In Ontario’s provincial election, leaders of the three political parties recently submitted blood and urine samples to environmentalists “to be analyzed for chemical contaminants,” according to a story in The Globe and Mail. “According to a report on the results [released] Friday,” says the story, “the three men carry in their bodies a bewildering variety of pesticides, residues from stain and grease repellants, and compounds used in plastics.” What’s more:
The highest chemical exposures the politicians had were for a class of compounds known as phthalates, chemicals used to soften plastic and a primary component of the new car smell in automobiles. Phthalates are often also found in cosmetics, to which politicians are exposed more than most men because they typically have makeup applied before appearing in television studios.
Phthalates, for the uninitiated, have been of great concern for some years to people who use sex toys. Disturbingly ubiquitous in modern products, phthalates can cause all sorts of problems, not least the disruption of hormones, leading Treehugger’s Lloyd Alter to offer that the region’s three main (male) political leaders “are so chock full of gender benders like phthalates and Bisphenol A, they should be wearing dresses.” Which would certainly make politics more interesting.
”Finding out what toxics are in your body is a humbling experience,” liberal leader Dalton McGuinty told The Globe and Mail.
Link, via Treehugger.
Image via the Globe and Mail story.