[NYTr] Dioxin Spot in Mich. Could Be Worst Ever (So Let's Stop Screaming about China)

[All the News That Doesn't Fit]

[The steady drumbeat of bleating complaints about terrible China are
not exactly apolitical. If manufacturers want to outsource to China,
they should put the specs they require in their contracts and then test
the products they are expected to buy. The US Government should then be
watching over US manufacturers' shoulders, too.  But let's not forget,
either, how much US industry has done to pollute the USA, and along
with the US military, so much else of the world. Let's start with Dow
and its dioxin and agents orange, purple, white, etc. -NY Transfer]

sent by Steven L. Robinson - activ-l

AP via San Francisco Chronicle - Nov 25, 2007
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2007/11/25/national/a174212S80.DTL


Dioxin Spot in Mich. Could Be Worst Ever

The Associated Press

Saginaw, Mich.  -- A find of dioxin at the bottom of the Saginaw River
could be the highest level of such contamination ever discovered in the
nation's rivers and lakes, according to a federal scientist involved in
cleanup efforts downstream from a Dow Chemical Co. plant.

A crew testing the Saginaw and Tittabawassee rivers discovered the
sample, which measured 1.6 million parts of dioxin per trillion of
water, The Saginaw News and The Detroit News reported last week. That
level is about 20 times higher than any other find recorded in the EPA
archives.

"There may be more surprises out there," said Milton Clark, a health and
science expert for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. "I'd be
surprised if there's not more surprises out there."

State guidelines require corrective action on contamination above 1,000
parts per trillion.

Dioxins are toxic byproducts of the manufacture of chlorine-based
products, and some have been linked to cancer and other health problems.

Michigan health officials were worried enough about last week's
announcement that they extended a fish consumption advisory already in
effect for the Tittabawassee River - a Saginaw River tributary that
winds through Dow's plant in Midland - to include the entire Saginaw
River and a portion of Lake Huron's Saginaw Bay, where both rivers'
water ends up.

Dow is removing three dioxin concentrations along a six-mile stretch of
the Tittabawassee. The company plans to remove the latest find, Dow
spokesman John C. Musser said.

"We don't believe there's any imminent or significant human health or
environmental threat," Musser said.

The Michigan Department of Community Health advisory warns against
eating carp, catfish and white bass - fish that feed near the riverbed
where contaminants are buried. It also alerts women of childbearing age
and children against eating certain types of other fish.