"Little danger from tarballs" and Corexit 9500 is "a slight hazard."

[onestepforward]

:wtf:


http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/37520064/ns/disaster_in_the_gulf/

Skeptical public fears oil-spill health issues
Experts say medical risks will be mild, but many people just don't believe it

snip-
For nearly seven weeks, local and national health officials have stressed that most medical risks likely will be mild and confined to workers exposed to oil and chemical dispersants at the source of the Deepwater Horizon disaster.

“The human toxicity of oil, it’s pretty low,” said LuAnn White, a toxicologist and director of the Tulane Center for Applied Environmental Health in New Orleans, La. “It looks awful, it’s coating the birds, but the toxicity of those compounds is very low.”

snip-
Last week, the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said that tarballs now washing up on Florida beaches pose little danger and that exposure to small amounts of oil and dispersants is not harmful.


snip-
Corexit 9500, a dispersant being used in such vast amounts, is rated as a 1 on the HMIS scale, or a slight hazard, according to the product's Material Safety Data Sheet, which warns against contact with eyes, skin or lungs.

Critics such as the coalition Safer Chemicals, Healthy Families charge that the dispersants have not been adequately tested and that the ingredients in the products have not been fully disclosed, obscuring potential health problems.

The worst health effects of oil exposure occur early and then diminish over time, White said. Volatile compounds in the oil, which are most toxic, evaporate quickly into the air. By the time oil reaches beaches, and becomes so-called "weathered oil," it has lost most of its toxicity. By the time it shows up as tarballs, the risk is even lower, she said.

Studies of dispersants have focused more on the effect on aquatic life than human life, White said. Though little is known about the long-term effects of the substance, she said an analogy would be the difference between people being exposed to dish soap residue after doing dishes versus dumping the stuff into a fish tank.

"It's not going to hurt you, but it might kill your fish," she said.

snip-

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

1. Agreed

:shrug:

[onestepforward]

3. So this seems like a credible article to you?

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

5. Yes.

But then again I am familiar with basic chemistry and toxicology.

[realisticphish]

7. don't let facts

spoil the message!!

This article isn't saying this isn't an environmental disaster. Far from it. But the actual, chemical toxicity of oil decreases over time, it's a fact. This will devastate the coastline, no doubt; but it will primarily be from the physical presence of oil clogging and suffocating, not actually poisoning. I'm no chemist, but facts are facts.

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

8. That's what I'm saying.

The hysteria over the dispersant is ridiculous. Better the dispersant than great globs of oil.

[laconicsax]

2. Just looking at the picture...

That's the wrong way to clean up dog poop. You're supposed to turn the bag inside-out, use it to pick up the poop, turn it right-side-out and seal it.

wikihow.com has a good article on this. http://www.wikihow.com/Pick-Up-Dog-Poop

[Scuba]

4. That must be why they banned Corexit in UK. They only like toxic stuff in their water.

[RB TexLa]

6. I didn't think anyone thought petroleum was that dangerous to humans.

[obxhead]

9. We used to hose down our homes, belongings, and children in

DDT as well. Turned out to be not such a great idea.

[NC_Nurse]

10. I thought this "light sweet crude" contained benzene in some form. That stuff is

definitely toxic, not to mention carcinogenic. Maybe I heard wrong? :shrug:

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

11. In large amount, yes.

It's also volatile. And like the article is saying, by the time it reaches the beach in the "tar ball" form much of the volatiles have evaporated.

I suspect you're getting more benzene every time you fill up your tank then by picking up tar balls at the beach.

[SoCalDem]

12. and who would have thought that having picnics at Nuke testing would be bad for you?

or that DDT would hurt humans...or that Agent Orange was not safe and wonderful ?

[agent46]

13. Just remember kids!

Tarballs are more afraid of you than you are of them. And when you go to the gulf - don't drink the water. (It'll loosen yer stool.)

There. Problem solved.
:beer:

[marions ghost]

14. Mercury, lead and other toxins...in crude

http://www.drury.edu/multinl/story.cfm?nlid=246&id=25139

Drury professor: There's more to the oil leak than just oil

For Immediate Release: June 4


SPRINGFIELD, Mo., May 27, 2010 – Everyone hopes that sooner rather than later, the millions of gallons of crude gushing from the leaking deep-sea oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico will be stopped and cleaned up, but one expert says the more significant, long-term disaster will be the impact of waste oil products being released into the ocean along with the crude oil.

In fact, Dr. Sean Terry, Associate Professor of Environmental Studies at Drury University, says the leaking oilrig is a reminder that every oil well on earth is causing environmental degradation, with little oversight in the U.S. and nearly none at all in other countries.

"That mud they tried to use to plug up the leak is not natural mud,” says Terry. It's an industrial lubricant, with toxic ingredients. In addition to this, raw oil comes out of the ground with more ingredients than just oil and natural gas. "It also includes water, salt and toxic metals in a brine, and up to 10 gallons of this waste product are produced for every gallon of crude pumped from any well on earth." These toxic materials are flowing into the Gulf of Mexico in addition to the crude oil, and they may pose a more serious, and more long-term environmental threat than the oil itself.

