A Slow Death

Adversaries claim the science is limited. Adversaries claim correlation does not equal causation, that testing petrochemicals under a microscope for their toxicity doesn’t equate to disease. These adversary claims are simply distractions to the ensuing consequences of petrochemicals in our environment. Assessing petrochemicals necessitates a multifactor approach similar to that of the ecosystem.

Approximately 2,000 new chemicals get introduced to our environment on a yearly basis, yet the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) only reviews a minimum of 20 of those chemicals at a time, having a seven-year deadline, resulting in industry having a cushion of five years to comply with these standards. Given the extensive timeframe the EPA has to evaluate such chemicals and make proper adjustments, this entire process exudes superficialness. No urgency in the process, and in the meanwhile, our livers are asked to detoxify at rates it has never before, straying away from homeostatic principles the human body strives on.

Consumers often have a distorted view regarding petrochemicals. No matter how health conscious an individual, petrochemicals find their way into blood samples. The abundance of petrochemicals in our environment, and how easily the body takes them in, consumers often underestimate. The most obvious form, food, is just one mechanism of ingestion. Our skin, often remiss in the conversation, is the overlooked mechanism and perhaps even more potent because of its ability to enter the bloodstream without any barriers. The ideology that our skin eats has only reached worldwide attention in recent years. Skin care products, shampoos, acne solutions have resulted in billions of dollars of profit for the skin care industry yet manufacturers are gradually being asked to revoke their products or re-evaluate their formula because of the carcinogens in their products. In the year of 2020, 30 products were recalled in the category of beauty and personal care products. The process of assessing unevaluated chemicals once they’ve already been in the market for years seems quite counterintuitive. We are the test subjects to a wicked experiment.

A miniscule 5-10% of cancers come from genetics, thus our environment cannot not be overlooked. Our environment is the difference between health and disease. Our indoor environment is 10-100 times more toxic than the air outside, leading to more chemicals coming into contact with our skin and lungs. A natural solution to this toxic indoor environment comes in the form of substituting a memory foam mattress for a natural rubber organic mattress. Walter Bader, author of Toxic Bedrooms, attests that a natural rubber organic mattress produces 95% less chemical emissions than its counterpart, memory foam. Resorting to material that has roamed our world since the dawn of time, rubber comes from the sap of trees, and has advantageous properties such as elasticity and strength. Unfortunately, most people consume an industrialized, highly processed version, but let it be known that natural rubber exists in a non-toxic form from the very trees of this earth.

Proponents of petrochemical based items, such as memory foam mattresses argue there’s no adequate alternative. This myth couldn’t possibly be further from the truth. In addition to the natural rubber organic mattress previously mentioned, options include pure organic wool and certified organic cotton. Independent third party testing ensures delivery on the promise of top tier ingredients. These methods also stray from dyes, which when added to a product in a synthetic manner, promote symptoms such as difficulty breathing and burning sensations to the eyes and throat.

To combat an increasingly toxic world, several things need to take place to fend off the ill effects of petrochemicals. More toxicity in our environment produces a void only antioxidants can combat, thus an increasing petrochemical world requires substantial amounts of antioxidants in our diet. Antioxidants, obtained from food, fight off the free radicals that wreak havoc on our DNA. But with an ever increasing reliance on industrialization processes, even an ordinary grocery store trip will result in unknown chemicals that we call ‘food’ find its way into our mouths. To avoid even going down the rabbit hole of naming foreign petrochemicals, analyzing what part of the body they wreak havoc on, the prevailing sentiment remains that petrochemicals pose a hazardous health risk to our health.

This generation marks the first of its kind, one that will not outlive its previous generation. For quite some time now, scientists have elongated life spans through chemical means, but our mental fortitude, even from the brightest of humanity, cannot outsmart biology. Man made interventions can only take us so far.

Certainly, a degree of exposure can be had to the toxic effects petrochemicals pose. Simply because sleeping on a memory foam mattress does not evoke instant death by no means eliminates the ensuing effects they have on our respiratory tract, or skin. Our current environment has produced 80,000 new chemicals in the last 100 years alone. In that time span, chronic illnesses have skyrocketed. In order to make substantial change, a more suitable approach in combating this petrochemical world lies in acknowledging the increasing prevalence of petrochemicals in our environment, rather than dissecting individual petrochemicals. Countless individual petrochemicals get vilified in this modern era, but the take home message appears misaligned with healthful intentions. To check the box off year after year banning a certain amount of petrochemicals only makes a dent in this dilemma. At the rate petrochemicals appear in our environment, a ban needs to be placed on all petrochemicals, starting with the ones found in our mattresses, sheets, and food.

Our current system puts bandaids on bullet holes. Symptomatic people get ignored. Interventions, guidelines, and policies only surface at the sight of an emergency. Our toxic laden world has become so normalized that it has drowned out the noise of our own common sense. Malfeasance will always concern the hierarchies, creating the need to vote with our dollar on an individual basis to enact change to move away from petrochemicals and back to our natural environment consisting of natural material free from pesticide usage.

References

TMHS 455: The Surprising Truth About Cancer, Carcinogens, & Community – With Guest Dr. Christian Gonzalez – The Model Health Show

https://www.pbs.org/newshour/science/it-could-take-centuries-for-epa-to-test-all-the-unregulated-chemicals-under-a-new-landmark-bill

Product recalls in the United States – Statistics & Facts | Statista