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S. HRG. 110–1265 

OVERSIGHT ON EPA’S CHILDREN’S 

HEALTH PROTECTION EFFORTS 

HEARING 

BEFORE THE

COMMITTEE ON 

ENVIRONMENT AND PUBLIC WORKS 

UNITED STATES SENATE 

ONE HUNDRED TENTH CONGRESS 

SECOND SESSION 

SEPTEMBER 16, 2008 

Printed for the use of the Committee on Environment and Public Works 

( 

Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.access.gpo.gov/congress.senate 

(II) 

COMMITTEE ON ENVIRONMENT AND PUBLIC WORKS 

ONE HUNDRED TENTH CONGRESS 

SECOND SESSION 

BARBARA BOXER, California, Chairman 

MAX BAUCUS, Montana 

JOSEPH I. LIEBERMAN, Connecticut 

THOMAS R. CARPER, Delaware 

HILLARY RODHAM CLINTON, New York 

FRANK R. LAUTENBERG, New Jersey 

BENJAMIN L. CARDIN, Maryland 

BERNARD SANDERS, Vermont 

AMY KLOBUCHAR, Minnesota 

SHELDON WHITEHOUSE, Rhode Island 

JAMES M. INHOFE, Oklahoma 

JOHN W. WARNER, Virginia 

GEORGE V. VOINOVICH, Ohio 

JOHNNY ISAKSON, Georgia 

DAVID VITTER, Louisiana 

JOHN BARRASSO, Wyoming 

LARRY E. CRAIG, Idaho 

LAMAR ALEXANDER, Tennessee 

CHRISTOPHER S. BOND, Missouri 

BETTINA POIRIER, Majority Staff Director and Chief Counsel 

ANDREW WHEELER, Minority Staff Director 

(III) 

C O N T E N T S 

Page 

SEPTEMBER 16, 2008 

OPENING STATEMENTS 

Boxer, Hon. Barbara, U.S. Senator from the State of California ........................ 1 

Barrasso, Hon. John, U.S. Senator from the State of Wyoming .......................... 3 

Cardin, Hon. Benjamin L., U.S. Senator from the State of Maryland ................ 5 

Lautenberg, Hon. Frank, U.S. Senator from the State of New Jersey ............... 7 

Whitehouse, Hon. Sheldon, U.S. Senator from the State of Rhode Island ......... 8 

Clinton, Hon. Hillary Rodham, U.S. Senator from the State of New York ........ 49 

Inhofe, Hon. James M., U.S. Senator from the State of Oklahoma, prepared 

statement .............................................................................................................. 213 

WITNESSES 

Gray, Hon. George, Assistant Administrator for the Office of Research and 

Development, United States Environmental Protection Agency ...................... 10 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 13 

Stephenson, John B., Director, Natural Resources and Environment, Government Accountability Office .................................................................................. 22 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 24 

Marmagas, Susan West, Director of Health Programs, Commonweal ................ 62 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 65 

Responses to additional questions from Senator Boxer ................................ 75 

Trasande, Leo, Co-Director, Children’s Environmental Health Center, Mount 

Sinai Medical Center ........................................................................................... 76 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 79 

Responses to additional questions from Senator Inhofe ............................... 143 

Brent, Robert, Distinguished MD, Ph.D of Pediatrics, Radiology and Pathology, Thomas Jefferson University, A.I. Dupont Hospital for Children ............ 145 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 147 

Responses to additional questions from Senator Inhofe ............................... 203 

ADDITIONAL MATERIAL 

Statement of Dana Best, MD, MPh, FAAP on Behalf of the American Academy of Pediatrics .................................................................................................. 215 

(1) 

OVERSIGHT ON EPA’S CHILDREN’S 

HEALTH PROTECTION EFFORTS 

TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 16, 2008 

U.S. SENATE, COMMITTEE ON ENVIRONMENT AND PUBLIC WORKS, Washington, DC. 

The full committee met, pursuant to notice, at 10 a.m. in room 

406, Dirksen Senate Office Building, Hon. Barbara Boxer (chairman of the full committee) presiding. 

Present: Senators Boxer, Lautenberg, Cardin, Klobuchar, Clinton, Whitehouse, and Barrasso. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. BARBARA BOXER, 

U.S. SENATOR FROM THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA 

Senator BOXER. Good morning. I understand from Senator 

Barrasso that he will be joining in. Why don’t you join us up here 

then, Senator? We would love to have you. 

I believe this oversight hearing on the Environmental Protection 

Agency’s Children’s health protection record is key to our work. 

Protecting children’s health should be a top-level priority for every 

EPA program. Children are not little adults; they can be extremely 

vulnerable to harm from toxic chemicals, often far more vulnerable 

and more exposed to pollutants than adults. Their rapidly growing 

bodies, complex and developing nervous and immune systems, their 

way of exploring their environment, including by putting just about 

everything they find into their mouths, all make children more vulnerable to harm from toxic pollutants than adults. 

Their small size means they also consume more air, they drink 

more liquids, they eat more food for their body weight than do 

adults. A ten-pound infant may not be able to withstand the same 

amount of air pollution as a 170-pound adult male without suffering life-long injury. 

On April 21, 1997, President Clinton issued Executive Order 

13045 titled, Protection of Children from Environmental Health 

Risks and Safety Risks. This order established a national policy requiring all Federal agencies to ‘‘make it a high priority’’ to assess 

environmental health risks that may disproportionately affect children and to ensure agencies’ policies, programs, activities, and 

standards address such risks. 

The order also created an inter-agency task force that reported 

to the President with recommendations on ways to better protect 

children’s health. 

In May 1997 Administrator Browner established the Office of 

Children’s Health Protection to help EPA implement the order and 

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to make the protection of children’s health a fundamental goal of 

public health and environmental protection in the United States. 

EPA also created a Federal Advisory Committee on Children’s 

Health Protection to advise EPA on children’s environmental 

health issues, as it develops standards, communicates with the 

public, and conducts research. 

When it was first created, EPA used the Office of Children’s 

Health Protection and the Children’s Health Protection Advisory 

Committee in a proactive way to help the Agency better protect our 

children. Unfortunately, it has become clear that EPA has taken a 

dangerous u-turn on children’s health protection. 

My colleagues and I have spoken out and fought against EPA decisions that put our children’s health at risk. Many of us have introduced bills. Many of us have fought against these regulations on 

perchlorate, on mercury, dangerous air pollutants such as smog 

and toxic soot and lead. We all know that children are more vulnerable than adults to these threats, and we know that these contaminants are in the air we breathe, the water we drink, and the land 

that we live in, and I am tired of people saying our children are 

our future as they roll back protections and don’t do everything 

they can to protect our children. 

Because of the disturbing pattern in rollback after rollback in 

this Administration, Senator Clinton joined me in asking the GAO 

to investigate EPA’s record on children’s health. Today they are 

going to give their interim findings. 

The early results of GAO’s investigation could not be more deeply 

troubling. GAO has found that EPA has failed to followup on recommendations of its own children’s health experts and has weakened the Office of Children’s Health Protection. Who are they listening to? The special interests. That is the answer, and it is absolutely unacceptable. 

You may also remember the infamous Cheers program that EPA 

proposed jointly with the pesticide industry in 2005. It would have 

provided gifts to low-income families to participate in a study to 

evaluate children’s exposure to toxic pesticides in their homes. 

They actually had kids crawling around in pesticides that were 

sprayed as part of the experiment. That is what they did. And then 

they were going to pay the families money, give them a camera, a 

video camera to follow the children around while they crawled 

around the sprayed areas. That is the reason I voted against Johnson when his vote came up. 

We forced EPA to cancel that unethical study. We required EPA 

to issue new rules banning these types of tests. However, EPA’s 

rules failed to sufficiently protect children. I have joined other colleagues in filing an amicus brief and a court challenge to EPA’s 

rules, and EPA has a string of losses in the courts, and we trust 

they will lose this one, too. 

I was stunned when EPA recently tried to quietly issue a proposal that could have allowed studies very similar to the Cheer’s 

program. At my request, my Committee staff asked EPA a series 

of detailed questions about the ethical and other aspects of this 

proposal. EPA was unable to defend this program and answer 

these questions, so last week they canceled the proposal. Good. But 

why would EPA consider it in the first place? 

3 

We know that the failure to protect children’s health has consequences, and when you hear the sound of my voice it is not 

happy because I am not only a Senator, but I am also a mother 

and I am a grandmother and I am going to be a grandmother 

again. Senator Lautenberg and Senator Cardin, if you would please 

give me this moment—I know that when my daughter has to consider what she can eat because of the levels of mercury in the food, 

where she can go, what she can do, we already know that premature babies are coming more and more often because of a lot of 

these exposures. This is not the time to pull back from protecting 

the public. 

My colleagues, I know you are with me 100 percent on this, because we know the failure to protect our children has consequences. 

Senator Lautenberg in every hearing we have had has gone 

through chapter and verse the experience of his own grandchild 

due to asthma, and I hope he will do it again, because he can’t do 

it enough times for me, because that makes it real. 

We will hear testimony from Dr. Trasande of Mount Sinai Medical Center today that ‘‘chronic diseases of environmental origin 

have become epidemic in American children. These diseases include, one, asthma; two, birth defects; three, neurodevelopmental 

disorders; four, leukemia; five, brain cancer in children; six, testicular cancer in adolescents; and, last but not least, pre-term birth. 

We also will hear from GAO that EPA no longer has high-level 

infrastructure or mandates to coordinate Federal strategies for children’s environmental health. Let me repeat that. We will hear from 

GAO that EPA no longer has high-level infrastructure or mandate 

to coordinate Federal strategies for children’s environmental 

health. Now that does not reflect the values of the American people 

and our families. Children’s health should be our top priority. 

I will do everything in my power, and I know I speak for others 

on this committee, to ensure that EPA’s inexcusable policies of neglecting children’s health and carrying out its mission is reversed 

either now or when the next Administration takes over from this 

dismal, dismal record. 

