{"id":8661,"date":"2005-09-12T17:43:17","date_gmt":"2005-09-13T00:43:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/2005\/09\/12\/risk.html"},"modified":"2014-11-10T11:32:58","modified_gmt":"2014-11-10T18:32:58","slug":"risk","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2005\/09\/12\/risk.html","title":{"rendered":"Risk"},"content":{"rendered":"

My mom writes:<\/p>\n

Don’t know how valid this is or not, but wanted to pass along to you info from an article in the health section of the LA Times this morning. It quoted an Oakland-based environmental group, The Center for Environmental Health that “filed lawsuits late last month against several lunchbox manufacturers and various retailers who sell the products.” The article talks about the discovery of lead in “excess of federal safety standards” in some soft vinyl lunchboxes. Don’t know if you can access the article on the internet. It does reference the website for the group, www.cehca.org.<\/em><\/p>\n

The article itself, I discover, is here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The Center for Environmental Health (CEH) announced it is filing lawsuits today against makers and retailers of soft vinyl lunch boxes that can expose children to harmful levels of lead. The Center has also notified several other companies of violations under California?s toxics law Proposition 65 (Prop 65) for lunch boxes with high lead levels. The lawsuits and violation notices against companies including Toys ‘R’ Us, Warner Brothers, DC Comics, Time Warner, Walgreens, and others involve many lunch boxes featuring beloved children?s characters including Superman, Tweety Bird, Powerpuff Girls, and Hamtaro. The level of lead in one lunch box, an Angela Anaconda box made by Targus International, tested at 56,400 parts per million (ppm) of lead, more than 90 times the 600 ppm legal limit for lead in paint in children’s products.<\/p>\n

Hmm. Katherine does, indeed, have a soft vinyl lunchbox<\/a> (Disney Princesses, inherited from Meredith<\/s> the girls next door, made in China by Zap designs of 100% pure PVC).<\/p>\n

Okay, reality check one: Vinyl lunchboxes are not paint. The point of restrictions of lead in paint in kids’ products is because paint chips and kids eat paint chips and thus ingest lead.<\/p>\n

Granted, we are talking about a lunch<\/em>box, and CEH is quick to say it’s basically the same thing:<\/p>\n

In most cases, the highest lead levels were found in the lining of lunch boxes, where lead could come into direct contact with food. Lead is known to be harmful to children even in minute amounts, as it can impair brain development and cause other behavioral and developmental problems. Children may be exposed to lead from lunch boxes when they eat food that has been stored in them. Handling the lunchboxes just before eating could also be an exposure risk.<\/p>\n

That’s right — kids may be at risk from even touching <\/em>their PVC lunchboxes.<\/p>\n

Um …<\/p>\n

Lead is not good, sure, but, uh … despite CEH seeming to be a legit organization (a quick Google doesn’t find any specific criticism of them), I don’t find myself desperately planning on running out tonight to get a replacement lunchbox for her any time soon. Well, except that her present one doesn’t have enough room for her sandwich case and her thermos, so we’ve been planning on eventually finding a replacement. <\/p>\n

The CPSC has a report on PVC, lead, and children’s toys<\/a>. In particular, it did testing not just for the presence <\/em>of lead in things (as the CEH seems to have done), but on exposure <\/em>risks (i.e., whether kids would be exposed to said lead). The results would seem to be applicable here, at least to this lay person. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

My mom writes: Don’t know how valid this is or not, but wanted to pass along to you info from an article in the health section of the LA Times…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[263,7,23,6,8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8661","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-disney","category-health","category-parenting","category-science","category-zt-pc"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":13209,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2008\/06\/24\/home_depot_will_recycle_c.html","url_meta":{"origin":8661,"position":0},"title":"Home Depot will recycle compact fluorescents","author":"***Dave","date":"Tue 24-Jun-08 9:26am","format":false,"excerpt":"Because compact fluorescent lights (CFLs) contain trace amounts of mercury, there are concerns about their broader use (saving energy and reducing heat). Now Home Depot has announced it will recycle...","rel":"","context":"In "Environment"","block_context":{"text":"Environment","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/science\/environment"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":24601,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2011\/12\/16\/this-is-the-way-we-no-longer-wash-our-clothes-early-in-the-morning.html","url_meta":{"origin":8661,"position":1},"title":"This is the way we (no longer) wash our clothes, early in the morning?","author":"***Dave","date":"Fri 16-Dec-11 7:17pm","format":false,"excerpt":"A bit breathless of an article, to be sure -- there are some questions as to comfort here (are the magical moisture-repellant items comfortable to wear? do they breathe?), as well as health and safety, plus environmental issues (cf. ScotchGard).Plus, of course, laundering items does more than remove stains and\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":44025,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2014\/07\/31\/on-political-lawsuits-and-political-endgames.html","url_meta":{"origin":8661,"position":2},"title":"On Political Lawsuits and Political Endgames","author":"***Dave","date":"Thu 31-Jul-14 5:26pm","format":false,"excerpt":"Can someone point me to something that actually explains what, legally, the House of Representatives is filing suit over? With what standing? To what actual end? \u00a0I mean, what court are they going into, and what result are they actually seeking?Or, like their health care reform alternative, are they just\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":8681,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2005\/09\/08\/back_when_a_car.html","url_meta":{"origin":8661,"position":3},"title":"Back when a carriage return meant a carriage return, dagnabbit!","author":"***Dave","date":"Thu 8-Sep-05 1:34pm","format":false,"excerpt":"Interesting (but anecdotal) article about how manual typewriters are making a comeback amongst the younger generations. Popular wisdom would hold that typewriters are a dying breed, replaced by ever-faster personal...","rel":"","context":"In "Hi-Tech"","block_context":{"text":"Hi-Tech","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/hi-tech"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":134022,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2017\/08\/02\/the-golfing-president.html","url_meta":{"origin":8661,"position":4},"title":"The Golfing President","author":"***Dave","date":"Wed 2-Aug-17 8:33am","format":false,"excerpt":"This Golf\/Sports Illustrated article has been getting play for Trump's alleged comment that he spends so much weekend time off at his resorts because the White House is a \"dump,\" but it's actually a fascinating article at length, looking at how Trump plays golf, who he plays with, and how\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":2068,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2002\/03\/18\/eat_lead_or_not.html","url_meta":{"origin":8661,"position":5},"title":"Eat lead … or not","author":"***Dave","date":"Mon 18-Mar-02 3:19pm","format":false,"excerpt":"While talking about the Dept. of Defense along side \"green\" issues would seem oxymoronic, there's actually quite a bit of environmental sensitivity making its way through the halls of the...","rel":"","context":"In "Fourth Estate"","block_context":{"text":"Fourth Estate","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/media\/fourth-estate"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8661","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8661"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8661\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":47571,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8661\/revisions\/47571"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8661"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8661"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8661"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}