The Case Against Worrying About Phthalates in Children's Toys

Mark Shapiro, an investigative journalist, makes the case on the Huffington Post about the need to ban phthalates in children's toys. Responding to the charge that he had abandoned journalism for activism, he argues: "My work was reporting the findings of scientists about the apparent havoc wreaked on infant's developing metabolism from phthalates."

But there's a problem: if you are going to muckrake with science, you need to be able to refute scientific evidence which doesn't agree with your hypothesis. That's how science works. Posit a theory, find evidence (or find data and posit a theory), test that evidence and theory against everything else out there.

This, Shapiro doesn't do. He takes only the evidence that supports his position and avoids addressing the problems with it, even though these problems are substantial.

For instance, Shapiro cites "abundant peer-reviewed" evidence for the risks from phthalates, yet he ignores when one of the key pieces of that evidence was called into question by an expert panel of the National Toxicology Program, as Dr. Shanna Swan's key study on phthalate exposure was.

According to Shapiro, Dr. Shanna Swan, Director of the Center for Reproductive Epidemiology at the Rochester University School of Medicine and Dentistry, found "a corollary between the phthalate intake of pregnant women and decreased ano-genital distance in their male offspring."

Actually, she didn't. She claimed to find a correlation. Corollary and correlation don't mean the same thing. More to the point, the anogenital distance was rejected as a biomarker by the expert panel as no-one has determined what a normal range for AGD is to begin with.

And while there is a norm for the anoscrotal distance, Swan's study found no correlation between that marker and in utero phthalate exposure. Swan's statistical correlations were also re-evaluated and found weaker than she claimed.

But most interesting of all, Swan didn't find a statistically significant correlation between the phthalate Shaipiro cites as being widely used in toys - DEHP - and AGD.

It might also have been useful to tell readers that all the baby boys in Swan's study had normal genitals and reproductive functioning. What her statistics showed was a trend whereby a shortened anogenital index might indicate that phthalate exposure in utero is associated with reduced penile volume and delayed testicular descent. One key problem is that she didn't control for premature birth in her study, and as premature babies are much more likely to have undescended testicles, so this may have skewed the results.

Now Swan has repeatedly talked all of this up as indicating the possibility of the "feminization" of boys, which Shapiro notes. But that stretches her evidence beyond breaking point - and I sincerely doubt that many toxicologists or endocrinologists would subscribe to that interpretation of the statistics in her study. In fact, most toxicologists I've spoken to about Swan's work (none of them industry-affiliated) have said, her research is interesting, but that there needs to be a lot more study.

Shapiro however, doesn't seem to believe that this sort of measured interest is sufficient given that the European Union have banned phthalates in children's toys.

But in an astonishing omission for an investigative journalist, Shapiro neglects to mention that the ban was political and not scientific in origin. Indeed, the head of the European Commission's own Scientific Committee on Toxicity, Ecotoxicity and the Environment, which found no risk to children from phthalates in toys, described the European Commission Directorate for Public Health and Consumer Safety decision to push for a ban as a "gross misuse" of its research.

Bringing up the ban without explaining that it was instituted over the objections of the European Commission's own scientists might be said to be a rather gross journalistic license. But it also underscores what the public loses by an investigative journalist getting out of his scientific depth with a topic.

Let's for the sake of argument, say that DEHP, the phthalate Shapiro cites as prevalent in toys, is a reproductive risk to children: if you look at in utero and postnatal exposure routes, the overwhelming source for DEHP is not toys! It's food and dust (from paint), which the latest EU risk assessment points out. In other words, given the disparity, banning toys will have no discernible impact on public health.

That's why it's important to look at ALL the evidence, and not just the stuff that makes for a good muckraking scare story that gets PBS and NPR viewers all hot and bothered about evil corporations. For if Shapiro and Swan et al are right, we're devoting a huge amount of energy to a false solution to the problem. If, that is, they are right. At present, the scientific arguments driving their claims are a lot weaker than they'll admit. But good journalism, like good scientific research, faces up to what it doesn't know, or can't answer, and deals with the strongest evidence against its claims honestly.

Comments

[jeet]

According to Shapiro, Dr. Shanna Swan, Director of the Center for Reproductive Epidemiology at the Rochester University School of Medicine and Dentistry, found "a corollary between the phthalate intake of pregnant women and decreased ano-genital distance in their male offspring."

Would it be improper to describe Swan's conclusions about ano-genital distance as "tainted"?

[dragonfyr]

THANK YOU FOR THE TRUTH!!!!

It's refreshing to have a journalist do proper research instead of spouting the same garbage fed to the media by special interest groups.