I would ask Senator Barrasso to now speak. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. JOHN A. BARRASSO, 

U.S. SENATOR FROM THE STATE OF WYOMING 

Senator BARRASSO. Thank you, Madam Chairman. 

Protecting children’s health is a serious issue. As the father of 

three, I understand the concerns of parents wanting to protect 

their children from illness, from disease. As a doctor also and a 

trauma surgeon, a doctor who takes care of young children, I have 

treated children so that they can grow up to lead productive lives. 

I have taken an oath both as a Senator and as a doctor to work 

to improve the lives of people, and especially children. Our children 

must be protected. We must do whatever we can to achieve this 

goal. 

But I think we can all agree that protecting children is a bipartisan issue. There may be different approaches to how to do it best, 

but it is a bipartisan issue. There is nothing that we wouldn’t do 

to provide for our children. Children need safe drinking water. 

4 

Children need lifesaving medication. They need safe food to eat and 

clean air to breathe. 

One way we provide these things for our children and our communities is through scientific innovation. Every day American ingenuity is generating the next generation of child safety products and 

medical devices. They are being created under a risk-based regulatory process under the EPA. But there is risk, unfortunately, that 

this next generation of life-saving innovations will not be developed. That is because some believe that the best way to protect our 

communities is to ban any chemical that might, even in the most 

remote instance, have a negative health effect. 

This approach is designed to instill fear and precaution in families which will prevent future technologies that can make a real 

difference in the lives of children. Chlorine, for example, is a base 

ingredient. It is in disinfectants. You can read the possible harmful 

effects on a bottle of Lysol. In large doses, chlorine is toxic. And 

we often say in the medical world the dose makes the poison. Despite this, chlorine-based disinfectants are used every day to clean 

day care child centers, as disinfectants in hospitals across the 

Country. That is because chlorine kills e-coli, salmonella, other 

food-borne illnesses and bacteria that are a threat to infants, to 

toddlers, and to pre-teen children. 

But in addition to disinfectants, chlorine chemicals are used to 

make prosthetic devices, PVC, which is a common chlorine-containing plastic used to construct prosthetic legs and arms for children who have lost legs because of birth defects. Thanks to these 

devices, many of the children can now lead normal lives and participate in most activities. PVC is used in blood bags and IV fluid 

bags and tubing to help deliver medication needed to care for 

young patients. 

These things all improve people’s lives. 

I believe that the approach that the EPA uses is a correct approach, setting standards for clean water or for clean air or for 

what chemicals can be approved. You need to have a risk-based approach. Such an approach has peer review, it verifies data, it takes 

laboratory work and applies that to what you know about realworld exposures. Then you make a determination as to what is the 

best benefit to the environment and public health in making regulations. 

In a previous hearing earlier this year I highlighted an article 

that ran in the Washington Post. The story is entitled, For Children, A Better Beginning. In brief, it says, ‘‘In a wide-ranging look 

at how children have fared in the first decade of life, a study released offers a promising picture of American childhood. Sixth 

graders feel safer at school. Reading and math scores are up for 9- 

year-olds. More pre-schoolers are vaccinated. Fewer are poisoned 

by lead.’’ 

The analysis was created as a composite index of more than 25 

key national indicators reports an almost 10 percent boost in children’s well-being between 1994 and 2006. 

Now, the article mentioned possible reasons for the trend: better 

medical care, better nutrition, mandatory use of car seats, safer 

playground equipment. All of these things were brought about by 

5 

new innovation, the kind of innovation that comes about when you 

operate under a risk-based regulatory approach. 

There is still more work that needs to be done. Children across 

the globe face new dangers from new diseases and other health 

threats. We must continue to review our regulations using a riskbased regulatory system to make sure we are adequately protecting 

our children. But the evidence clearly shows that the EPA is doing 

something right. Let’s make sure that we are prepared here at 

home to address these challenges by keeping America the world 

leader in innovations that protect our children. 

Thank you, Madam Chairman. 

Senator BOXER. Thank you, Senator. 

Let me just say for the record there isn’t anyone on the Democratic side of the aisle that doesn’t support risk-based analysis. 

What we do not support is tainted risk-based analysis by taking 

the scientists out and putting the special interests in, so let’s be 

clear. Let’s not set up a straw person here. 

Senator Cardin. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. BENJAMIN CARDIN, 

U.S. SENATOR FROM THE STATE OF MARYLAND 

Senator CARDIN. Well, let me thank my colleague for his courtesy 

and thank our Chairman for calling this hearing and for your dedication to the responsible of this Committee for oversight, which is 

one of the principal responsibilities we have as to whether the Office of Children’s Health Protection is carrying out its mission to 

provide adequate protection for our children. 

Madam Chair, I would ask my entire statement be made part of 

the record and let me just comment on a conference that I attended 

yesterday in Baltimore dealing with healthy homes in which agencies were represented. I think we had a good group there. I look 

forward to their recommendations. 

It pointed out something that should be obvious in our Country, 

and that is that children have a right to expect a healthy environment. Children are not miniature adults. They deal with contaminants differently. Their bodies are growing. It is for that reason 

that we set up special protection for our children. They need our 

special protection. 

We have a responsibility to make sure that the issues the that 

chairman referred to in regards to mercury, or an area that I have 

been involved with for many years, lead contaminant where we 

have lead poisoning of our children. You know, when a child suffers 

from a high level of lead in his or her blood, it robs that child of 

their full potential. They are more likely to drop out of school. They 

are more likely to have learning disabilities and are not able to 

achieve their full God-given potential. That is something that each 

one of us should be concerned about, because lead poisoning is totally preventable. This is a preventable disease. 

Yes, I am proud that in Maryland we have made progress. We 

have reduced actually the children exposed to lead by about onethird over the last 12 years, and that is good numbers, but there 

are still too many children in my State and too many children in 

this Country that have a high level of lead in their blood that could 

have been prevented. We need to do more. 

6 

We can talk about the sub-standard housing in America where 

children are exposed to mold and mildew and pests and rodents, 

and it aggravates their ability, and we have asthma, and we have 

children being denied their full potential because we haven’t dealt 

with that environmental risk. 

So I think the frustration you are going to hear today is the fact 

that we have an interim report from the GAO that confirms what 

we, I think, knew from our own gut, and that is that the agency 

that was created to protect our children and speak up for our children, the Office of Children’s Health Protection, has not utilized 

the services of its own advisory group, has not followed the recommendations that are important to protect our children, and that 

this Administration is not putting our children first and protecting 

them from environmental risks, which was the clear intent of Congress in establishing this agency and the responsibility of this 

Committee to make sure that the agency is aggressive in looking 

for ways. Rather than avoiding its responsibility, it should be using 

its Advisory Committee, it should be looking for creative ways to 

help our children so that we can be more aggressive in eliminating 

the risks that are out there. 

Madam Chairman, again I thank you for holding this hearing. 

[The prepared statement of Senator Cardin follows:] 

STATEMENT OF HON. BENJAMIN L. CARDIN, U.S. SENATOR

FROM THE STATE OF MARYLAND

Madam Chairman, thank you for calling this hearing on a topic of great importance to me. I have been involved in children’s environmental health issues, especially lead-poisoning of our children, dating back to my time in the State legislature. 

I appreciate the opportunity to address this key issue. 

Children are not miniature adults. They are exposed to different environmental 

threats and their growing bodies process some contaminants differently than adults 

in important ways. The Office of Children’s Health Protection was established following the recognition that children are affected uniquely by environmental risk factors and therefore need special protection. The goal of the office’s creation was to 

ensure that the EPA established protections to specifically address threats to children’s health and ensure a safe environment for every child. 

Today we have reason to believe that this goal is not being achieved. The interim 

findings of the Government Accountability Office suggest that OCHP has failed to 

utilize the Children’s Health Protection Advisory Committee, and has ignored the 

recommendations of this committee. The office has failed to take actions that would 

reduce the risks children face from environmental threats and has shown a lack of 

focus on children’s health issues. 

Environmental threats affect all children, but we have increasingly seen that they 

are most detrimental to infants and children who live in low income areas. There 

is significant evidence that environmental risks have negative impacts prenatally 

when pregnant women are exposed to unhealthy conditions. The impact on these 

populations, often unrepresented and under served, highlights the critical nature of 

OCHP’s task. To ensure safe environments for all children is to encourage the 

equality of opportunity that is fundamental to America’s ideals. 

In my home State of Maryland, as in many states, children are at risk of being 

exposed to mercury through our waterways, lead in housing and commercial products, and untested pesticides, all of which have the potential for long-term health 

consequences. As a State we have attempted to address several of these issues, and 

have succeeded in decreasing childhood exposure to lead by thirty-three percent 

since 1995. However, we continue to see trends of the greatest impact in infants and 

low-income populations. It is critical that the Federal Government address these 

issues to lead and assist states in making children’s health a demonstrated priority 

nationwide. 

EPA has not done enough to protect children’s health. I look forward to hearing 

from today’s witnesses and to a recommitment from EPA to meet the special needs 

of America’s children. 

Thank you. 

7 

Senator BOXER. Thank you very much. 

Senator Lautenberg. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. FRANK LAUTENBERG, 

U.S. SENATOR FROM THE STATE OF NEW JERSEY 

Senator LAUTENBERG. Thank you, Madam Chairman. 

One who serves on this Committee with any exposure to the operation of the Committee knows how forceful, how concerned our 

chairperson is to these things that endanger children or that permit us to lower our standards for what ought to be a good air quality standard or anything that presents risk. 

When we talk about risk based, I think there is another way to 

view this, and that is on a precautionary basis, because when you 

say risk based it means that there are a group of kids who might 

become terribly affected, but the numbers aren’t that great. Any 

child, any family that has children coming and knows that the risk 

is one in a thousand versus one in a hundred may be left out of 

the calculation because it doesn’t furnish the fullest risk consideration. 