Dr. Terry can discuss:

* How Gulf oilrigs try to dispose of wastewater in rubber-lined estuary pits, but when storm high tides come, the wastewater often is washed into the gulf or ocean.
* How the material BP is proposing to use to plug the leak is not "mud" but actually waste products from petroleum extraction that is another pollutant.
* His research in oil fields in Oklahoma and Texas, how toxic scars on the landscape still linger from drilling that took place 100 years ago, how companies then dumped wastewater on the ground and the salts and metals destroyed any growth. Then how they tried pumping it into abandoned wells, polluting groundwater, which, ironically, flows even today into the Red and Arkansas Rivers, then into the Mississippi and ends up polluting the Gulf, which Terry calls the "toilet" of the U.S.
* Why oil companies are immune to regulation for disposal of these waste products.
* The bioaccumulation of this toxic waste in the Gulf that he foresees being a factor in the food chain for a minimum of a decade. “There is still not a blade of grass in many areas of Oklahoma from oil waste dumped in 1914,” he says.
* How the mercury, lead and other toxins will not only degrade fish and seafood quality, but also the reproductive health of all Gulf species.
* Why we need stricter regulation of waste oil products in this country and around the world.

[onestepforward]

20. Great information.

I didn't know about the 10 gallons of waste product for every gallon of crude nor what the waste product consists of. Ugggg.

I will bookmark that site. Thank you!

[marions ghost]

23. yes that factoid struck me too

10 gal toxic waste for every gallon of crude.

[inna]

15. Tell it to cancer victims of previous spills.

[flyarm]

16. wow PR can be bought at the cost of a child's life and safety..I didn't know that was possible!!

that bastard exposing that child should have that child removed from his custody! And that is my opinion as a mother and grand mother!

Who in their right mind would expose a child to the tar balls..when no one knows how damn dangerous it really is?

Yeah yeah..just try telling me it is safe..they used to wrap homes and schools with asbestos too! And coat our hardwood floors with polyurathane..and dump toxins in our cities..how much did we pay to remove toxic waste sites from our cities?? oh yeah and my brother worked on some of those sites and now sits in a hospital with a very agressive Leukemia..he was also told the zoot suits he wore would protect him! His hair is now falling out in chunks after finishing his Chemo last week!

What a load of shit!

What a piece of Pr horseshit!

I guess some people can be sold a load of shit and they will buy the crap hook, line and sinker!

What is that saying..there is a fool born every minute??????

[onestepforward]

18. I was very suspicious of this article.

I've been reading on DU and independently searching for information on the oil and dispersants and this article really bothered me. I think that it is deceptive, starting with the picture, and would probably confuse the average person who hasn't researched the information.

With BP making sure that the workers do not talk to the press, restricting reporters and photographers, etc., it really got me wondering if they are now influencing news articles too?

I found this article on my local message board, posted by a pro-BP right winger. This was his evidence that this oil and the dispersants are basically non-toxic for humans. Not that MSNBC is so great, but I was disappointed that they published it.

I hope your brother recovers quickly and I wish him the very best.

[Art_from_Ark]

19. Don't forget lead-based paint

That was supposed to be A-OK, too.

[MisterP]

17. think they'll have simpering SweetSurprise.com-style ads

where doubters are stricken dumb when some smarmy relative or girlfriend spouts a corporate line?

or will they just lament it as "denialism" and lump it together with global warming deniers, accusations of antidepressant suicides distrust of mercury compounds and pharma, critics of the Bell Curve, Derrida, Theosophists, people who buy organic, and that girl who was reported to have killed herself when the LHC went online?

[onestepforward]

21. It wouldn't surprise me at all.

That SweetSurprise.com site is a trip.

[Feron]

22. Tar balls in general won't hurt you, but...

due to the dispersant I would steer clear of any area affected by this particular spill.

[flyarm]

26. tell the dead birds the tar balls aren't bad!! eom

[blindpig]

24. Whose experts?

As though we haven't seen this movie before....

Kill Capitalism

[KharmaTrain]

25. We Know What We Don't Know...

That's the frustrating aspect of this entire disaster. We've had to rely on a hapless and wreckless corporate to take responsibility for a problem they created and we saw early on they never had any real plans for a real spill or what the consequences would be. There was no impact study, just projected profits.

We know there's a toxic soup out there...add the Corexit and the affects aren't known. There is no "Plan A" here nor any real experience...just a lot of knee-jerk reactions that may prove to have made matters worse than better.

There will be a need for close monitoring on many levels in the months and years ahead. Those involved in the clean-up will need to get some type of hazardous pay and provisions for extended medical care (at BP expense)...none of this contracting shit! This will be a fast learning curve and the government walks a fine line as its the only real conduit for relief.