Joanna Malaczynski
In the 1962 book Silent Spring, Rachel Carson dedicated one short chapter to the anticipated human health impacts from toxic chemicals. That chapter seeded Silent Winter: Our Chemical World and Chronic Illness (Algora Publishing, 2021), which was written after sixty additional years of scientific research and widespread human exposure to a variety of toxic chemicals. Silent Winter is about the silent spread of toxic chemicals in our daily lives and their role in the growing prevalence of illnesses such as cancer, chronic fatigue, diabetes, asthma, digestive issues, depression, dementia, and others.
Approximately 45% of the adult US population now has at least one chronic illness. We are often told that these are a result of our lifestyle or our genes. We rarely hear that chronic illness is on the rise as a result of toxic chemicals in consumer products and throughout our environment.
The book describes how toxic chemicals wreak havoc in our bodies and lead to the growing epidemic of chronic illness. The problem is covered up at a societal level by obscuring what we know, and discussion of possible solutions is silenced by manipulating the marketplace.
Chapter 1 paints a future toward which we are heading and frames our current health crisis. Chapters 2–3 introduce the disruption that manmade chemicals have caused in our world. To help explain how we got here, Chapters 4–7 discuss the economic and political forces at work that have enabled such large-scale pollution. Chapters 8–14 lay out specific examples of companies, chemicals, and products that need to be on your radar. Chapters 15–22 explain how chemicals affect our bodies. Most chronic illnesses are tied to toxic chemicals, and this book discusses how these chemicals cause various chronic illnesses. Some chronic illnesses are already acknowledged in many circles as “environmental illnesses,” characterized by flu-like symptoms, chronic fatigue, and multiple chemical sensitivity. Chapters 21–22 describe these illnesses and share some of the personal stories of individuals who suffer from them. The final chapters of this book (Chapters 23–24) discuss the root societal causes of our environmental woes.
Chapter 15: The Chronic Illness Epidemic
A living cell, like a flame, burns fuel to produce the energy on which life depends. The analogy is more poetic than precise, for the cell accomplishes its ‘burning’ with only the moderate heat of the body’s normal temperature. Yet all these billions of gently burning little fires spark the energy of life. Should they cease to burn, “no heart could beat, no plant could grow upward defying gravity, no amoeba could swim, no sensation could speed along a nerve, no thought could flash in the human brain.”….The ultimate work of energy production is accomplished not in any specialized organ but in every cell of the body.
—Rachel Carson1
The flames that sustain life in every cell of our body referred to by Rachel Carson are collectively known as our metabolism. The energy produced by our metabolism relies upon the foods we eat, the water we drink, the sunshine we are exposed to and the air we breathe. Our metabolism converts energy into fuel for our organs, cells, and even DNA. This happens within a sequence of endless chemical reactions inside of us.
Our metabolism is regulated by our mitochondria, which are found in the DNA of our cells and which have recently been discovered to circulate in our bloodstream as well.2 We know that mitochondria “contain 1500 proteins…and catalyze over 500 different chemical reactions” alone.3 Excessive exposure to toxic chemicals, just like excessive exposure to radiation, damages our mitochondria and our ability to produce the energy we need to carry out the functions of our body.4
A single deadly chemical exposure can damage a person’s mitochondria so badly that they may die, become paralyzed, or develop cancer. Often times the damage does not take full effect until weeks or months after chemical exposure, when the dysfunction in our mitochondria fully take toll throughout the internal organs, tissues, and cells. Systems slowly break down, until the body is no longer self-sustaining.
Chronic exposure to much smaller amounts of toxic chemicals is equally bad.5 It ultimately leads to a condition known as “oxidative stress,”6 where the cells of the body have a hard time maintaining their life-supportive environment.7 Oxidative stress is so problematic that it actually causes visible lesions to our DNA.8 It also disrupts our mitochondria and our life-giving metabolism.9
Our world has become a test laboratory for metabolic damage and oxidative stress as the use of toxic chemicals has proliferated. Environmental pollution now contaminates all of our waterways, air, soil, food, homes, workplaces, and the products we use every day. Toxic chemicals even get passed down from mother to child before birth.10 We know that they are consistently found in our blood streams, urine, fat tissue, internal organs, and even breast milk.11 Because the most troublesome of these substances do not fully break down in our systems, they also build up in our bodies.12 And our widespread contamination with such pollutants extends to every single living being around the world, no matter how remote their location.