This Committee once again finds itself forced to bring attention 

to dangerous shortcomings of the Bush administration’s EPA. Simply put, this Administration repeatedly failed to do what they can 

do to protect the health of our children, and yet the EPA doesn’t 

seem at all fazed by it. They could have set higher air quality 

standards so that our children are protected from asthma. 

Senator Boxer was kind enough to remember that I have a 

grandchild who suffers from asthma, and it presents a lot of problems when my daughter takes her son to play soccer or another 

sport. The first thing she does is check where the nearest clinic is, 

emergency clinic, in case he starts to wheeze. She has to get him 

over there, regardless of where they stand in their games. That is 

her first concern, and I agree with that. 

EPA could have made sure toxics and other industrial chemicals 

used in thousands of everyday products, from plastics to children’s 

toys, were finally regulated, but they failed to act. 

In fact, both of these changes were recommended by the EPA’s 

own expert committee, the Children’s Health Advisory Committee, 

and, as GAO will testify today, the EPA has chronically ignored the 

advice of these experts and repeatedly set standards too low to protect our children’s health. 

Out of the 80,000 chemicals and products that are found in our 

homes, around our children, the EPA has only tested 200. This statistic is the reason that I was joined by Chairman Boxer, Senators 

Clinton, Menendez, Carey, Schumer, Whitehouse to introduce the 

Kid-Safe Chemical Act instead of waiting for a chemical to make 

someone sick, are hoping for the EPA to prevent that from happening. We need to prove that chemicals are safe before they get 

into the hands of consumers. Precaution. 

Our bill would direct the EPA to make sure that every chemical 

in every product is safe before it ends up on the store shelves or 

in our homes, and would put special emphasis on chemicals that 

are used by children. 

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We already regulate pesticides and pharmaceuticals this way. It 

is simply common sense that we do the same for chemicals that are 

used in consumer products. 

We have so many other contingent things that concern us, and 

that is the lack of health care coverage for lots of young mothersto-be, particularly in the teenage area. Some of those women see 

a doctor for the first time when labor begins. So we have an obligation to make sure that they are carrying a healthy child, to whatever extent we can. 

Also, as we look at things, we have to note that in the State of 

California, for instance, Senator Boxer, in the last 10 years autism 

has increased as an incident over 200 percent, and in the State of 

New Jersey we know it is believed that one out of ninety-four 

males being born will be autistic. It is a terrible thing. 

We need whatever help we can get. For the EPA to ignore the 

recommendations of the Committee is absolutely unacceptable. 

I thank you. 

Senator BOXER. Senator, thank you so much for your constancy 

on this issue. 

We are joined by Senator Whitehouse. Senator Clinton is also on 

the way, so I told her staff that when she gets here we will finish 

whoever is speaking on the panel and let her make her opening 

statement, since she joined with me in calling for the GAO investigation. 

I want to make a point that Senator Whitehouse, before he came 

here he was Attorney General in his State, and he took the leadership on the lead issue, protecting children from lead, so I am just 

so pleased you are here, Senator. Please go ahead. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. SHELDON WHITEHOUSE, U.S. 

SENATOR FROM THE STATE OF RHODE ISLAND 

Senator WHITEHOUSE. Thank you, Chairman. And thank you for 

holding this hearing. 

It is, in many respects, unpleasant that we have to be here, and 

I hope very much that whoever is elected President they put in 

place leadership at EPA so that these sorts of hearings are no 

longer necessary, because my at this point very strongly held view 

is that they represent an absolutely abject failure of governance 

and integrity at the Environmental Protection Agency right now. I 

have mentioned this on many occasions. 

I will address the ozone issue briefly in my remarks right now 

because it is so important to Rhode Island’s children. We get huge 

ozone load from midwestern power plants. As Attorney General I 

had to file suit to try to get action, and it continues to the point 

where Rhode Island, which is a beautiful State where people come 

to visit, which has a wonderful Atlantic shore, from time to time 

in the summer you drive in to work and you hear on the radio the 

announcements that this is not a safe day to breathe the air if you 

are elderly or if you are an infant or if you have breathing difficulties, and it is because of the level of ozone. 

Here is the agency that is supposed to champion environmental 

protection. It is supposed to be their sole mission. It is right in 

their founding statement by the first administrator that that is 

supposed to be the case. And when you look what they did on 

9 

ozone, they got the answer substantively wrong, as they have on 

many environmental standards. They disregarded the advice of 

their own scientists and others. The procedures, as we have shown, 

in many of their decisionmaking have been deliberately manipulated to allow interference. So they have actually undercut the very 

administrative integrity and structure of the organization. 

Finally, on other issues, we have had the administrator come in 

and, in my opinion, lie to this Committee as part of a calculated 

scheme to obscure the White House’s political fingerprints on the 

decision that EPA purported to have made itself in the California 

waiver decision. 

So the rot is very serious over there, in my estimation, at this 

point in its leadership. It looks very much like what people talked 

early on as the regulatory infrastructure was built in the United 

States, the great danger was a regulatory capture. This looks like 

an agency that is now captive in the hands of industry and is led 

by people whose job is not to follow the science, is not to protect 

the public, but is to deliver for the industry and then say whatever 

nonsense is necessary to try to cover their tracks to try to hang on 

to it. Because the American people certainly aren’t going to put up 

with somebody who says, I am here to ruin this agency. I am here 

to hurt children’s health protection. I am here to deliver for industry polluters. You can’t be dumb about it; you have got to be clever. 

You have got to be crafty. You have got to be familiar with the kind 

of phony science that has become a minor industry in this Country 

to create doubt where no doubt should lie. 

That is the strategy right now, and it makes it very awkward to 

have these hearings, because what we get it the screen of falsehood 

and prevarication that is designed to cover up the fact that this is 

an agency that has sold out at the highest levels. 

I have called for the Administrator’s resignation. I did it with 

great reluctance. The Chairman was gracious enough to join me 

and, in fact, lead that call, along with other members of the Committee, including Senator Lautenberg. I think we have kind of had 

it. 

In the limited time remaining in this Administration it is a hard 

call to know whether it is worth just looking forward, moving on, 

and hoping it will be clean next time, or try to continue to root at 

the problem. I am very proud that, despite the limited time remaining, our Chairman has decided to root out this problem, because it is not just a problem of environmental protection; it is a 

problem of the integrity of Government at this stage, and we need 

to make sure this sort of thing doesn’t happen again in American 

governmental organizations. 

I thank the Chair. 

Senator BOXER. I thank you for your very strong statement. I 

share every bit of what you said. I believe that you are right on 

target here. 

I think I want the record to show that we invited Administrator 

Johnson again. Is this the fifth time? He hasn’t been here since 

March. Senators Lautenberg and Whitehouse and my friends on 

the other side who aren’t here, we have an Administrator, as I understand it—correct me if I am wrong—when he came to testify 

said he was thrilled to be the choice for Administrator. We asked 

10 

him, as we do everyone, will you come before this Committee whenever this Committee needs you to be here? He said yes. 

Well, Senators, I am looking at that, because if somebody says 

yes—and I believe he was under oath at the time because it was 

in testimony—and he hasn’t shown up since March, April, May, 

June, July, August, September—six months, and we have asked 

him to come to a number of hearings, and so far we have not received an affirmative response. 

I am pursuing my remedies on that. You would think he would 

show up to talk about children. He said, I remember so clearly 

when we interviewed him when he came forward and he was before 

the Committee how proud he was of his kids and his grandkids 

were his biggest joy, and I believe that. Well, why isn’t he here? 

He is hiding from this Committee and the American people. He is 

hiding from the American people. 

So we are going to hear from The Honorable George Gray, Assistant Administrator for research and development at the EPA, and 

John Stephenson, GAO, Director, Environment and Natural Resources. We will ask each of you to speak for 5 minutes, please, and 

we will ask questions. 

Mr. Gray. 

STATEMENT OF HON. GEORGE GRAY, ASSISTANT ADMINISTRATOR FOR THE OFFICE OF RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT, UNITED STATES ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION 

AGENCY 

Mr. GRAY. Thank you, Madam Chair and members of the Committee. My name is George Gray and I am the Assistant Administrator for the Office of Research and Development and EPA, and 

I also serve as Agency Science Advisor. 

Thank you for the opportunity to appear before the Committee 

to discuss an issue that is critically important to the American people and the future of our Nation, our children’s health. As a Federal agency whose mission is to protect health and the environment, safeguarding children from unsafe exposures to chemicals 

and other toxic substances is a top priority at EPA. 

On a personal note, as a parent with two growing children of my 

own, I know how important it is that we base our decisions on 

sound science to make sure that our children are safe from environmental harm. That is why EPA is constantly seeking ways to enhance children’s health and why my office is producing and funding 

the best science to inform regulatory decisions. 

Today I will highlight several key programs and regulations 

which were put in place to ensure that EPA continues to protect 

human health and children’s health, and I will also discuss some 

of EPA’s ongoing scientific research and analyses on this topic, as 

well as some publicly available resource guides for the public. 

Because children are different from adults in several important 

ways, they may be more vulnerable to some health and developmental risks. Since EPA was established in 1970, we have taken 

leadership in the Nation’s efforts to protect children’s health. We 

all know, of course, of our early actions that mandated the removal 

of lead from gasoline, which continues to represent a landmark 

achievement in protecting children’s health. Blood lead levels of 

11 

children born today are significantly lower than those born when 

EPA took action. 

In 1995 EPA established an Agency-wide policy to ensure that 

unique vulnerabilities of children be explicitly and consistently considered in our risk assessments, risk characterizations, and our 

health standards. In 1996, the national agenda to protect children’s 

health from environmental threats expanded the Agency’s activities 

to specifically address risks for children. 

As previously mentioned, in 1997 the President signed an Executive Order, protection of children’s health from environmental 

health risks and safety risks. The order requires all Federal agencies to address a high priority to addressing health and safety risks 

to children. 

