PCBs AND COUNTRY LIFE

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We quickly discovered that what we were dealing with was a huge puzzle ... a puzzle to which every "authority" had one or more pieces, but that no one individual could put together for us. We'd make a phone call, and the person on the other end of the line would suggest that we talk to someone else. The next person, in turn, would refer us to someone else again, and so on until—finally—we found ourselves talking to scientists actively working on research projects involving PCBs.

One person who was immensely helpful to us in our quest for information was Don Jordan, an environmental reporter for the local newspaper. Don had followed a different set of leads in his own investigation of the PCB controversy ... which meant that—by comparing notes and working together—he and I were able to add to each other's knowledge and make progress a good deal more quickly than either of us could have alone.

Between us, we talked to officials of the EPA, FDA, U.S. Public Health Service, National Cancer Institute, and Environmental Defense Fund, as well as many researchers deeply involved in the study of PCBs. Here's some of what we've learned:

[1] The Westinghouse plant in Bloomington, Indiana has been putting three to eight pounds of PCB's into the city's sewer system per day.

[2] Bloomington's drinking water now contains 3 parts per billion of PCB's ... three hundred times the EPA's 1972 recommended upper limit for PCB's in drinking water.

[3] Fish caught from several streams in and around Bloomington have been found to contain PCB's in excess of the FDA-established limit—for fish—of 5 ppm.

[4] Southern Indiana milk contains varying amounts of PCB's. (Some of the samples that have been tested were above the FDA limit—for milk—of 2.5 ppm.) The contamination is thought to be coming from a PCB-containing substance which has been used as a silo sealer.

[5] Monkeys that were fed 2.5 and 5.0 ppm of PCBs in their diet for two months experienced loss of hair, facial lesions, swollen eyelids, stomach ulcers, and decreased fertility. In other experiments, PCB's have caused liver tumors to appear in mice, rats, and mink.

[6] The Indiana State Board of Health, along with Monroe County and Bloomington city officials, was informed of the toxicity of PCB's as early as 1968 (and again in 1972) and did nothing to prevent Westinghouse from dumping PCB's into the sewer or to warn sludge users of possible health hazards.

Everyone we talked to advised us not to drink the contaminated milk that our cow was (and still is) producing, not to use sludge-treated land to produce food for animals OR humans, and not to eat fish caught in various nearby streams.

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