Under the influence of toxic chemicals, 45% of the adult US population now has at least one chronic illness.13 And our poor health statistics are on the rise. Scientists have eliminated inactivity, diet, and other similar lifestyle factors as the cause of our rising health problems.14 Rather, the common denominator for the aggravated rates of chronic disease is toxic chemical exposure and other forms of environmental pollution. Research has shown that that our exposure to toxic chemicals is correlated with high cholesterol, diabetes, depression, digestive disorders, liver disease, heart disease, obesity and many other health issues we commonly believe are caused by our genes or lifestyle choices.15
Cancer is one of the most common chronic illnesses. Liver cancer, thyroid cancer, pancreatic cancer, breast cancer and prostate cancer—all cancers of organs most impacted by toxic chemical exposure—have grown astronomically in industrialized countries.16 Cancer is no longer a problem for the middle-aged and older. The incidence of breast cancer in women under 40 has nearly doubled in the US in less than four decades.17 And childhood cancer (cancer in those under the age of 20) has increased 34% since 1975.18
Alzheimer’s disease and other forms of dementia are also a growing epidemic. Contrary to popular belief, this is not explained away by an aging population.19 The disease is hitting the young as well as the old. Blue Cross Blue Shield recently revised its diagnosis rates of dementia-related disease in younger adults (ages 30-64) from 4.2 to 12.6 per 10,000 adults between 2013 and 2017; this is a 200% increase.20 Alzheimer’s disease is known to result from metabolic damage, insulin resistance and brain inflammation, all of which also occur in response to toxic chemical exposure.21
Kidney disease has also grown sharply and now affects over 30 million Americans.22 Our kidneys eliminate waste and excess fluids from the bodies. When our kidneys become chronically overwhelmed, we will develop kidney disease. About 15% of the US population suffers from kidney disease as of 2018. Kidney disease is frequently the outcome of diabetes—another disease known to have increased steadily as a result of toxic chemicals (see Chapter 16).
Over 720,000 of Americans suffering from kidney disease have progressed to kidney failure; these are individuals wholly dependent upon kidney dialysis for survival. That means they must physically hook up to a machine to eliminate the waste and excess fluids from their bodies three times a week.23 Forecasts expect that 1.26 million Americans will have kidney failure by 2030. Because of this growing problem, the federal government announced in July 2019 a law that will enable widespread kidney dialysis to be completed at home. A new market is burgeoning around our health woes—and the US kidney dialysis industry alone has grown to a $24 billion industry.24
Intestinal disorders such as Crohn’s disease and colitis have increased abruptly over the last decades as well. The number of people who have been hospitalized as a result of digestive illnesses has grown sharply.25 Many of these diseases were so uncommon in the past that they historically have had no specific disease category of their own—they were simply identified as “other digestive disorders” in government studies.26 Children are some of the hardest hit by the new wave of intestinal disorders. In Canada, for example, the rate of inflammatory bowel disease in children under 16 years of age increased by almost 60 percent in just one decade from 1999 to 2010.27
The growing epidemic of digestive ailments have mostly fallen under the radar of the conventional medical community. Receiving no answer from their primary care physician, many Americans show up at the offices of acupuncturists, naturopaths, herbalists, and homeopaths complaining of problems such as intestinal bloating, irritable bowel, the inability to absorb nutrients from their food, etc.28 Trying to stem the time, we take probiotics and digestive enzymes at rates never before seen in history.29
Toxic chemicals are also known to cause immune suppression, making us more vulnerable to infection and less responsive to vaccines.30 And immune suppression from toxic chemical exposure can cause us to develop chronic infections—e.g. chronic sinus infections, frequent cold sores, Epstein Barr virus, etc.31 Immune suppression may also make us more likely to develop chronic fatigue, as discussed in Chapters 19-20. What makes matter worse is that immune suppression also makes it harder for doctors to diagnose our infections, because our immune systems are no longer behaving normally. For example, fever is an indicator of illness but we may not develop a fever during an infection because our immune system is suppressed.