EPA established the Office of Children’s Health Protection in 

1997 to support the agency as it embraced our 1996 agenda and 

the 1997 Executive Order. The mission of EPA’s children’s office is 

to make the health protection of children a fundamental goal of 

public health and environmental protection in the United States. 

The office ensures that risks to children are considered in agency 

activities, standards, and regulations. It also works to advance 

science relating to children’s exposure and risk. 

To continually inform Agency initiatives related to children’s 

health, EPA established the Children’s Health Protection Advisory 

Committee in 1997. Through this Committee, leading researchers, 

academics, health care providers, NGO’s, industry representatives, 

as well as representatives of State and local governments, regularly 

advise EPA on regulations, research, and communication’s that are 

related to children’s health. 

EPA has worked to ensure that standards and regulations consider the potential risks that children face from exposure to chemicals and toxic substances. 

I would like to highlight some examples of how the regulatory 

process has addressed children’s health concerns. 

You know that the Clean Air Act requires EPA to set national 

ambient air quality standards for widespread pollutants from diverse sources that are considered harmful to public health and the 

environment. Primary NOX standards are designed to protect the 

health of sensitive populations, including children. These ambient 

air quality standards are an important mechanism for reducing 

children’s exposure. For example, in September 2006 EPA issued 

the Agency’s most protective set of NOX ever for particular matter. 

Our estimates indicate that attaining the new 24-hour PM 2.5 

standards will result in the following improvements in children’s 

health each year compared to 2006: we predict there will be 1,200 

fewer emergency room visits for asthma, 7,300 fewer cases of acute 

bronchitis, 97,000 fewer cases of upper and lower respiratory symptoms, and 51,000 fewer cases of aggravated asthma. And the 

NAAQS for lead, ozone, nitrogen, and sulfur oxides also provide important benefits for children’s health. 

In addition, under the Safe Drinking Water Act Amendments of 

1996 the EPA must consider segments of the population at risk 

from drinking water contaminants. In setting standards for drinking water, EPA conducts detailed analyses of available data to determine children’s health risk. 

12 

Protecting children from potential effects of pesticides is an important aspect of EPA’s pesticide program. 

The Food Quality Protection Act requires EPA to place particular 

interest in children when making regulatory decisions about pesticides. 

Risk assessments include evaluations for children in various age 

groups, since children’s feeding and activity patterns change as 

they grow up. 

In another area of critical important to children’s health, EPA recently published its lead renovation and remodeling and painting 

rule. This rule is designed to minimize children’s lead exposure as 

a result of renovation activities by ensuring that safe occupational 

practices are used by renovaters and that workers are properly 

trained. 

EPA also conducts and facilitates research that provides essential information on children’s health. In addition to intramural research in our Office of Research and Development, EPA’s National 

Center for Environmental Research actively supports extramural 

research on topics related to children’s environmental health 

through its Science to Achieve Results, or STAR, program. 

From a read of our 2007 report, A Decade of Children’s Environmental Health Research, you can see impressive results—— 

Senator BOXER. Mr. Gray, can you just sum up, because you have 

gone a minute over and we have a lot of questions. If you could 

sum up it would be great. 

Mr. GRAY. We have an impressive portfolio of 100 projects that 

have resulted in more than 1,000 peer review publications. 

In addition, we have guidance on conduct of risk assessment and 

the ways in which children’s health should be considered, guidance 

on exposure assessment and the ways in which children’s health 

can be considered, all of which are developed through a rigorous 

Agency-driven process, go through a complete peer review, and are 

available to those who are interested. 

So thank you, Chairman Boxer, members of the Committee. I appreciate your dedication to children’s health and your interest in 

EPA’s efforts. EPA embraces its mission to protect the environment 

and public health, and we take extra care to protect those who may 

be most vulnerable, especially children. 

I look forward to answering any questions that you may have. 

Thank you. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Gray follows:] 

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Senator BOXER. Thank you. 

Mr. Stephenson, welcome. 

STATEMENT OF JOHN B. STEPHENSON, DIRECTOR, NATURAL 

RESOURCES AND ENVIRONMENT, GOVERNMENT ACCOUNTABILITY OFFICE 

Mr. STEPHENSON. Welcome. Madam Chairman, members of the 

Committee, I am pleased to be here today to discuss our work of 

evaluating EPA’s efforts to protect children from environmental 

health risks. Many of the Nation’s 74 million children are exposed 

to hazardous chemicals daily. In 2006, for example, 55 percent of 

children lived in counties that exceeded one or more of the six principal air pollutants, two of which, ozone and particulate matter, are 

known to cause respiratory diseases such as asthma. 

Asthma is the third most common cause of hospitalizations 

among children, resulting in 3.2 billion for treatment and 14 million lost days of school annually. 

In April, 1997, as you have mentioned, the President signed Executive Order 13045 establishing an inter-agency task force to ensure that Federal regulations recognize, explicitly account for 

health and safety risks to children. The President’s task force was 

co-chaired by the Administrator of EPA and the Secretary of 

Health and Human Services at the time and included the heads of 

at least 14 other departments, agencies, commissions, and councils. 

Also in 1997 EPA established the Children’s Health Protection 

Advisory Committee to advise the Agency on regulations, guidance, 

and policy relevant to children’s health. 

My testimony is based on ongoing work for this Committee. We 

are reporting today on how well EPA is using the Advisory Committee and responding to its recommendations. 

In summary, we found that, although the Advisory Committee is 

a FACA chartered specifically to ensure that the Agency’s regulations, guidance, and policies address the disproportionate risks to 

children that result from environmental contaminants, EPA is not 

effectively using its expertise. The Advisory Committee met more 

than thirty times over the last 10 years and discussed a variety of 

environmental health issues with dozens of officials from EPA program offices; however, we identified just seven instances where 

EPA program offices actually asked the Committee’s advice. Rather, in the absence of such requests, the Advisory Committee, itself, 

has taken the initiative to write more than 70 letters to the Administrator since 1998 offering recommendations on a wide variety of 

children’s environmental health concerns. 

I have a chart here that depicts this over 600 recommendations 

categorized in terms of the subject they wrote on. It was very difficult to get these recommendations gleaned out of these 70 letters 

because it is not generally tracked by EPA. 

In addition, in April 2007, to mark its tenth anniversary, the Advisory Committee wrote a letter to the EPA Administrator highlighting progress, but also identifying seven key areas of concern. 

That is depicted in this next chart. They include the need for EPA 

to eliminate environmental health disparities among low-income 

and minority children, the need to strengthen the national approach to regulating toxic chemicals, and the need to provide the 

23 

necessary leadership and infrastructure to protect children’s 

health. 

Our preliminary analysis shows that in about half the cases 

EPA’s response to the Advisory Committee’s 70 letters was non-responsive. We also found that the Administrator has not yet honored the commitment he made in his June 2007 letter for EPA program offices to review the recommendations in the Advisory Committee’s letter. It has been over a year since he made this commitment, but this first step has not yet been completed. 

While we are still in the process of evaluating EPA’s response to 

all of the over 600 Advisory Committee recommendations, we have 

examined in detail recommendations pertaining to three air quality 

standards: particulate matter, ozone, and lead. We selected these 

air standards because of their affects on the rising rates of asthma, 

one of the most critical children’s health concerns in the U.S. 

We found that the Advisory Committee has written seven letters 

containing 27 recommendations on these air pollutants, alone because scientific evidence suggests that standards were not sufficiently protective of children’s health. However, in analyzing EPA’s 

response to these recommendations, we found that EPA either did 

not acknowledge, was non-committal, rejected, or offered only to 

consider them along with comments from the general public. 

As shown in my last chart, EPA ultimately set the standards for 

these air toxins at less stringent levels than those recommended by 

not only the Children’s Advisory Committee, but its own Clean Air 

Advisory Committee, as well. 

Finally, nearly every children’s health expert we have spoken to 

in the course of our work has suggested the need for an inter-agency group to provide important high-level leadership and coordination on children’s environmental health issues. The President’s 

Task Force on Environmental Health Risks and Safety Risks to 

Children had been providing this leadership from 1997 until it was 

allowed to expire in April 2005. The Task Force championed several important initiatives such as the National Children’s Study 

and the healthy schools environmental assessment tool and developed national strategies to coordinate Federal programs for asthma, developmental disorders, cancer, and unintentional injuries, 

four major environmental health threats to children that it identified. 

In conclusion, we believe that EPA should take steps to reinvigorate and more proactively use the expertise of its Advisory Committee and its Office of Children’s Health, and it should honor the 

Administrator’s commitment to act on the Advisory Committee’s 

numerous recommendations. 

Madam Chairman, that concludes my statement. I will be happy 

to take questions. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Stephenson follows:] 

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Senator BOXER. Thank you very much. 

Here is what we are going to do. First, we need to just take down 

that chart, please, because people can’t see Senator Clinton for her 

statement. If you could put it right in front of the table so we can 

look at it, it would be very helpful. 

Here is what we are going to do. As I promised Senator Clinton, 

I am going to give her 5 minutes for an opening, and I am going 

to give up my questioning time to her. She and I worked together 

on this GAO report, and I will come last on my questions, so we 

will go to Senator Clinton for 10 minutes, and Senator Lautenberg, 

Senator Whitehouse. 

Please proceed. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. HILLARY CLINTON, 

U.S. SENATOR FROM THE STATE OF NEW YORK 

Senator CLINTON. Thank you so much, Chairman Boxer, and 

thank you for your lifetime commitment, really, to the health and 

well-being of our children. 

This is such an important hearing, because obviously many of us 

believe strongly that there are direct links between environmental 

contaminants, pollution, stresses, and our children’s health. We 

thought that we were on the right track in our Country and our 

Government in focusing on these concerns, and we learn, unfortunately, but not unexpectedly, that the Bush administration has basically undermined much of what we were trying to accomplish. 

