Toxic / endocrine disrupting chemicals in outdoor equipment & clothes.

[Darryle]

Anything that is processed, by man or machine has the potential to be damaging.

If you are worrying about this stuff now, you're late to the party. At some point, a researcher somewhere has said something that was dangerous is no longer dangerous and something that wasn't dangerous is now dangerous.

Just remember, if you live in a major Metropolitan area, the water entering and exiting your home, most likely come from the same reservoir.

 

[jj554]

In construction we’re exposed to a number of toxins, some I’ve developed a sensitivity to, but more than anything it has made me more aware of chemicals we’re constantly exposed to.

The type of chemical is important, but also concentration, exposure time, and type of exposure.

Hunting clothes are worn a relatively short amount of time each year, don’t come in direct contact with skin other than base layers, are normally used in great ventilation so off gassing harmful stuff is mostly carried away, and surface contaminants are regularly washed away.

I’ve always thought any chemicals in a pair of boots will make it into the bloodstream since we wear them all day (exposure time) and sweat transfers chemicals freely through socks directly onto the skin.

Everything we touch seems to be made of plastic or rubber - guns, binocs, everything. Knowing all the chemical bottles that go into recycled dumpsters, not to mention even worse industrial waste that gets recycled, it’s safe to assume any plastic we touch is releasing a number of bad things directly onto our skin.

I think in our lifetimes the off gassing of automobile interiors and home building materials will come to the forefront - these are the places we spend most of our time, and standards/testing leave a lot to be desired. Something as simple as an expanded foam is pretty safe, unless it wasn’t produced exactly right then it’s quite toxic - relying on knuckleheads to make anything correctly is a big leap of faith.

Radon is well known, but there are a number of naturally occurring gases that a poorly ventilated house can have at elevated levels - Radon mitigation systems built into a house do a great job of taking care of the other chemicals, even if there isn’t radon present. I’ve seen building lots that are permanently off limits to residential construction because the ground releases naturally occuring toxic gasses other than radon.

I personally met the guy who originally was in charge of marketing Teflon - it sounded great at first, but I’ve all but stopped using Teflon pans because ingesting what comes out of it at high temps doesn’t seem like a good risk/benefit choice.

We haven’t even touched on the processed food industry - God help us all. Lol

The story behind the Teflon scandal at Dupont is tragic. There were both immediate effects like horrible birth defects among pregnant women as well as long term cancers. This newspaper did a three-part series on the story.

How DuPont Slipped Past the EPA

The Environmental Protection Agency has long known that C8 is harmful to human health. But the chemical, which is in the bloodstream of 99.7 percent of Americans, remains unregulated at the national level.

theintercept.com