It is also widely known that toxic chemicals affect our central nervous system.32 As a result, they can disrupt both our mood and our mental health. Problems such as depression, anxiety, aggression, memory impairment, and even schizophrenia are fair game when it comes to toxic chemical exposure.33 In children, problematic chemicals can set off a chain of reactions that alter neurodevelopment, causing chronic behavior issues and diseases such as autism.34 Indeed, autism rates in our youngest generations have climbed at alarming rates.35
Toxic chemicals in a fetus and in young children are most problematic.36 Researchers recognize that adults “can tolerate levels of pollution that devastate their offspring.”37 The fetus is still in development in the womb and exposure can lead to potentially permanent changes in the metabolism, organs, nervous system, immune system hormone balance, and other aspects of their bodies. These changes may frequently not arise to the level of obviously visible birth defects, but may cause life-long challenges.38 Even exposure in young children can lead to relatively permanent changes, as the metabolism and neural pathways of a child are still in development. For example, asthma rates have jumped steadily.39 And childhood chronic fatigue—formerly unheard of—has become a public policy issue.40 Indeed, 30% of American children are living with some form of chronic illness today; an astounding figure.41
1. Rachel Carson, Silent Spring, 200-201 (Riverside Press 1962), quoting Eugene Rabinowitch.
2. Rachel Carson, Silent Spring, 202 (Riverside Press 1962); see also Al Amir Dache, et al, “Blood contains circulating cell‐free respiratory competent mitochondria,” The FASEB Journal 34(3), 3616-3630 (January 19, 2020).
3. Robert K. Naviaux, “Metabolic Features of Cell Danger Response,” Mitochondrion 16, 7-17 (2014).
4. Rachel Carson, Silent Spring, 203 (Riverside Press 1962).
5. Rachel Carson, Silent Spring, 188-189 (Riverside Press 1962). As Rachel Carson explained, a “change at one point, in one molecule [of our body] even, may reverberate throughout the entire system to initiate changes in seemingly unrelated organs and tissues…”
6. Toshikazu Yoshikawa & Yuji Naito, “What is Oxidative Stress?” Journal of the Japan Medical Association 45(7) 271–276 (July 2002).
7. James M. Samet & Phillip A. Wages, “Oxidative Stress from Environmental Exposures,” Current Opinion in Toxicology 7, 60-66 (Feb. 2018); Alexandros G. Asimakopoulos, et al, “Urinary biomarkers of exposure to 57 xenobiotics and its association with oxidative stress in a population in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia,” Environmental Research 150, 573-581 (Oct. 2016).
8. Bennett Van Houten, et al, “DNA repair after oxidative stress: Current challenges,” Current Opinion in Toxicology 7, 9-16 (Feb. 2018).
9. Helmut Sies, “On the history of oxidative stress: Concept and some aspects of current development,” Current Opinion in Toxicology 7, 122-126 (Feb. 2018) (our life-giving metabolic processes are driven by our mitochondria and are called redox-signaling; this signaling is disrupted by xenobiotics); see also Yvonne Collins, et al, “Mitochondrial redox signalling at a glance,” Journal of Cell Science 125, 801-806 (2012).
10. Kirsi Vahakangas, et al, “Chapter 18 – Biomarkers of Toxicity in Human Placenta,” in Ramesh C. Gupta (ed)., Biomarkers in Toxicity, 2nd Edition (Elsevier Press 2019); and Dana B. Barr, et al, “Concentrations of xenobiotic chemicals in the maternal-fetal unit,” Reproductive Toxicology 23(3), 260-266 (April-May 2007).
11. “Fourth National Report on Human Exposure to Environmental Chemicals” US Centers for Disease Control (2019) and previous reports dating back to “National Report on Human Exposure to Environmental Chemicals” US Centers for Disease Control (2001); see also European Union, “Endocrine Disruptors: from Scientific Evidence to Human Health Protection,” a study commissioned by the PETI Committee of the European Parliament PE 608.866
(March 2019).
12. Arnaud Tonnelier, et al., “Screening of chemicals for human bioaccumulative potential with a physiologically based toxicokinetic model,” Archives of Toxicology 86(3), 393-403 (March 2012).
13. Wullianallur Raghupathi and Viju Raghupathi, “An Empirical Study of Chronic Diseases in the United States: A Visual Analytics Approach to Public Health,” International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health 15(3), 431 (March 1, 2018); individual health statistics for the US are also available from the US Centers for Disease Control, National Center for Health Statistics, available at https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/.
14. See e.g., Swanson, N.L., Leu, A., Abrahamson, J. & Wallet, B. “Genetically engineered crops, glyphosate and the deterioration of health in the United States of America,” Journal of Organic Systems 9 (2014) 6–37 (citing various research studies); Carla Lubrano, et al, “Obesity and Metabolic Comorbidities: Environmental Diseases?,” Oxidative Medicine and Cellular Longevity 2013 (Feb. 5, 2013); US Centers for Disease Control, “Transcript for the 9th CDC Myalgic Encephalomyelitis/Chronic Fatigue Syndrome Stakeholder Engagement and Communication (ME/CFS-SEC)” CDC (May 25, 2017) (testimony of Robert Naviaux).