Now, for me this is a very significant finding that the GAO has 

presented in its report. It reveals a systematic failure to prioritize 

children’s health in the Bush administration. The specifics of this 

are, unfortunately, clear for all to see. 

The Bush administration disbanded a critical inter-agency task 

force in our Government that was focused on bringing agencies together to protect children’s health against threats in the environment. While disbanding the group that spearheaded the major children’s health reforms of the past decade, it ignored its own panel 

of experts, disregarded recommendations to ensure our children 

have access to clean air and water, safe homes, safe schools, and 

healthy food. 

It is time to sound the alarm. This cannot be permitted to continue. 

More than 40 years ago, Rachel Carson wrote, ‘‘For the first time 

in the history of the world, every human being is now subjected to 

contact with dangerous chemicals from the moment of conception 

until death.’’ Environmental contamination and pollution presents 

an insidious threat to children’s health, a silent but ever-present 

factor in childhood asthma, cancer rates, and other serious health 

problems. 

Cancer rates, asthma, people think, Well, what does that have to 

do with the environment? Well, asthma rates have more than doubled since 1985. The CDC estimates that more than 300,000 children currently have elevated levels of lead in their blood. We know 

that children living near very obvious sites of pollution have other 

serious diseases, including cancer, in a higher than expected rate. 

We cannot allow this to continue. 

50 

In the Clinton administration more than a decade ago we issued 

an Executive Order on the protection of children from environmental health risks and safety risks. EPA established the Office of 

Children’s Health Protection and created the Children’s Health Advisory Committee. That was an important set of decisions and represented a milestone in making sure we did not ignore the scientific evidence and linkage between environmental exposure and 

children’s health, adverse effects. 

These actions helped make schools safer for kids and helped reduce pesticide exposure and focused attention on the growing asthma epidemic and expanded lead poisoning prevention. The task 

force established under the Executive Order was instrumental in 

the creation of the landmark National Children’s Study, a longterm effort that will help us better understand the links between 

chronic disease and the environment. 

So it defies common sense that the Bush administration quietly 

disbanded the task force in 2005, undercut the Children’s Health 

Protection Office, and failed to follow through ton the Clinton administration’s efforts on children’s health. 

I mean, this would be laughable if it weren’t so serious. In 2002 

EPA made the Office of Children’s Health Protection responsible 

for the aging initiative, focused on issues facing seniors, equally important but undermining the mission of that office, and doing so 

despite recommendations to the contrary by the Children’s Health 

Protection Advisory Committee. 

Later, the Office of Children’s Health, having incorporated aging 

issues, was combined with the Office of Environmental Education. 

Until recently, the Administration refused to appoint anyone to actually be the director of the office, essentially and purposefully 

leaving it rudderless. 

So it is time we restored the mission of this office, the function 

of the inter-agency task force, and nation spirit of the orders issued 

by the Clinton administration. 

Today I will be introducing the Children’s Environmental Health 

and Safety Risk Reduction Act, which will once again ensure that 

we have the entire Federal Government working together to protect 

the health of our children. The Children’s Health Protection Advisory Committee made seven recommendations for action EPA 

should take to recommit the Agency to children’s health. I echoed 

those findings in a letter to Administrator Johnson, asking him to 

take action. He responded that he would ask the Office of Children’s Health to review the recommendations. But, according to the 

GAO, no progress has been made more than a year after the initial 

promise of a review by Administrator Johnson. It is no wonder he 

wouldn’t come to testify today. 

Ten years after the landmark executive order, this is the State 

of children’s health protection at the EPA: no leadership, no resources, no initiative, no real mission. It is a disaster and it is a 

disgrace, and we intend to fix it. 

I hope that today’s hearing will galvanize advocates, parents, as 

well as the EPA, itself, to take action. I look forward to continuing 

to work with our chairman and other colleagues to try to push forward an agenda that will protect our children. 

[The prepared statement of Senator Clinton follows:] 

51 

STATEMENT OF HON. HILLARY RODHAM CLINTON, U.S. SENATOR

FROM THE STATE OF NEW YORK

Thank you so much, Chairman Boxer, and thank you for your lifetime commitment, really, to the health and well-being of our children. 

This is such an important hearing because obviously many of us believe strongly 

that there are direct links between environmental contaminants, pollution, stresses, 

and our children’s health. And we thought we were on the right track in our country 

and our government in focusing on these concerns, and we learn unfortunately but 

not unexpectedly that the Bush administration has basically undermined much of 

what we were trying to accomplish. 

Now for me, this is a very significant finding that the GAO has presented in its 

report. It reveals a systematic failure to prioritize children’s health in the Bush administration. And the specifics of this are unfortunately clear for all to see. The 

Bush administration disbanded a critical interagency Task Force in our government 

that was focused on bringing agencies together to protect children’s health against 

threats in the environment. While disbanding the group that spearheaded the major 

children’s health reforms of the past decade, it ignored its own panel of experts, disregarded recommendations to ensure our children have access to clean air and 

water, safe homes, safe schools, and healthy food. 

It is time to sound the alarm. This cannot be permitted to continue. More than 

40 years ago, Rachel Carson wrote, ‘‘For the first time in the history of the world, 

every human being is now subjected to contact with dangerous chemicals from the 

moment of conception until death.’’ Environmental contamination and pollution presents an insidious threat to children’s health—a silent, but ever present factor in 

childhood asthma, cancer rates, and other serious health problems. 

Cancer rates, asthma, people think, ‘‘Well what does this have to do with the environment?’’ Well, asthma rates have more than doubled since 1985. The CDC estimates that more than 300,000 children currently have elevated levels of lead in 

their blood. We know that children living near very obvious sites of pollution have 

other serious diseases, including cancer, at a higher than expected rate. 

We cannot allow this to continue. In the Clinton administration, more than a decade ago, we issued an Executive Order on the protection of children from environmental health risks and safety risks. The EPA established the office of Children’s 

Health Protection and created the Children’s Health [Protection] Advisory Committee. That was an important set of decisions and represented a milestone in making sure we did not ignore the scientific evidence and linkage between environmental exposure and children’s health adverse effects. 

These actions helped make schools safer for kids and helped reduce pesticide exposure and focused attention on the growing asthma epidemic and expanded lead 

poisoning prevention. The Task Force established under the Executive Order was 

instrumental in the creation of the landmark National Children’s Study, a long-term 

effort that will help us better understand the links between chronic disease and the 

environment. 

So it defies common sense that the Bush administration quietly disbanded the 

taskforce in 2005, undercut the Children’s Health Protection Office, and failed to follow through on the Clinton administration’s efforts on children’s health. I mean, this 

would be laughable if it weren’t so serious. 

In 2002, EPA made the Office of Children’s Health Protection responsible for the 

Aging Initiative, focused on issues facing seniors—equally important, but undermining the mission of that office and doing so despite recommendations to the contrary by the Children’s Health Protection Advisory Committee. Later the Office of 

Children’s Health, having incorporating aging issues, was combined with the Office 

on Environmental Education. And until recently, the administration refused to appoint anyone to actually be the director of the office, essentially and purposefully 

leaving it rudderless. 

So it’s time we restored the mission of this office, the function of the interagency 

Task Force, and the spirit of the orders issued by Clinton administration. 

Today I will be introducing the Children’s Environmental Health and Safety Risk 

Reduction Act, which will once again ensure that we have the entire Federal Government working together to protect the health of our children. 

The Children’s Health Protection Advisory Committee made seven recommendations for actions EPA should take to recommit the agency to children’s health. I 

echoed those findings in a letter to Administrator Johnson, asking him to take action. He responded that he would ask the Office of Children’s Health to review the 

recommendations. But according to the GAO, no progress had been made more than 

a year after the initial promise of a review by Administrator Johnson. It’s no wonder 

he wouldn’t come to testify today. 

52 

Ten years after the landmark Executive Order, this is the State of children’s 

health protection at the EPA: no leadership, no resources, no initiative, no real mission. It’s a disaster and it’s a disgrace, and we intend to fix it. 

I hope today’s hearing will galvanize advocates, parents, as well as the EPA itself 

to take action, and I look forward to continuing to work with our Chairman and 

other colleagues to try to push forward an agenda that will protect our children. 

Senator CLINTON. Now, there is so much to be talked about here 

that it is almost hard to know where to start, but let me begin, Mr. 

Stephenson. Your testimony notes that if the inter-agency task 

force created by President Clinton’s Executive Order 13045 were 

still in existence, it could have helped address the multiple toy recalls last year. Would you please elaborate on the importance of 

that task force and the ways that it contributes to children’s health 

protection. 

Mr. STEPHENSON. That is, of course, hypothetical, but nevertheless, without the inter-agency task force you don’t have Housing 

and Urban Development working with the EPA. You simply don’t 

have a high-level infrastructure with which to coordinate Federal 

programs. Even in the EPA’s annual operating plan for Fiscal Year 

2009 it recognizes the importance of the task force and its contribution to removing lead. That was just in this year’s plan, even 

though the task force was disbanded over 3 years ago. 

Senator CLINTON. Dr. Gray, can you explain why the President 

chose to disband the task force? 

Mr. GRAY. Well, Senator, I think it is important to realize that 

there is high-level coordination in the Federal Government. It has 

been focused for the last several years, however, on the National 

Children’s Study, which is an outgrowth of the task force. 

Senator CLINTON. Well, isn’t it true that in the President’s budget of the last several years it was recommended to cut the funding 

for the National Children’s Study? 

Mr. GRAY. The funding for the National Children’s Study has 

continued. There are recommendations for cuts, but that is an effort to make sure that we have just the resources that we need to 

do the highest priority work. That high-priority work comes from 

an inter-agency process that is co-chaired by the EPA, and it also 

involves an ongoing consortium that coordinates between all of the 

Federal agencies, including Housing and Urban Development, who 

are interested in children’s affairs. So there is coordination. 

