Home products, cleaning agents, mosquito spraying, lawn care products, lead paint, small balls and marbles, asbestos and more are injuring and killing as many as the wars about which we speak daily. Let's go after these producers of illness and death also!
The "War" is Not The Only Thing Killing and Injuring Innocents New Homes Designed By Profit Hungry Developers/"Builders' are Worse-but worse still are what people put on their lawns and allow their communities to put into the air, soil and water. Some see these dangers as political, rather than health issues. However, then i guess a great many people are contracting health problems and dying of their political beliefs or disbeliefs. A study ought to be made of how many who do believe that, for instance OSB board releasing Formaldehyde, become ill from it. Or those who do believe that who move into a new home in which the Oil based staining and polyurethane treatment of floors does or does not suffer from the illnesses that such causes. The onward march of "Better Living Through Chemistry" has proven in many cases, to be a bonanza of disease and death for the medical establishment and undertakers.
While parents are hysterically busy searching their homes for toys and other things that might poison their offspring, they are missing the bigger picture, as most people do, who are not fully informed and always cling to the latest trends and fashions.
Is lead paint on toys dangerous? Of course it is. It can cause them major health problems, but living in a house with asbestos can cause them Mesothelioma a deadly cancer of the lungs which death rate is 100%.
It appears that millions of very popular toys were covered in paint containing lead, but the possibility of being subjected to lead poisoning by eliminating lead painted toys is only minimally reduced as in older homes the walls are most likely covered with leaded paint and if remodeling begins the dust created in removing it is as or more deadly. Even if no remodeling or redecorating is done, deteriorating lead paint on walls is a large risk for children and pregnant women, as well as healthy adult males.
Children and pregnant women should not be present during scraping and other remodeling and those doing the remodeling, should wear hats, gloves and proper breathing devices that are tested and approved for toxic dust filtering. Such dust can lodge in Forced air HVAC and haunt the home for month's even years. If remodeling is begun it might be a better idea to replace the Forced Air HVAC with a combination of Geothermal HVAC and Solar shingles, a much cleaner and far more inexpensive means of HVAC, in which the electric company PAYS YOU a monthly fee, and your heating/cooling costs are close to nothing.
The greatest fear concerning lead is the particularly noxious, insidious and cumulative nature and nature of its. It attacks the central nervous system and the brain of smaller children, whose systems are still undergoing development, leading to impaired intellects, learning disabilities, and a lifetime of substandard health and existence.
Balloons have always been a problem for children. Sometimes a child in trying to blow up a balloon, sucks in to get a breath and, the doctors says, "Balloons tend to drape themselves over the top of the voice box like shrink wrap; there's a suction that's created." "It will conform to the shape of the entrance of the larynx and will completely block off the airway."
Adding to the run on toys, the toxic dog food and other toxic products, even though their were less recalls in 2007, the RC2 Corp. in June recalled 1.5 million Chinese made Thomas & Friends wooden trains because of lead paint, Americans were up in arms over Chinese products.
Their fears were exponentially widened in August when Mattel Inc. world's largest toy maker, taking no chances, followed suite with a series of recalls of Chinese made products.
The question for some in pediatric medicine is whether worry about imported lead paint obscures equal or greater perils much closer to home.
In 2005, the most recent year for which data are available, 20 children younger than 15 died from toy-related injuries, according to the federal Consumer Product Safety Commission.
Nine children between the ages of 15 months to 8 years old, died by choking on toys, six died swallowing balls which blocked their the throat leading to the lungs, and another choked on a toy dart and yet another died accidentally sucking in a balloon or part of a balloon and still another after swallowing beads off a toy horse, and still.
While lead painted toys of every sort are a definite risk, more risky are other toys such as small rubber balls and marbles, which have been responsible for the deaths at least 12 children last year. Dr. Gary Smith director of the Center for Injury Research and Policy at the Columbus, Ohio, Children's Hospital, says Ball-shaped objects are particularly dangerous. "If you took the best engineers in the world and asked them to design a perfect plug for a child's airway, you couldn't do much better than a round rubber ball," "It's airway-sized, it's airway-shaped and it will wedge itself in so that it is very hard to dislodge and will completely block the airway."
You don't see them much anymore but I was nearly killed using a bean blower as a kid 10 years old, one of my pals showed me how to speed up loading, by using the bean blower as a straw, sucking the peas up into the mouth, I tied it and the pea caught in my wind pipe, I drew in air through my nose and coughed as hard as possible and up came to pea. That was the end of Pea-speed-loading, for me.
Magnetic toys are atop the list of most dangerous. Mattel recalled more than 18 million worldwide and it had nothing to do with Chinese lead or manufacturing, instead because of a design error through which magnets could become detached from the toy, and which could be then swallowed. If a child were to swallow more than one magnet, the magnets could attract one another causing severe intestinal or stomach damage or worse, life threatening blockages or perforations.
Professor Bagnolo is a Renaissance man: Cultural Anthropologist, Architectural designer, painter, writer, novelist, theologian. As a child prodigy, abed with polio for almost two years, with an off the charts IQ, reading at the graduate level by 5th grade, offered an opportunity to skip three grades at age 8. Later He was a recipient of an Art Institute scholarship at age 11, a Ford Foundation Fellowship in Anthropology and in Painting and a merit scholarship in art, and was appointed a Graduate Research Assistant position in college. He holds a triple bachelor's degree in Painting and Drawing, Anthropology, Architectural Design Advertising. MA's in Cultural Anthro, Painting and more. After being tenured he taught; architecture, anthropology, Theology, advertising, painting and drawing, entrepreneuring and Creative Profit Making. He produced a star-studded Music festival, had a radio talk show in Chicago, and cable TV show. Now, retired from Teaching, he paints, writes, and pursues other ventures.
The above bio harvested from the comments of Deans, colleagues, students, clients and collector's.
You are not only a hunk, but a great investigative and insightful writer. Thanks for your stuff. PS I sent you an email w/my picture and contact info to your art site will you call me? Aggie
by
Agatha Payne (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 2 diaries, 43 comments)
on Tuesday, September 25, 2007 at 2:53:54 PM
