Health Care Without Harm Praises MN Law to Ban Mercury Thermometer Sales

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TO MEDICAL, ENVIRONMENTAL AND POLITICAL EDITORS:

Health Care Without Harm Praises MN Law to Ban Mercury Thermometer Sales

ST. PAUL, MINNESOTA, Apr. 26 -/E-Wire/-- Today, Minnesota Governor Jesse Ventura signed legislation that will all but eliminate the sales and distribution of thermometers that contain mercury. Representative Dan Dorman (R-Albert Lea) and State Senator John Marty (D-Roseville) authored the historic bill, which passed in the House in March and in the Senate last week.

Inappropriate disposal of thermometers and other mercury-containing products is a major source of mercury emissions to the environment, although coal-burning power plants are the top polluter. Once mercury enters the environment, microorganisms in lakes and rivers convert it to the more toxic methylmercury, where it builds up in fish and wildlife.

"This is a great day for the environment, and especially for people and wildlife who like to eat fish!" said Jackie Hunt Christensen, co-coordinator of Health Care Without Harm, an international coalition concerned about the environmental impacts of health care. "We'd like to thank Representative Dorman and Senator Marty for their leadership on this important public health issue, as well as Governor Ventura for signing the bill into law."

Mercury can cause neurological damage, affecting the way we think, see, hear, smell, taste and touch. Most human exposure to mercury comes through eating fish. Pregnant women, women of childbearing age, and young children are particularly at risk from mercury exposure. In fact, the National Academy of Sciences noted in a recent report that more than 60,000 children annually may be at risk for learning disabilities because of mercury-contaminated fish eaten by their mothers during pregnancy. Over 90% of the Minnesota lakes and rivers that have been tested receive fish consumption advisories due to mercury contamination, totaling over 800 in 2000.

Each fever thermometer contains approximately one gram of mercury, which may not seem like much. But collectively, thermometers are a significant source, and it doesn't take much mercury to contaminate fish. The current levels of fish contamination are caused by air deposition of one gram of mercury per 20 acres of water.

"Fish are an important part of many Minnesotans' diets," emphasized Christensen, who also directs the Food Safety project at the Minneapolis-based Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy. "Getting our mercury fever thermometers out of our medicine chests is just one way in which we can make fish safer to eat." She noted that people who visit the Science Museum of Minnesota on Mother's Day, May 13 from 1-4 p.m. can bring in their mercury fever thermometer and get a free non-mercury replacement. (Limit: one per household; supplies are limited).

Nationwide, mercury fever thermometers contribute 17 tons of mercury to the solid waste stream annually. Some cooking thermometers and indoor/outdoor thermometers contain the toxic metal; these are also restricted under the Minnesota law.

Health Care Without Harm encourages anyone who eats fish or seafood to learn about the fish advisories in their local lakes and rivers as well as in commercial fish, and eat accordingly. Unlike polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), a pollutant that builds up in fat and can be trimmed from the fillet, mercury is stored in the muscle tissue of the fish, so trimming fat will not decrease mercury exposure.

Health Care Without Harm is an international coalition of more than 300 member-organizations working internationally in 29 countries to transform the health care industry so that it is no longer a source of environmental harm.

To learn more about HCWH, visit our web site: http://www.noharm.org/

Health Care Without Harm

http://www.noharm.org

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