Senator CLINTON. Well, it is somewhat confusing to follow your 

testimony, because the fact is that President Bush had sought to 

zero out the National Children’s Study in his budgets, and it is interesting that your testimony touts programs spearheaded by the 

task force such as the National Children’s Study, so it is very difficult to understand exactly what the priorities of this Administration are when it comes to children’s health. 

I don’t hold you responsible. You are here representing the EPA, 

but, unfortunately, the bottom line is that actions speak louder 

than words, and the efforts to zero out the funding, to disband the 

task force I think speaks volumes about what we can expect from 

this Administration, thankfully not for very much longer. 

Dr. Gray, in June 2007 Administrator Johnson promised to implement an inter-agency review of the Children’s Health Protection 

Advisory Committee regarding a renewed focus on children’s 

health. In a letter I sent to him in October 2007 I asked for a time 

53 

line. In December 2007 I was told that there were preliminary discussions and we would be hearing something soon. It has been 

roughly 10 months since that response. What progress has been 

made in reviewing these recommendations and what is a time line 

for the completion of that review? 

Mr. GRAY. Well, thank you for an opportunity to make clear that, 

in fact, the Agency is working to understand and to consider those 

recommendations that came from the Children’s Health Protection 

Advisory Committee. There have been conversations between at 

the time the acting head of the Office of Children’s Health Protection, and a variety of the program offices. There are staff-level collaborations that are going on. There has been a change, as was 

mentioned. We have a permanent head for the Office of Children’s 

Health Protection, and as that person has the opportunity to get 

settled and organize things, we will be moving forward. 

I can’t give you a time line right now, but I would be happy to 

get back to you with a time line. 

Senator CLINTON. Well, the time line is that nothing has happened. 

Just to followup quickly, Mr. Stephenson, what progress has EPA 

made in reviewing the recommendations of the tenth anniversary 

letter since December 2007? 

Mr. STEPHENSON. Really, none. There is a new director of the 

Children’s Health Office. That is true. But under the acting director they had actually established task groups to work on the recommendations, and those were pretty much disbanded by the current director when she took office. I know she has held meetings 

with each of the program offices and so forth, but there has really 

been nothing concrete that has come out of that, to my knowledge. 

Senator CLINTON. Thank you. 

Senator BOXER. Thank you so much, Senator Clinton. 

Senator Lautenberg. 

Senator LAUTENBERG. Thank you, Madam Chairman. 

Mr. Stephenson, in your testimony you highlight very clearly the 

fact that there has been virtually no response to many things that 

the Committee has recommended. Has EPA explained to your 

agency why they haven’t implemented the Committee’s recommendations or why they haven’t? Do they acknowledge in any 

way receipt of letters or communication from your Agency that recommendations made are either being ignored, not understood? 

What do they say? 

Mr. STEPHENSON. One of the advantages of having an actual 

FACA Advisory Committee is that the Agency is required to respond in writing to each of the letters written to it by the Advisory 

Committee. They have done so, but what I was suggesting is that 

a quarter of the time no response was delivered. About a quarter 

of the time the response was a, Thank you very much for your interest. And, to be fair, half the time there was a detailed response. 

What is more alarming is that we had to work very, very hard 

to pull the recommendations out of these 70 letters to even determine that there were 600 recommendations. Nobody is tracking 

that. There is no rigor in what the Advisory Committee has recommended and what actions we might do. There is no proactive 

asking of the Advisory Committee, What do you think about this 

54 

regulation? What do you think about that policy? It is all push; 

there is no pull. 

That is what we noticed. We just think they need to invigorate 

and use in a more concrete way the valuable input that they are 

getting from this 29-member scientific Advisory Committee. 

Senator LAUTENBERG. You are very kind to say re-invigorate. No 

response. How do you invigorate the no-response kind of thing? 

What does that say to you? Are they asleep over there? Do they 

think that your recommendations are useless? What about you got 

some responses here and there, and thank you very much, as you 

said, for your interest. What do they say? do you followup when 

there are letters sent, recommendations made, and you hear nothing? 

Mr. STEPHENSON. Well, the Office of Children’s Health is assigned to the Office of the Administrator, and it is an Advisory 

Committee. Nevertheless, it exists because of the unique needs of 

children, and simply to say that we have improved this clean air 

program or we have improved this drinking water program for the 

general public is not good enough. The office exists for the explicit 

needs of children, and we just don’t see it being used in that manner. 

Senator LAUTENBERG. So if you had to grade their report card, 

what kind of a grade would you give them for their attention to 

children’s health needs, as described by your agency and by the 

Committee and your commentary? 

Mr. STEPHENSON. Probably an incomplete. 

Senator LAUTENBERG. Incomplete is like failure, right? 

Mr. STEPHENSON. You haven’t asked. 

Senator LAUTENBERG. Yes. Recently the EPA put forward air 

quality standards that are less protective than what the Children’s 

Health Advisory Panel [sic] called for. Is there any evidence that 

EPA even considered this recommendation or is it, as has happened so often in the past, ignored? 

Mr. STEPHENSON. I am sure they considered it, but, again, when 

you are looking at the Advisory Committee’s contribution toward 

these air standards, they made, as we said, over 20 specific recommendations concerned with the high level of these standards. 

The chart is right in front of you here that shows that ultimately 

where the standard was set is above not only the Children’s Advisory Committee recommendation, but also the Clean Air Advisory 

Committee. So they consider them along with public comments like 

everyone else, but I am not sure that they took the science specifically attributable to children into account. 

Senator LAUTENBERG. Madam Chairman, thank you very much. 

One thing is obvious that we have learned here in this Committee, that the primary gesture that you get from EPA when questions of significance are put to them or recommendations made that 

it is kind of thumbing their nose. Forget about the Congress. I 

mean, we can take the insults. But the abuse of children’s health 

is an unacceptable condition and we have got to make it change 

here. 

I thank you very much. 

Dr. Gray, I wouldn’t want to be at your spot at the table right 

now. 

55 

Thank you very much. 

Senator BOXER. Senator, you speak for me. 

Senator Whitehouse. 

Senator WHITEHOUSE. Thank you, Chairman. 

The suggestion in Senator Lautenberg’s question is that it actually matters to the leadership of EPA how well the decisions turn 

out for children. There isn’t actually a very good case for that proposition. The proposition that is supported by the evidence is that 

EPA cares about how this works out for industry and for the big 

donors to the Bush White House. It is very hard to reconcile their 

decisions with any other motivation. 

I would like to focus particular on this ozone question that you 

looked at, Mr. Stephenson. As I understand it, the standard for 

ozone pollution had been set at 0.08 parts per million, and then the 

EPA’s own clean air scientific advisory commission came back and 

said that is not safe. The safe range is between 0.07 and .06 parts 

per million, a range, .06 to .07. Then the Children’s Health Advisory Committee chimed in on the Clean Air Advisory Committee, 

so now you have two scientific committees speaking, and the children’s one says, Look, because the way you calculate the risk 

doesn’t take into account the risk to children adequately, you 

should go to the low end of that range, and they recommended the 

0.06. 

Mr. STEPHENSON. Correct. 

Senator WHITEHOUSE. So the Administrator is faced with two 

recommendations: one, a range that is the safe range from .06 to 

.07; within that a recommendation protective of children because of 

the specifics of the way this was done that said if you want to protect children you have got to go all the way to .006 [sic]. Straight 

out of the range, he sat, as your chart shows, a standard outside 

the safe range and quite distant from the range that had been recommended for children. 

Mr. Gray tells us that we take extra precaution to protect those 

who are most vulnerable to contaminants in the environment, especially children. Can you reconcile Mr. Gray’s statement with what 

was decided in this particular case? And could you elaborate at all? 

Well, let me ask you that first and then I will go to my second 

question. 

Mr. STEPHENSON. Well, as with any rule or regulation you have 

to do a cost/benefit study and show the benefits, and you heard Dr. 

Gray talk about the benefits of this particular standard of .075. 

Just imagine how much greater the benefits would have been had 

they adopted the Children’s Advisory Committee recommendations. 

We did not do a cost/benefit analysis to show how much more expensive that would have been to the polluting entities, but EPA 

does have to take that into consideration. 

These are small numbers we are talking about, .06 to .075, but 

percentage-wise that is huge. 

Senator WHITEHOUSE. Yes. It is huge, and it matters a great deal 

to little lungs. 

The question that I have, you see this going on. You have a clean 

air scientific advisory committee that is appointed by EPA, itself, 

with the best scientists in the Country. You have a children’s 

Health and Protection Committee that Mr. Gray here in his own 

56 

testimony says is comprised of leading researchers, academics, 

health care providers, NGO’s, industry representatives, and State 

and local government representatives. They get recommendations. 

They got recommendations specifically from the Children’s Health 

Science Advisory Council. Then they ignore it. 

You have pointed out how the final standards over and over 

again fall outside the safe range and in favor of industry. Did you 

try to explore why it is that this is happening? 

Mr. STEPHENSON. No, not as part of this study. We haven’t examined these specific clean air rules. We were more looking at just 

how EPA responded to specific recommendations from the Advisory 

Committee. We just pointed this out as an example of where the 

Advisory Committee had made very specific recommendations, 27 

of them, in fact, and the ultimate result of those recommendations. 

Senator WHITEHOUSE. Well, we can follow this up later, but I do 

think it is important outstanding understand, when Government 

goes off the rails like this, why, in part so that we can be more 

alert and not allow it to be repeated. 

I would suggest that it is a combination of a very significant industry investment in phony science and in phony doubt about 

science corresponding with an Agency that is captured by political 

interests and basically instructed to disregard its mission. When 

you have that instruction coming from the top and the phony 

science to work with, given that motivation at the bottom, you connect those two dots and you get these results. 

I think it is a matter of real concern and we will talk later on 

about maybe pursuing this and getting into the why question. 

I appreciate the time to question. Thank you, Chairman. 

Senator BOXER. Thank you. 

Senator Barrasso. 

Senator BARRASSO. Thank you, Madam Chairman. 

