Category Archives: Accessibility

Shouldn’t Cleaning Products REMOVE Pollutants Instead of ADDING Them?

Here’s yet another scientific report about how dangerous chemicals and VOCs are being released from the everyday cleaning products most people use in their homes!

Environmental Defense (Canada) recently released their report THE DIRTY TRUTH, which found that products from some of the biggest cleaning brands (Mr. Clean, Clorox, Lysol, Windex, and PineSol ) pollute the air in Canadians’ homes with harmful chemicals. (Note that these products are not significantly, if at all different in the US, but the EU does have some bans on ingredient that are still allowed here).

ED’s The Dirty Truth follows hot on the heels of Women’s Voices For the Earth’s DEEP CLEAN report, and while both of these reports name names, they had a slightly different focus.

In Deep Clean, Women’s Voices For the Earth graded four major cleaning product manufacturers based on key indicators to expose their commitment to product safety: Product Ingredient Disclosure, Responsiveness to Consumer Concerns, Toxic Chemical Screening Process and Removal of WVE’s Chemicals of Concern.

Dr. Anne Steinemann’s research from earlier this year did not name product names, but she named numerous harmful volatile organic chemicals (VOCs) that the many popular products she tested do release into the air we breathe.

One has to wonder why this is allowed to be going on?

We should not be subjected to harmful industrial pollutants in our own homes!

cleaning pollution 1.

“Our new report found that products from some of the biggest cleaning brands (Mr. Clean, Clorox, Lysol, Windex, and PineSol ) pollute the air in Canadians’ homes with harmful chemicals called Volatile Organic Compounds. These chemicals have been linked to respiratory problems such as asthma and lower IQs.”

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 Volatile Organic Compounds and Your Health

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Are Healthy Hospitals Possible?

That may seem like a dumb question to people who haven’t been in a hospital, but to the rest of us, including those of us who can’t even go into a hospital in life or death situations, it’s a serious one.

hospitals make us sick

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Check out this TEDMED video where Robin Guenther* discusses connections between health and environmental design, and what she and others are doing to make things  different:

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2014 Statistics for MCS, FM, and CFS in Canada

The 2014 statistics for Canadians reporting a diagnosis of fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue syndrome, or multiple chemical sensitivities, (by sex, household population aged 12 and older) are here:

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The Effort and “Inconvenience” of Single-Handedly Trying to Remove Systemic Barriers to Access

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When she needed accommodation, you won’t believe the rigmarole that ensued.

(unless you have MCS/ES)

equal opportunity 1

“They should not have to make significantly more effort to access or obtain service. They should also not have to accept lesser quality or more inconvenience.”

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Someone with MCS (who wishes to remain anonymous) was asked about how her efforts to receive appropriate, safe, accommodation were going, so she could see a health care provider. She is one of a growing number of people who become disabled from exposures to toxic chemicals found in many everyday products and materials, especially in fragrances.

This is pretty much how the story goes:

She contacted a health care provider by phone and talked to a receptionist.

She asked her if they had a scent-free policy and was told they didn’t.

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Optional “Inconvenience”

Guest post and images by Laura J Mac

What always strikes me during conversations about how to persuade service providers to accommodate our disability is how much extra work we have to do just to participate in simple survival stuff. I mean, “simply” tracking down professionals who are willing to accommodate is a chore and a half. The luxury of “having a good relationship” with a service provider falls way down on the list because it’s usually one or the other.

Laura J Mac 1

Nobody would think twice about someone who uses a mobility device asking if there are ramps and elevators but it seems that our need for fragrance-free and reduced chemical exposure is perceived as a “preference” rather than a medical necessity. That perception leads to the idea that accommodation of our disability is an “option” (and generally it’s an “option” that service providers aren’t willing to make available.) It’s not that we don’t “like” fragrance, these chemical exposures cause neurological and physiological problems that interfere with our ability to function on a daily basis.

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When Women Don’t Relinquish Fragrance

Guest post by By Heidi Utz

Several years ago, I posed to my women’s group a simple question: Can we ask members not to wear fragrances here? A hush fell over the room, then a silence so vast you could have heard a vial of Obsession drop. The same sweet women I’d grown to respect morphed into a pack of rabid wolves. No perfume?! It was as if I’d proposed giving up coffee, sugar, and styling gel in one fell swoop.

Since then, I have spent much time puzzling over their response. Are we so addicted to our scented products that the very notion of relinquishing them strikes terror in our hearts? Or is it more that the perfume industry has done such a stellar job in marketing its wares? Even in Santa Fe, where a comparatively high level of health-consciousness exists, we’re still susceptible to those redolent magazine ads, featuring the young and glossily naked in their evidently perfume-induced attractiveness.

But what if perfumiers, like chemical producers, were forced to include in their ads the manufacturer’s safety data sheets (i.e., the very interesting ways each spritz affects your liver)? Sound far-fetched?

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Report: RF EMR and the Health of Canadians

The_Canadian_Flag
… “Numerous concerns relating to radiofrequency (RF) exposure were raised by witnesses during Committee meetings on Safety Code 6 as well as in the briefs that were submitted. …
Witnesses also spoke to possible links between RF exposure and cancer, reproductive issues and autism.These concerns tied in to other testimony that expressed unease about RF exposure in schools as a result of the use of Wi-Fi; the need for RF exposure limits and guidelines to protect vulnerable populations such as pregnant women, infants and children, and others who may be more susceptible to the effects of RF exposure; and electromagnetic hypersensitivity (EHS).
While witness testimony and briefs often emphasized the need for Health Canada to take a precautionary approach to RF exposure by reducing the limits established by Safety Code 6 (and sometimes provided examples of limits and other measures taken to protect populations from RF exposure in other jurisdictions), they also referred to steps that individuals can take to reduce their own RF exposure. Finally, some witnesses stated that industry should play a role in reducing RF exposure.” …
RADIOFREQUENCY ELECTROMAGNETIC RADIATION AND THE HEALTH OF CANADIANS
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Report of the Standing Committee on Health
This much awaited report contains 12 major recommendations by effectively echoing the expert evidence heard by eight MPs during the recent hearings this Committee.
 
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The List of Recommendations:

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It’s Only A Little Fragrance

How many times have we heard it’s “only a little fragrance”?

Telling a person with MCS/ES that there is “only a little fragrance”

is like

telling someone with Celiac Disease that there’s “only a little gluten”

or

 telling someone with a peanut allergy that there’s “only a little peanut”

or

telling someone who uses a wheelchair that there are “only a few steps”.

It’s not ok.

telling 103It’s NOT ok.

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MCS and EHS Included in New National Council on Disability Transportation Report

Press Release from National Center for Environmental Health Strategies

~ Mary Lamielle

Transportation Update NCD

… excerpts …

National Council on Disability Transportation Report Addresses Chemical and Electrical Sensitivities; Recommends Changes in Policies and Practices to Improve Access

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Have Your Say for May by Leah

 

Before I got sick, I was a dog trainer. My life was centered around my dogs,maybe too much, but I was happy. I taught basic classes, worked with serious behavior problems, and competed with my own dogs. It was my culture, and my life.

As MCS started to creep in, it make more difficult and even dangerous, to continue. To have poor reflexes or to miss something because I was brain fogged, could be the difference between success and failure, and sometimes failure meant a bite.

So I had to give it up. But I didn’t give up my personal dogs. While the number of dogs has diminished, I still have 3 beautiful and wonderful dogs left that keep me happy, keep me laughing and keep me sane. They make me get up on the bad days, cuddle with me when I’m sick, and keep my spirits up when I’m sad. And on a really good day, I train.

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