Chemical Pollution

Chemical pollution usually have toxic effect. Each year American Industry about 126 billion pounds of toxic wastes-enough to fill the New Orleans Superdome from top to bottom every day. According to the EPA, only about 10 percent of these chemical are regularly disposed of safely. The remainder are illegally clumped in municipal landfill, open pits, or lagoons.

Toxic wastes can enter the body through the mouth, nose or skin. Some are stored in the fat of human being and causing damage to vital organs, debilitation, and death. Some toxic waste substances, such as asbestos, benzene, vinyl chloride, and arsenic, are carcinogenic. Others are teratogenic (causing birth defects) or mutagenic (trigering mutation in genes).

Among the toxic waste substance whose health dangers have been documented are poly-chlorinated bisphenyls (PCBs) poisons whose chemical structure is similar to that of the persisent pesticide DDT. A component of electrical insulator, adhesives, sealants, printing inks, waxes and other products. PCBs are believed to produce cancer in laboratory animals, and they have been linked to reproductive disorders, kidney damage, liver ailments, and eye irritation in humans.