiring regulations of toxic chemicals to be based on risk rather than a risk-expense balance.

History and summary of the Lautenburg Act: 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frank_R._Lautenberg_Chemical_Safety_for_the_21st_Century_Act

Text of the Lautenburg Act--PDF for Real Wonks to download:

https://www.congress.gov/114/plaws/publ182/PLAW-114publ182.pdf

This web site officially thanks those who supported even minor improvements to TSCA...but...my reply to the e-mail is below.

"

July 11, 2018

Ms. Priscilla King
Computer Center
Gate City, VA 24251

Dear Ms. King:

Thank you for contacting me about the regulation of toxic chemicals. I appreciate hearing from you.

I have noted your concerns about the Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) findings related to the effects of glyphosate. Glyphosate is an herbicide about which there has been extensive debate and research as to its carcinogenicity. As you know, a September 2016 EPA report indicates that glyphosate is unlikely to pose a carcinogenic threat to human health. The EPA Scientific Advisory Board is currently evaluating this report.

These debates often involve complex scientific questions, and reports like this can take years and multiple rounds of scientific review to finalize. I believe public policy decisions about these issues should follow the science, and I will strive to make sure all decisions that Congress makes about issues like this take into account the most rigorous scientific research.

One good decision Congress recently made was to update the obsolete law guarding the public against exposure to toxic chemicals, the Toxic Substances Control Act of 1976 (TSCA). This past year, the House and Senate agreed upon a final update to TSCA, the Frank R. Lautenberg Chemical Safety for the 21st Century Act, which took years of bipartisan cooperation to craft. I was a proud cosponsor of the Senate version of this legislation because I believe it represents a true bipartisan compromise that strengthens important public health safeguards and improves existing law. With this bill, consumers receive an up-to-date law that would do a better job keeping them safe from harmful chemicals than current law does, while businesses would gain the regulatory certainty they need. Among other measures, this legislation would require EPA to base chemical regulations solely on issues of public health instead of industry cost considerations, which would at last allow the EPA to regulate chemicals that are proven to be dangerous, such as asbestos. It would also require companies to make more information publicly available about chemicals and provide the EPA with new authority to inspect chemicals before they are allowed onto the market to determine whether or not they are likely safe. The Senate passed this legislation on June 8th, 2016.

Please know that I will keep your thoughts in mind as I continue to monitor the scientific review of glyphosate as well as other matters of public health importance.

Thank you again for contacting me.

Sincerely,

Tim Kaine

"

I replied:

"
Thank you for your prompt and politically balanced reply, and thanks to Senator Kaine for supporting the Lautenburg reforms...but I wonder whether it may be better just to drop the question of glyphosate "carcinogenicity."

Even for radiation and cigarettes there's never been a precise one-to-one correlation between carcinogens and cancer. Individuals' resistance to cancer varies so widely that it always takes years even to prove that something is a carcinogen. Meanwhile, while those predisposed to develop cancer are building up higher levels of the possible carcinogen, many people who never get cancer can be harmed by other toxic effects of the same suspected carcinogen--even when the "carcinogenicity" level turns out to be low, as with straight tobacco (bleached paper in cigarettes being more carcinogenic than tobacco in cigars).

With glyphosate the other toxic effects are especially bad; I'm seeing them disable people, feeling them handicap me, and aware that they're likely to kill other people, who don't have cancer, but who are Irish-American. Glyphosate reactions are genetic and those whose reactions are most severe happen to have a gene concentrated on the northwestern coast of Europe AND IN SOUTHWESTERN VIRGINIA.

I know the burden on U.S. Senators' eyes is huge, so may I even recommend reading my summary, and the linked documents from the EPA site, back to front--the critical information about actual, immediate, unmistakable effects of glyphosate toxicity appear toward the chronological end of the EPA's file.

The summary appeared at https://priscillaking.blogspot.com/2018/03/ this-web-site-loves-vegetables-here-is.html .

The study of eight types of effects on humans appeared at https://www.regulations.gov/document?D=EPA-HQ-OPP-2009-0361-0069 .

Someone summarized the range of toxic effects in a rabbit study as "nasal discharge, diarrhea, and death." That's at https://www.regulations.gov/document?D=EPA-HQ-OPP-2009-0361-0071 .

Because "confounders" are built into all cancer studies I don't expect confirmation of glyphosate "carcinogenicity" to be completed during the Senator's lifetime, or mine--but, because glyphosate TOXICITY is disastrous and growing with increased exposure, I'd like to see this poison banned before it has time to be confirmed as a carcinogen.

For all Irish-Americans and all Virginians,

Priscilla King

"