If I could, Mr. Gray, when the EPA sets health standards, reference doses, what do you take into account in terms of maybe differential sensitivities when it comes to children and how you are 

trying to figure things out and what is safe and what is not? 

Mr. GRAY. Well, the EPA always looks very closely at any potential adverse effects that a material might have, and those certainly 

include things that we might have concerns with children. We look 

at potential developmental effects, potential neurotoxic effects, and 

we consider those very, very seriously. 

Just to give a feel for how much this is done, in the Office of Pesticides, the Food Quality Protection Act told EPA to go back and 

look at the assessments that they had done of pesticides to consider 

the special sensitivity that children might have. To this point, with 

a terrific amount of effort, EPA has reviewed and re-assessed over 

9,700 pesticide tolerances—that is, the levels that can be on food— 

to take into account things about children—their consumption patterns that might be different. As a father, I know that your kids 

don’t always eat what you want them to eat; they eat what they 

eat, and we have to make sure that we keep track of their consumption patterns, and also potential increase of susceptibility because of developmental issues. 

57 

So this is something that the Agency takes very, very seriously. 

We look at the science. We use a science-based approach to understand the right steps to take to prevent any harm to children. 

Senator BARRASSO. So we looked at both existing chemicals and 

then potential new chemicals coming on the market? If we could 

talk about both of those separately, one is in terms of existing 

chemicals, what are the things you can do under the Toxic Substance Control Act to address the children’s health concerns about 

existing chemicals. And then I want to ask a second question to followup in terms of new chemicals coming on the market. 

Mr. GRAY. Well, for existing chemicals there are two things that 

we can point to. One is our VCCEP program that was launched in 

the late 1990’s. This is the Voluntary Children’s Chemical Evaluation Program. It was our attempt to learn how we can take in and 

develop special information about potential risks to children and to 

use that in our assessment process. 

This is something that we have worked hard on. This has been 

a volunteer program that has involved the development of a great 

deal of data. 

We have recently taken a look at that pilot to say what can we 

learn about the way we can get more information, that we can better use information to look at potential risks to children. We, in 

fact, have gone to our Children’s Health Advisory Committee. We 

are going to them again in October with questions about this 

project. We are going to them very specifically. We are using them 

proactively to help us understand what we have learned from this 

process. 

We have also had public meetings on this where we have worked 

with a variety of stakeholders. Because of this, we are looking at 

modifications to the way that we are going to run this VCCEP program. That is very important. 

One of the modifications has to do with working through the program chemicals that we choose to evaluate. What we wanted to do 

there is to link it up with what we call our Champ program, our 

chemical assessment program that is committed to reviewing about 

3,000 existing chemicals for their hazard and exposure information 

so that we can set the appropriate priorities. 

We want to use what we learn from that to set priorities for our 

children’s efforts, as well. So we have efforts going on to look at 

those chemicals in a very, very careful way. 

Senator BARRASSO. Are the IRIS health-based risk values applicable only to adults, or do you include children in that, too, when 

you go into all of the—— 

Mr. GRAY. That is another good question. Our IRIS program is 

the way in which we develop health values that are used by other 

parts of the Agency, by States, by localities, by folks around the 

world to assess risks. In the IRIS program we look very specifically 

at potential risks to children. In fact, you will see that there are 

places. We have a couple of our IRIS assessments out there now 

that use what we call in the Agency speak our age-dependent adjustment factors to those assessments that are there specifically to 

account for situations in which there might be greater-risk children. This is something that we take into account in those assessments, as well. 

58 

Senator BARRASSO. Thank you, Mr. Gray. 

Thank you, Madam Chairman. 

Senator BOXER. Thank you, Senator. 

Senator Klobuchar. 

Senator KLOBUCHAR. Assistant Director Gray, Director Stephenson, thank you very much for being here. I tell you my interest in 

this came out of what we have seen in our State where we had a 

little 4-year-old boy die when he swallowed a charm that was 99 

percent lead. I know that is under the Consumer Product Safety 

Commission, but when we started looking at that from the Commerce Committee we found that the agency had been a shadow of 

its former self, that it was down on the job, and as a result these 

toxic products were allowed on our shores and in our stores. 

And then, getting ready for this hearing, we looked at what was 

going on in our State where we have seen more and more children 

with asthma, $3 billion in treatment, according to the Center for 

Disease Control; 14 million days of school lost per year. Minnesota 

children, 4,339 days hospitalized because of asthma. That is where 

my concern comes from. 

As I read what was going on with Director Stephenson talked 

about with nor responding to the Advisory Committee, it reminds 

me eerily of what we saw with the climate change issue, where recommendations were made by scientists and the only ones that 

could see the endangerment standard were a group of Senators in 

a back room. It is like the science doesn’t exist. And I come from 

a State where we believe in science. We brought the world everything from the Post-It note to the pacemaker. But it seems as 

though the Administration continues to live, as Senator Clinton 

has so adeptly put it, in an evidence-free zone. 

So I want to talk a little bit about the evidence and how we can 

get the evidence into our Government again. 

One of the things that I got here was an article from the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, Assistant Administrator, and it talks 

about this EPA voluntary children’s chemical evaluation program, 

and this program was supposed to rely on companies to provide information about the dangers about the chemicals they produce. 

What is the status of that program? 

Mr. GRAY. Thank you, Senator. 

As I just mentioned, the VCCEP program was our attempt. It 

was started in the late 1990’s. it was an attempt to learn how we 

can develop the information that we need to help address potential 

sensitivities of children. 

Senator KLOBUCHAR. And is there still funding for that program? 

Mr. GRAY. Yes, there is. In fact, the program has recently undergone a number of reviews to help us understand this. We have gotten reviews from our Children’s Health Protection Advisory Committee. We have talked to other stakeholders. We have held public 

meetings to help us understand what we have learned and what 

we might do to make this even more effective. 

Senator KLOBUCHAR. And when is the last time that committee 

met? 

Mr. GRAY. It is not really a committee; it is an ongoing process 

that is involved with getting data together and bringing it in. We 

do have a meeting planned. We had a public meeting in July, and, 

59 

in fact, in October we are going to our Children’s Health Advisory 

Committee for their advice on what we should do with this program, as well. 

Senator KLOBUCHAR. But is it true the Committee hasn’t met in 

nearly a year? 

Mr. GRAY. I will have to get back to you. I don’t quite understand. 

Senator KLOBUCHAR. You just said that it was a thriving committee and that there was funding, and it appears to me, according 

to this article, it hasn’t met. Key members of the program can’t 

even say if it is alive. 

Chairman, could I put this into the record, the Milwaukee Journal article. 

Senator BOXER. Without objection, yes. 

Senator KLOBUCHAR. March 29, 2008. 

[The referenced information was not received at time of print.] 

Senator KLOBUCHAR. Then I just had a few questions of you, Mr. 

Stephenson. You talked about how these 70 letters come in from 

the advisory group to the EPA, and you can only think of three instances where there was some kind of a response. Could you explain those to me and what happened with the information from 

the letters to the Administrator as they were recommendations regarding children’s health? 

Mr. STEPHENSON. No. This is over a 10-year period. We said 

there were seven instances where we could identify where the EPA 

program offices actually came to the Advisory Committee to ask 

them for input or questions. Nevertheless, the Children’s Health 

Protection Advisory Committee wrote 70 letters over those 10 

years. We worked very hard to pull 600-plus recommendations out 

of those, and we are in the process of analyzing EPA’s response to 

those. The furthest we have got along is for these NAP standards 

that you see on the chart in front of me here. 

Senator KLOBUCHAR. And you had examples of how the EPA has 

disregarded, rejected, or ignored recommendations to protect the 

health and well-being of our children? Do you know how many children we are talking about there? 

Senator KLOBUCHAR. No. We said that in reference to these NAP 

standards, that we looked at the 27 recommendations from the Advisory Committee specifically concerning those, and the EPA response was kind of non-responsive to those particular standards. 

Senator KLOBUCHAR. This last thing I wanted to mention for future use is in Minnesota because of our frustration with what is 

going on. Our citizens have taken matters into their own hands, 

and there is a group called Health Legacy, which is a broad public 

health coalition of 29 members of health professionals, health-affected groups, environmental groups, faith communities, and parent groups. They have actually taken on the job of educating people 

in their community. I think it is worth looking into this, but obviously I think it would be better to do on the Federal level. 

Thank you very much. 

Senator BOXER. Thank you. 

I will conclude, because I deferred my questions until the end. 

Mr. Gray, why did Mr. Johnson refuse to come to this hearing? 

Mr. GRAY. He was not available. I do not know any other details. 

60 

Senator BOXER. When will he be available to come before this 

Committee? 

Mr. GRAY. We can get back to you for that. 

Senator BOXER. You will get back to me? Will you get back to me 

today? We have been trying to get Mr. Johnson here since March. 

He is violating a promise and a pledge he has made to this Committee. Will you please tell him that we want an answer and we 

want to see him up here. 

I will come back in a lame duck session. He has got to come before this Committee. Will you please relay that to him? So you 

don’t know why he couldn’t make it? Just couldn’t make it. 

Do you know if Mr. Johnson is planning foreign travel between 

now and the end of his term? 

Mr. GRAY. I am sorry, I don’t know his schedule that far in advance. We have a process where we can answer those questions. 

Senator BOXER. Do you know if anyone is planning foreign travel? I am not asking you when, I am just asking does he plan foreign travel between now and the end of his term? 

Mr. GRAY. I just don’t know. 

Senator BOXER. You don’t know. OK. But you will please, if you 

would, find out for me if he is planning foreign travel, because I 

will tell you right now our kids are in trouble. There are lots of 

problems out there. The GAO has just done a stupendous job and 

you say you are proud of your work there with children, and yet 

they said, ‘‘EPA has largely disregarded key recommendations from 

its Children’s Health Protection Advisory Committee, particularly 

several recent letters advising EPA on proposed revisions to the 

clean air standards.’’ 