15. Dr. Robert Naviaux, “Metabolic Features of Myalgic Encephalomyelitis/Chronic Fatigue Syndrome,” presentation found in Transcript for the 9th CDC Myalgic Encephalomyelitis/Chronic Fatigue Syndrome Stakeholder Engagement and Communication (ME/CFS-SEC) (May 25, 2017), available at https://www.cdc.gov/me-cfs/pdfs/transcript-naviaux-05272017.pdf. Carla Lubrano, et al, “Obesity and Metabolic Comorbidities: Environmental Diseases?,” Oxidative Medicine and Cellular Longevity 2013 (Feb. 5, 2013); Swanson, N.L., Leu, A., Abrahamson, J. & Wallet, B. “Genetically engineered crops, glyphosate and the deterioration of health in the United States of America.,” Journal of Organic Systems 9(2), 6–37 (January 2014); Anthony Samsel and Stephanie Seneff, “Glyphosate, pathways to modern diseases II: Celiac sprue and gluten intolerance,” Interdisciplinary Toxicology 6(4), 159–184 (Dec. 2013).
16. See e.g., Marta Benedetti et al, “Incidence of Breast, Prostate, Testicular, and Thyroid Cancer in Italian Contaminated Sites with Presence of Substances with Endocrine Disrupting Properties,” International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health 14(4), 355 (March 2017); Miranda M. Fidler et al, “A global view on cancer incidence and national levels of the human development index,” International Journal of Cancer 139, 2436-2446 (Aug. 2016).
17. Rebecca H. Johnson, et al, “Incidence of Breast Cancer With Distant Involvement Among Women in the United States, 1976 to 2009,” JAMA 309(8), 800-805 (February 2013).
18. “Childhood Cancer: Cross-Sector Strategies for Prevention,” at 3, Childhood Cancer Prevention Initiative (2020).
19. Liara Rizzi, et al, “Global Epidemiology of Dementia: Alzheimer’s and Vascular Types,” Biomed Research International 2014, 908915 (June 2014).
20. Blue Cross Blue Shield, “Early-Onset Dementia and Alzheimers Rates Grow in Young American Adults” (February 2020), available at https://www.bcbs.com/the-health-of-america/reports/early-onset-dementia-alzheimers-disease-affecting-younger-american-adults.
21. See e.g., Suzanne M. de la Monte & Ming Tong, “Brain metabolic dysfunction at the core of Alzheimer’s disease,” Biochemical Pharmacology 88(4), 548-559 (April 2014). See also the next chapters in this book, discussing metabolic disfunction, inflammation, and diabetes.
22. Yan Xie, el al, “Analysis of the Global Burden of Disease study highlights the global, regional, and national trends of chronic kidney disease epidemiology from 1990 to 2016,” Kidney International 93(3), 567-581 (Sept. 2018); Robert Holly, “Trump Administration Looking to Cut Dialysis Costs with Home Focus,” Home Health Care News (March 4, 2019).
23. Caroline Copley & Caroline Humer, “U.S. seeks to cut dialysis costs with more home care versus clinics,” Reuters (March 3, 2019).
24. Robert Holly, “Trump Administration Looking to Cut Dialysis Costs with Home Focus,” Home Health Care News (March 4, 2019) (citing 2018 figures).
25. Siew C. Ng., et al, “Worldwide incidence and prevalence of inflammatory bowel disease in the 21st century: a systematic review of population-based studies,” The Lancet 390(10114), 2769-2778 (December 2017 – January 2018).
26. James E. Everheart (ed), “Burden of Digestive Diseases in the United States Report,” National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases” National Institute of Digestive and Kidney Diseases (2008).
27. Eric I Benchimol, “Trends in Epidemiology of Pediatric Inflammatory Bowel Disease in Canada: Distributed Network Analysis of Multiple Population-Based Provincial Health Administrative Databases.” The American Journal of Gastroenterology, 112(7),1120-1134 (July 2017).
28. See e.g., Chang Gue Son, et al, “Complementary and Alternative Medicine for Diseases and Disorders in Digestive Tract: Basic to Clinics,” Evidence Based Complimentary Alternative Medicine, 2013, 565279 (Oct 2013).
