Perchlorate in Groundwater Conference

[Larry Ladd <llladd@sprintmail.com>]

Since perchlorate is a 'suspect' in thyroid malfunctions, I am curious if it
is also being suspect in all the other endocrine diseases such as pancreatic
cancers or diabetes.



A Houston woman in her 30s who lived next to our 300 ppb perchlorate well
was diagnosed with both thyroid and pancreatic cancer. Her family broke off
contact before I could get further info and verify the account, so it might
have been a hoax. The perchlorate suit in Redlands also features a woman
with multiple endocrine problems. About half of all diabetics have
autoimmune thyroid disease.

Theoretically at some dose perchlorate should disrupt the calcium channels
in the pituitary, parathyroid, pancreas, and c-cells of the thyroid, which
would clearly affect calcitonin and prolactin levels and probably wreak
havoc on the endocrine system in general. But to date  there has been no
discussion of this in the risk assessment. This thyroid tunnel vision has,
from the onset of the perchlorate debate, been created and shepherded by the
industry medical consultants. The regulators are under such intense fire
while their wagons are circled around the familiar ground of the thyroid
that none of them has dared venture to other less-studied mechanisms.

Even before there is any measurable effect on the sodium iodide symporter in
the thyroid or elsewhere in the body (tenative results suggest NIS may exist
in over 20 different tissues), perchlorate forms a film in various nooks and
crannies of the body -- albumin in the blood, DMPC in cell membranes, and
who knows where else. This film persists long after the thyroid effect is
over: The half life of perchlorate in the blood and thyroid is about 8
hours, but it is 32 hours in the skin.

As for a health survey in exposed areas. Have you ever dealt with ATSDR or
the California Dept. of Health Services Office of Environmental Health
Investigations? These people are not in the business of finding health
problems, they are in the business of covering them up. The previous head of
the California DHS, Sandy Smoley, waltzed straight over to Aerojet (the
source of our pollution) and worked for them as a consultant. Personal
injury attorneys? People here in Rancho Cordova were represented by none
other than Erin Brockovich before she was famous. My personal  opinion is
that Brockovich sold out on this issue in return for the film. The woman has
never uttered a word about perchlorate or NDMA, and it's not like she's
camera shy. Why did Jan Schlictman drop Olin as a potentially responsible
party in his Woburn/ Aberjona River child leukemia suit when there is an
NDMA plume flowing from Olin down the Aberjona and a persistence of
childhood leukemia in NDMA-contaminated Wilmington upstream fro Woburn?

The first person to speak out on a national scale as a victim of Sewergate
contamination, Greg Voetsch, was seriously beaten in a "road rage" incident
a week after his interview on Bay Area TV created a furor in the San Martin
perchlorate public meeting. You can view Greg's portrait on the front page
of the Wall Street Journal on the news link at http://www.perchlorate.org .
Some people here in Rancho Cordova who have stories to tell look at what
happened to Greg and say, "uh-uh, not me." Greg can't get his Southern
California personal injury attorney to take any interest in NDMA, which is
much more likely a cause of the illness in his family than perchlorate. He's
trying to find an attorney willing to take this issue on.

Others have tried in the past, and failed. A legal secretary with 30 years
experience was seeking a champion for our community and we were talking on a
conference call with the attorney representing 6000 plaintiffs in the San
Gabriel Valley Aerojet suit. I asked him what he knew about mismethylation
on the Insulin Growth Factor II gene at chromosome 11p15.5, which was
established as the effect of NDMA in drinking water exposure in Kathy Renaud
et al  vs. Martin Marietta and the Denver Water Board case dating 1987. This
results in neuroblastoma andWilm's tumor in fetuses directly exposed, and
embryionic rhabdomyosarcoma amongst children of exposed fathers. His
response: "Gee, that's real cutting edge. I can tell you this case is very,
very political."

At that point the legal secretary moved out of town and had her name
stricken from comments she had made in public EPA forums.

Larry Ladd

Rancho Cordova CA


----- Original Message -----
From: "Stella Bourassa" <Stellalogic@cfl.rr.com>
To: <cpeo@cpeo.org>; "CPEO-post" <cpeo-military@igc.topica.com>
Sent: Tuesday, January 27, 2004 4:36 AM
Subject: Re: Perchlorate in Groundwater Conference


The thyroid is one small part of the endocrine system=
>
> that also includes the pituitary, thymus, pancreas, parathyroid and
adrenal=
>
> glands.  I do not have a medical background but it would seem to me that
> perchlorate would also interfere with these other glands and their
> functions.  Is there any 'tracking' system in these communities to monitor
> abnormally high incidences of endocrine diseases?  Has anyone in the
> community considered creating an informative flyer and mailing or faxing
> this information to the local doctors and hospitals in the area?
>
> Stella

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
CPEO: A DECADE OF SUCCESS.  Your generous support will ensure that our 
important work on military and environmental issues will continue.  
Please consider one of our donation options.  Thank you.
http://www.groundspring.org/donate/index.cfm?ID=2086-0|721-0