U.S. facing "grievous harm" from chemicals in air, food, water, panel says

An expert panel that advises the president on cancer said Thursday that Americans are facing "grievous harm" from chemicals in the air, food and water that have largely gone unregulated and ignored. The President's Cancer Panel called for a new national strategy that focuses on such threats in the environment and workplaces.

Epidemiologists have long maintained that tobacco use, diet and other factors are responsible for most cancers, and that chemicals and pollutants cause only a small portion -- perhaps 5 percent. (...)

"With the growing body of evidence linking environmental exposures to cancer, the public is becoming increasingly aware of the unacceptable burden of cancer resulting from environmental and occupational exposures that could have been prevented through appropriate national action," the panel wrote in a report released Thursday. (...)

"There are far too many known and suspected cancer-causing chemicals in products people, young and old, use every day of their lives," said Kenneth A. Cook, president and co-founder of Environmental Working Group, an environmental advocacy group. "Many of these chemicals are believed to be time bombs, altering the genetic-level switching mechanisms that lead to cancerous cellular growth in later life."

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