Message from charlie.cray@green2.greenpeace.org

[charlie.cray@green2.greenpeace.org]

----------
Original-TO:      dioxin-l@essential.org
----------
 
Another disease associated with endocrine disruptors such as
dioxin may be Parkinson's Disease.  Here's an NPR interview with
Fred Vom Saal.  Also refer to the Erice statement: 
 
12. NPR Living on Earth:  Chemicals linked to Parkinson's Disease 
       September 6, 1996
Living on Earth's Daniel Grossman's says Parkinson's Disease may
be a result of  exposure to industrial or agricultural chemicals.
People who live in agricultural regions where pesticides are
used, or who drink water from shallow wells which are often
polluted with chemical runoff, are more likely to be afflicted
with the illness than city dwellers and customers of cleaner
public water supplies. Studies abroad like one in China by Dr.
Carolyn Tanner of the Parkinson's Institute also link the disease
to exposure to synthetic chemicals. It's a conclusion that
doesn't surprise University of Missouri biologist Fred Vom Saal.
He's recently been involved in some groundbreaking research
studying the effects of chemicals on other parts of the body and
the brain. VOM SAAL: "We already know that there are
environmental chemicals that can damage brain development and
lead to permanent changes in the functioning of the brain systems
that in fact are involved in certain types of human diseases."
GROSSMAN: "Dr. Vom Saal is referring to hormone disrupters.
Synthetic chemicals like dioxin and PCBs that can upset the
development and growth of humans and animals. Recent research
including a study of the children of women who consumed
contaminated fish from the Great Lakes show these chemicals can
cause behavioral abnormalities like reduced intelligence and
increased aggression. Dr. Vom Saal wonders if the same poisons
might cause Parkinson's Disease as well." VOM SAAL: The
interesting thing we know about these chemicals is that they can
interfere with thyroid hormone, which is a major regulator of
brain development. And one of the consequences of this is you
also have abnormal dopamine levels. Which is exactly what you see
later on in life in Parkinson's Disease." GROSSMAN: "Disrupting
the thyroid is only one of many ways these chemicals might be
implicated in Parkinson's. Researchers at New York State's
Department of Public Health recently discovered that rats fed
certain PCBs exhibit dramatic dopamine reductions in the same
part of the brain, the substantia nigra, as people with
Parkinson's. And Dr. Richard Seegal, who directed the research,
says recent other new findings make him wonder if the effect is
multiplied if more than one chemical is involved. Scientists at
Tulane University announced last spring that a mixture of
pesticides subjected to cells in the laboratory are hundreds of
times more toxic than any one acting alone. Dr. Segal says the
research is a call to arms. If a similar, synergistic mechanism
is at work in Parkinson's Disease, that may explain why
researchers who have been testing compounds one at a time have
been stymied for so long.

----------