29. Monica Feldman, et al, “Cultivate Your Probiotic Performance: Market Trends and Innovative Solutions,” Lonza Whitepaper (2019), available at https://www.probiotaevent.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Probiotics_Whitepaper_A4_10_2018_showpad.pdf; Aslam Shaikh, “Demand for Probiotics is Increasing Significantly,” Dairy Reporter (April 6, 2018); Harvard Health Letter, “Gut reaction: A limited role for digestive enzyme supplements,” Harvard Health Publishing at Harvard Medical School (March 2018), available at https://www.health.harvard.edu/staying-healthy/gut-reaction-a-limited-role-for-digestive-enzyme-supplements.
30. Jamie C. DeWitt, Sarah J. Blossom & Laurel A. Schaider , “Exposure to per-fluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances leads to immunotoxicity: epidemiological and toxicological evidence,”Journal of Exposure Science & Environmental Epidemiology29, 148–156 (March 2019); M. Chalubinski & M.L. Kowalski, “Endocrine disrupters – potential modulators of the immune system and allergic response,” European Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology, 61(11), 1326-1335 (Nov 2006).
31. Jaakkola MS, Yang L, Ieromnimon A, et al, “Office work exposures and respiratory and sick building syndrome symptoms,” Occupational and Environmental Medicine, 64:178-184 (May 2007); Melinda J. Tarr, “Chemical Alteration of Host Susceptibility to Viral Infection,” in Richard G. Olsen, et al (eds), Comparative Pathobiology of Viral Diseases, Vol. 1, (CRC Press 2019); cf. Robert Luebke, “Immune Function, Immunotoxicity, and Resistance to Infection and Neoplasia,” a case study abstract presented at Moving Upstream: A Workshop on Evaluating Adverse Upstream Endpoints for Improved Decision Making and Risk Assessment in Berkeley, California (May 16-17, 2007), and published in Environ Health Perspectives 116(11), 1568–1575 (Nov 2008).
32. Nicholas Ashford & Claudia Miller, Chemical Exposures: Low Levels and High Stakes (2nd ed), 27, 49, 208 (Wiley & Sons 1998).
33. Rachel Carson, Silent Spring, 198 (The Riverside Press 1962)and Nicholas Ashford & Claudia Miller, Chemical Exposures: Low Levels and High Stakes, 140-142 (2nd ed) (Wiley & Sons 1998).
34. Robert K. Naviaux, “Metabolic Features of Cell Danger Response,” Mitochondrion 16, 7-17 (May 2014).
35. “Autism Spectrum Disorder: Prevalence,” US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, available at https://www.cdc.gov/ncbddd/autism/data.html (last visited Oct. 22, 2019).
36. “America’s Children and the Environment (Third Edition),” EPA 240-R-13-001, US EPA (Jan. 2013), available at https://www.epa.gov/americaschildrenenvironment.
37. Theo Colborn, et al, Our Stolen Future, 155 (Penguin Group 1997).
38. See e.g., Philip J. Landrigan, et al, “Children’s Health and the Environment: Public Health Issues and Challenges for Risk Assessment,” Environmental Health Perspectives 112(2) 257-265 (Feb 2004) and Gayle C. Windham, et al, “Autism Spectrum Disorders in Relation to Distribution of Hazardous Air Pollutants in the San Francisco Bay Area,” Environmental Health Perspectives 114(9), 1438-1444 (Sept. 2006).
39. US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Asthma Prevalence Tables, available at https://www.cdc.gov/asthma/asthmadata.htm (last visited May 17, 2019).
40. US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, “ME/CFS in Children,” available at https://www.cdc.gov/me-cfs/me-cfs-children/index.html (last visited Oct. 22, 2019), stating that up to 1 in 50 children suffer from chronic fatigue.
41. “Metabolic Features of Myalgic Encephalomyelitis/Chronic Fatigue Syndrome,” by Dr. Robert Naviaux, found in Transcript for the 9th CDC Myalgic Encephalomyelitis/Chronic Fatigue Syndrome Stakeholder Engagement and Communication (ME/CFS-SEC), May 25, 2017, available at https://www.cdc.gov/me-cfs/pdfs/transcript-naviaux-05272017.pdf
Published July 15, 2023
About the Author
Joanna Malaczynski has spent a decade working on eliminating toxic chemicals from consumer products as an attorney, consultant, and entrepreneur. She first became involved in the enforcement of environmental and consumer protection laws related to environmental health as an attorney. She subsequently started a software company focused on helping industry find safer alternatives to toxic chemicals. Before writing Silent Winter, Ms. Malaczynski consulted for sustainability entrepreneurs.