I wish more people would research the full history. The group who started all of this was GreenPeace. After losing year after year in their fight to eliminate plastic from the world, they changed tactics. They targeted chemicals in plastics and use skewed, misleading reports on one chemical (DEHP) and then immediately linked this to all chemicals by simply talking about how "the chemicals in PVC have been found to blah blah". They mislead people by making broad statements without merit that media pick up as sound bites. Phthalates are simply not a safety issue; it's a political agenda being pushed by GreenPeace (and others under new names like the Center for Environmental Health and Justice in California) to forward their environmental agenda. They claim it's for the "safety of children" when in fact this is driving a more dangerous situation since manufacturers are now using dozens of chemicals that have 1% of the research done on them when compared to DINP and DEHP. DEHP/DINP are some of the most well studied, well understood chemicals in existence and are perfectly safe when you consider the exposure, dose and toxic response levels (all things all these non-scientists continue to ignore).

Thank you for being a true journalist instead of a hack like these other journalists who do no research.

[TrevorButterworth]

Thanks. Look - the message is simple. Examine all the evidence. Examine it thoroughly, rigorously and dispassionately. Follow the argument wherever the wind takes it, as Socrates said. Don't cherry pick. Don't cite out of context. Be honest. Now, if you want to be truly depressed by the kind of advocacy masquerading as journalism, read about my colleague's misadventures with PBS NOW on this topic. She's a prize-winning mathematician and she was royally shafted by PBS producers, who removed any information from the show that contradicted what Shapiro claims.

http://www.stats.org/stories/2008/dishonest_PBS_NOW_mar27_07.html

[Rule Of Law]

"In other words, given the disparity, banning toys will have no discernible impact on public health."

With this sort of logic, we'd be safe letting our children play in the freeway, just a little.

[TrevorButterworth]

No, the logic is that if the overwhelming majority of a child's exposure is not from toys, then banning toys isn't going to make a difference. It's the degree and route of exposure that makes the risk. Look at it this way, it'd be like banning smoking outside a Chinese smelting plant to improve public health but ignoring the smelting plant - not that phthalates, even by the most alarming research, constitute that kind of risk. And frankly, given your freeway analogy, the real health risks to children from automotive fumes are vastly greater than the hypothetical risks of sucking on a rubber toy.

[TrevorButterworth]

Only if you assume that any exposure whatsoever - even one part per trillion - puts a child at risk. But there is zero research to back that belief - and no reason to believe that levels of phthalates that low could cause any effect. It's illusory to think that banning an insignificant route of exposure is going to change anything. Compare this to the neonatal damage done by parents smoking and drinking, or poor nutrition, and the situation is one where we're panicking over a snowflake, when we're sailing towards several large icebergs. And speaking of metaphorical icebergs, if you look at the statistical data on how many children are killed by cars - even in their own driveways - and how much auto fumes contribute to ill health, your logic would suggest banning them altogether. That proposition, I have much more sympathy for than vinyl toys.

[SamThornton]

Mr. Butterworth is listed as the Editor of STATS (Statistical Assessment Service) which is described on the SourcWatch website as a front for the Center for Media and Public Affairs, an organization funded by such right-wing foundations as the Carthage Foundation (part of the Scaife Foundations) and the Sarah Scaife Foundation. Here are the links to the SourceWatch information:

http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Statistical_Assessment_Service

http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Center_for_Media_and_Public_Affairs

I bring this up not out of any disrespect to Mr. Butterworth, but because this information is lacking from his post and his bio. The right-wing funding, however, because of its association with other astro-turf organizations that routinely provide biased and misleading information, I believe provides a basis to question Mr. Butterworth's objectivity.

[Rule Of Law]

Part two

Yes, cars and auto fumes are dangerous. So are landmines, depleted uranium shells, tiger attacks in India (instant, and nearly always fatal) and Ebola, for which there is no cure. Agreed! There are many dangers--man made for the most part--in our modern world, that need to be addressed. Until Butterfield can distance himself from corporate interests, I will need to continue relying on Sirota and Palast for real news.

If the question is, "How far do you want to live from Chernobyl?" I'd prefer an answer from a reporter that doesn't say, "Guess it depends on which way the wind is blowing that day...!"

[Rule Of Law]

Sam, spot on as usual. Few of us can argue science with Mr. Butterfield. Though he is Not a scientist, he does convincingly play one here on the internet, and with his access to volumes of data from his supporters, he can easily talk over even the most well meaning of us.

I would understand his vigilance, if, in the tradition of great investigative reporters (and as evidenced by the pro-active nature of his responses here) he researched and reported All sides of the issue--whatever it may be. But his very carefully worded non-denial of STATS relationship to CMPA and their widely recognized conservative and corporate bent, leads me to question exactly what Butterworth's dog has in this fight?

