News Coverage
Some Inland milk tainted
PERCHLORATE: The state says a group's findings may not change its policy.
Published June 21, 2004
Some California supermarket milk is contaminated with the same rocket-fuel chemical that has fouled Inland water supplies and tainted some food crops, an environmental advocacy group is warning in a new report.
The Environmental Working Group said the new findings should promptstate health officials to rethink where they set drinking water standards that ultimately will guide efforts to clean up perchlorate contamination. In sufficient amounts, perchlorate can disrupt the thyroid's ability to produce hormones that regulate metabolism and fetal development.
State health officials said the perchlorate found in milk doesn't pose an immediate health threat to the public and that people - including mothers and young children - should not eliminate milk from their diet.
In addition, they said, the milk findings may not change where the stateultimately sets its health standard for drinking water early next year. As they weighed how much could be consumed safely in water, state officials assumed that 40 percent of the perchlorate people ingest comes from food.
The report being released today by the Environmental Working Group said perchlorate was found in milk samples the group collected and in samples collected by California's Department of Food and Agriculture. Some perchlorate was at levels higher than the 6 parts per billion that state scientists consider safe in drinking water.
State agency faulted
The environmental group also said the agriculture department failed toshare its findings with state officials who were developing a public health goal for the chemical earlier this year. That health goal, which will guide the development of a state drinking water standard, is based on how much of the chemical the public is exposed to in food as well as water.
But Steve Lyle, a Department of Food and Agriculture spokesman, said hisagency's samples weren't taken until April - a month after the public health goal was completed.
He said the department's samples were taken from bulk milk supplies throughout California to test new technology designed to identify perchlorate contamination in dairy products. The tests found perchlorate in amounts ranging from 1.5 ppb to 10.6 ppb in all 34 samples. Lyle said no further tests are planned.
"There is no state or federal regulatory standard for perchlorate in foods," he said.
The Environmental Working Group found perchlorate in 31 of 32 milk samples purchased from grocery stores in Orange and Los Angeles counties. The tests, which were performed by researchers at Texas Tech University, found perchlorate at levels ranging from .58 ppb to 3.62 ppb. The group report did not identify which grocery stories it obtained the milk from.
Bill Walker, the Environmental Working Group's spokesman, said the state should reassess how much perchlorate can be considered safe in drinking water in light of the perchlorate found in milk. But Walker said the test results are not definitive and should not prompt mothers and young children to quit drinking milk.
'Cause for concern'
"The last thing we want to do is create a food scare," Walker said. "There are all sorts of benefits from drinking milk. The levels (of perchlorate) are cause for concern, but not for alarm."
Perchlorate has been found in water supplies in at least 22 states, including Inland water basins serving Rialto, Redlands and Riverside, as well as in Colorado River water used to irrigate crops in the Imperial Valley.
An Environmental Working Group report last year found perchlorate in winter lettuce purchased from California supermarkets.
Walker believes the cows may be picking up perchlorate from their feed, particularly alfalfa irrigated with perchlorate-contaminated water.
Before California adopts an enforceable drinking water standard, Walker said, "these findings must be taken into account."
But Allan Hirsch, a spokesman for California's Office of Environmental Health Hazards Assessment, questioned whether the group's findings would change the outcome.
"We assumed that people would get as much as 40 percent of their exposure from perchlorate in milk, food and other sources besides drinking water," he said. Although the agency has seen only a summary of the Environmental Working Group's report, "it doesn't seem like it would have made the public health goal different."
Perchlorate has been found previously in milk. Scientists at Texas Tech University reported last year that they had found up to 6 parts per billion of perchlorate in seven samples of supermarket milk purchased in Lubbock. They also found 3 to 4.5 ppb of the chemical in one sample of human breast milk.
In recent months, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration tested bulk milk in nine geographic areas around the country and found perchlorate present in each sample, said Rachel Kaldor, executive director of the Dairy Institute of California. The trade group represents dairy processors.
"It's a national issue," she said. Milk purchased from Southern California grocery stores could be from California, Nevada or Arizona, she said.
Regardless of the perchlorate levels shown, she said, the Dairy Institute hopes efforts to remove perchlorate from water and food supplies proceeds quickly.
"Because cows have got to drink water and that's just the bottom line. And so do the rest of us," she said.
Perchlorate, the main chemical in solid fuel rocket engines, disrupts the thyroid's ability to produce hormones that govern metabolism and development of brains and bones in fetuses and young children.
The debate is over how much perchlorate is too much.The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the state of Massachusetts suggest the safe limit is at 1 part per billion.
Earlier this year, California environmental health officials concluded that 6 parts per billion in drinking water is safe for the most sensitive people - expectant mothers and developing infants in the womb.
The perchlorate industry and the military, which is the biggest consumer of the chemical, argue that up to 200 parts per billion of perchlorate in drinking water can be safely consumed.