I would be more inclined to take him at his word if, just once, I saw him file a report that was not in lockstep with the drug or chemical industries. Alluding to the Rockefellers as beacons of the Progressive Movement, alone, raises red flags for me. And, invoking that closet Republican, Clinton, does nothing to bring me to his side. Makes me wonder what sort of spin he would give to the disasters in Bhopal and Minimata? Unfair? Perhaps. But until I see more balance in his reportage, the question remains.

[Rule Of Law]

Part two

Yes, cars and auto fumes are dangerous. So are landmines, depleted uranium shells, tiger attacks in India (instant, and nearly always fatal) and Ebola, for which there is no cure. Agreed! There are many dangers--man made for the most part--in our modern world, that need to be addressed. Until Butterfield can distance himself from corporate interests, I will need to continue relying on Sirota and Palast for real news.

If the question is, "How far do you want to live from Chernobyl?" I'd prefer an answer from a reporter that doesn't say, "Guess it depends on which way the wind is blowing that day...!"

[TrevorButterworth]

Widely recognized corporate bent by whom? By people that are pushing an agenda and can't marshall rigorous science to support their case. Yeah, that's all I get from the left is ad hominem arguments. And clearly, if Bill Clinton is a Republican to you, only an avowal of your beliefs by me will satisfy you of my independence. And this I cannot do because your premises, if only generally adduced from your post, are themselves unquestioned by you on scientific grounds because you, by admission, are not able to defend them scientifically.

On PFOA, phthalates, and BPA, the environmental movement has and are misleading the public with their claims. They have distorted the evidence and the science. And journalists have mostly given them a free pass. Most scientists I know are appalled by the level of scientific discussion in the media of these issues. I make no apologies for trying to redress this, although it was the last thing in the world I got into journalism to do.

[TrevorButterworth]

Dear Sam,

Not everything you read on the Internet is true. And Sourcewatch is as selective Mark Shapiro is with his science. Yes, CMPA and STATS has received money from Scaife. But because both organizations are non-partisan, they receive and are open to receiving money from center and left wing foundations too. So, CMPA has received funding from the NRDC, the Rockefeller Brothers and other liberal foundations. Bill Clinton wrote admiringly of CMPA's work in his biography. STATS has been recommended by the BBC and are material has been cited by the Guardian for why the phthalates scare has been overblown. Of course, certain activists who can't argue on the science prefer to go with such "astroturfing" smear tactics.

[TrevorButterworth]

Hi Wilburr,

You write that I am "operating under a practice of exposure that maintains that there is some critical level, below which there are no adverse health effects." Yes - I am - as is every regulatory body in the world. It's called the No Adverse Effect Exposure Level, and it's a standard measurement in toxicology whereby a daily reference dose is calculated (ie, a level of chemical exposure which will cause no harm plus a large safety margin). If toxicology didn't work this way, you'd die from the naturally occurring carcinogens in vegetables. There have been numerous risk assessments for phthalates - and you'd have to drink bottles of nail polish, buckets of cologne or eat rubber ducks to exceed them

[Wilburrr]

Well, Mr Butterworth.... when you took whatever chemistry courses you have under your belt, weren't you required to use protective eye wear? Weren't you also required to wear a lab coat? Weren't you taught to treat all chemicals with care? Why was that? If you do a web search for "phthalates and health" you will certainly find that this topic is controversial. Shouldn't we employ the same care with these materials that you were taught in school? You are operating under a practice of exposure that maintains that there is some critical level, below which there are no adverse health effects. Can you tell us what that level is when dealing with phthalates? When the Bush administration appoints fox to watch the hen houses of public oversight, don't we need to take extra caution in our personal lives in situations of this nature? When it was suggested, back in the '70's, that chlorofluorocarbons might be destroying the earth's ozone layer wasn't it wise that we took the cautious approach? Why not take a cautious approach here? Certainly all of the data you demand is not in!

[dragonfyr]

Your response is ludicrous. If we followed your principle (which is the same principle these misguided activists are using), not one single product would ever be produced. The reports published by both the US scientists and EU scientists who researched this clearly indicated that the exposure from phthalates in plastics is not an issue; period, end stop. People like you continue to spout this "zero tolerance" policy that is as dangerous as it is ludicrous. Phthalates are not pouring out of these products. They are a substance that is embedded into the plastic that migrates out slowly in a parts per million level. You are able to drink a cup of these pthalates and still have no effect based ont heir toxicity profile researched by valid scientists (not ones paid for by industry, so don't even try that arguement). These simply are not an issue. This is a politically motivated issue driven by GreenPeace in their new attempt to get plastic materials out of the environment. Any claim about child safety is a complete farce!

[Wilburrr]

Both you and Butterworth miss my point. The truth is the jury is still out on phthalate exposure. It is obviously controversial and taking a cautious approach seems wise. Why are phthalates regulated so heavily in Europe? Phthalates don't 'pour out' of these objects? Have you checked those original Barbie dolls??