Now, air pollution is a serious threat to public health across the 

Country, including tens of millions of children who live in areas 

who don’t meet Federal air quality standards. Don’t the families 

and children in our Country deserve better than this? 

Mr. GRAY. Well, Senator, I think it is very clear that we do value 

the advice that we get from our Children’s Health Advisory Committee, and there are numerous examples of situations in which we 

have made real progress, made real changes in programs because 

of their advice, where we have taken our smart growth programs 

and focused them on children, where—— 

Senator BOXER. Well, why did GAO give you such a thumbs 

down? There is no equivocation. They don’t have any dog in the 

fight. They are just taking a look. If you are doing such a great job, 

why don’t they know about it? 

Also, if children are such a priority, why is it that the Administrator failed to re-establish the Children’s Health Protection Advisory Committee, the task force? Why was that allowed to expire, 

the Children’s Environmental Health Risks and Safety Risks, that 

task force expired in 2005. If children are so important, why did 

the Administrator let that expire? 

Well, let me ask Mr. Stephenson, since you have lost your ability 

to answer these questions. 

Based on your review, do you have any information that indicates that task force that was allowed to expire was not being effective? 

61 

Mr. STEPHENSON. No. To the contrary. It was initially set up 

under President Clinton for 4 years. It was re-established for 2 

years in 2001 and 2003 by President Bush and was simply not extended after 2005. It made very valuable contributions. It exhibited 

leadership. It wrote strategic plans, which now have no one to implement them. We do see a need for an inter-agency task force. 

I am sure that agencies talk all the time, but the discipline and 

rigor that a task force gives to a subject like this is very important, 

we think. And it is even recognized, as I mentioned, in EPA’s own 

Fiscal Year 2009 operating plan. They give credit to that Presidential task force for its progress on lead. That is 3 years after it 

expired. 

Senator BOXER. So, Mr. Gray, just spare me all your words that 

just are not true. I am sorry. Two-and-a-half years ago on March 

8, 2006, EPA’s independent children’s health advisors found that 

EPA’s cleanup levels for perchlorate ‘‘is not protective of children.’’ 

They didn’t mince words. They recommended that it be substantially strengthened. EPA still has not acted on that recommendation. 

How can you justify the Agency’s failure to set a cleanup standard for this toxic chemical that, by the way, is present in more 

than 40 of our States? How can you justify the Agency’s failure to 

set a clean-up standard for this chemical found in the water of millions of children, a standard that considers the vulnerability, body 

weight, and exposure patterns of infants and young children? Give 

me your rationale for that one if you love children so much in your 

work. 

Mr. GRAY. I do love children very much. 

Senator BOXER. I know you do. I know. 

Mr. GRAY. I have two of my own. 

Senator BOXER. I don’t question your private life; I am questioning your work. 

Mr. GRAY. I think you will be happy to know that we are working very hard on perchlorate. We have developed and had new data 

from the Food and Drug Administration that helps us understand 

much more about children’s routes of exposure. We have done extensive physiologically based pharmacokinetics modeling to help us 

understand the potential vulnerabilities of children. Perchlorate 

and children is an issue we take very seriously. 

Senator BOXER. Well, Mr. Grumbles, just so you know, your own 

Mr. Grumbles sat here in your chair and told us he doubted there 

would even be a standard for perchlorate, Mr. Stephenson. 

Mr. STEPHENSON. I was just going to mention that you will recall 

we also did some work on the integrated risk information system, 

which is scientific assessment of chemicals, and we used perchlorate as one of our poster children for being stuck in the assessment process for over a decade. So until you do that scientific assessment, it is a forerunner to any standard or regulation. Dr. Gray 

is correct. They are doing a lot of things on perchlorate. But we 

still haven’t concluded the basic scientific assessment needed to 

move forward on a regulation or a standard. 

Senator BOXER. And Mr. Grumbles practically told me they 

weren’t going to have a standard, practically sat there and said it. 

And the time has been wasted. 

62 

I have to say with Senator Clinton here, we have gone backward 

at a rapid pace since the Clinton years. That is not what America 

does. In America we make life better for our people. We use the 

tools we have. But when you have special interests sitting at the 

table you can talk to me about science. Of course that is what we 

want. But if the people who are translating the science have a special interest in it, nothing good can come of it. 

I can only speak for my State. We are setting a standard for perchlorate. We are not standing around waiting for you, because our 

kids are worth a lot to us. I just think this has been a very sad, 

sad moment for this Committee to sit here and hear this. 

I just want to say, Mr. Stephenson, thank you for this. Senator 

Clinton and I are so pleased, because when you did this work you 

didn’t equivocate. You just said this is where it comes down. We 

are just simply not doing the right thing for our children. That is 

clear. 

We will call on the next panel. 

We want to welcome our next panel. We ask you to take your 

seats as quickly as possible because the clock does tick around here 

and we have got to move forward. 

First we are going to hear from Susan West Marmagas, Director 

of Health Programs, Commonweal, and former member of EPA’s 

Children’s Health Protection Advisory Committee, to be followed by 

Dr. Leo Trasande, Co-Director, Mount Sinai’s Center for Children’s 

Health and the Environment, and Dr. Robert Brent, Distinguished 

Professor of Pediatrics at duPont Hospital for Children. 

We will call on Ms. Marmagas first. 

STATEMENT OF SUSAN WEST MARMAGAS, DIRECTOR OF 

HEALTH PROGRAMS, COMMONWEAL 

Ms. MARMAGAS. Thank you very much. 

Senator BOXER. Try to keep it to 5 minutes. 

Ms. MARMAGAS. Thank you very much. 

Dear Madam Chair and members of the Committee, good morning. It is my honor to speak before you today about the importance 

of children’s health and the environment and the track record at 

the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to address this vital 

issue. 

My name is Susan West Marmagas and I am the Director of 

Health Programs with Commonweal. 

Today I am speaking as a former member of, but not representing, the Children’s Health Protection Advisory Committee, a 

Federal advisory committee that advises the Administrator of the 

Environmental Protection Agency by offering scientific review, 

guidance, and technical assistance on children’s environmental 

health. 

As defined by EPA, the CHPAC is ‘‘a body of researchers, academicians, health care providers, environmentalists, children’s advocates, professionals, Government employees, and members of the 

public who advise EPA on regulations, research, and communications issues relevant to children.’’ 

The CHPAC is comprised of a broad swath of children’s health 

experts, from a range of perspectives, who reach all decisions by 

consensus. Every member has been appointed or reappointed by 

63 

this Administration, myself included. I served on the Committee 

from 2001 to 2007, during which time we brought many issues to 

the Agency. 

Today I will demonstrate a pattern of neglect by EPA leadership 

in the last years to address significant health threats to our Nation’s children. I will briefly comment on the weakened stature of 

the CHPAC, offer three specific examples where EPA leadership 

did not heed our advice, discuss the steady decline of EPA leadership support within the Agency on this issue, and conclude with 

brief comments on two timely policy issues. 

First, the use of the CHPAC by the Administrator of EPA has 

changed considerably over the last several years. At its inception, 

the Committee was seen as the go-to body of experts on children’s 

environmental health for EPA, and the Administrator and key offices came to the Committee for review, comment, and advice on 

critical policy, regulatory, and scientific issues. Many of these 

issues were well received by the Agency, and many incorporated 

into Agency decisionmaking. 

Over the last several years, however, the Committee has been 

seen less by EPA leadership as a critical advisory body and more 

solely as a public commenter. This has not stopped the CHPAC 

from seeking out critical issues, looking at the science, and making 

recommendations to EPA. We have looked at such issues as the national ambient air quality standards for ozone, particulate matter 

and lead; mercury; perchlorate; and other issues. However, they 

have increasingly ignored the recommendations of this Committee. 

I would like to just briefly talk about three issues. The first is 

the Clean Air Mercury Rule. This was an issue that the CHPAC 

took up in 2004 and wrote not one but four letters to the Agency. 

We wrote four letters because our first three letters were ignored, 

and we continued to talk about the scientific issues and the importance of addressing this issue. 

Even after these three additional letters to the Administrator, 

the Agency continued to downplay and ignore the significant threat 

of mercury to children’s health, even in the face of persistent evidence-based concerns on this issue. 

The second is the National Ambient Air Quality Standards. We 

wrote letters on particulate matter, ozone, and lead, laying out the 

scientific basis for protecting children, and we also specifically followed the recommendations of the Clean Air Science Advisory 

Committee. However, all of these recommendations were ignored 

by the Agency and they did not set the standard that our advisory 

committee recommended. 

Third, perchlorate, which has also come up in this hearing today. 

The main health risk of perchlorate is its effect on brain function, 

namely through the impact of perchlorate on the thyroid. 

In 2006 we wrote a letter with regards to the EPA preliminary 

remediation goal and we argued then that it was not sufficiently 

protective of children, most notably infants and breast-feeding infants. However, our extensive input has not been taken up by the 

Agency. Since that time, there is even additional study and analysis, especially from the Centers for Disease Control, which shows 

that nursing infants are at particular risk. 

64 

I now feel that it is important to take both our recommendations 

and this new science in considering this new standard. 

Finally, I would like to just talk briefly about the decrease of 

leadership within the Agency. I think this has been addressed already by the GAO report. There has been no permanent director 

of the Office of Children’s Environmental Health until very recently. We actually as a committee wrote comment letters to the 

Agency specifically saying they needed a director, they should not 

be adding aging and environmental education to the list, and they 

should add resources to this office. They have moved staff around 

to handle these three issues and they have also not increased the 

budget to address them. 

Finally, in my last second, I would just like to comment that 

there are two policy issues that are outside my role as the CHPAC, 

but I think are important, and one is the kids Safe Chemical Act. 

We found as a committee that it was challenging to get EPA to do 

what it needed to do to protect children because the Toxic Substances Control Act is not sufficient and does not effectively protect 

children, and the Kid-Safe Chemical Act would address a number 

of the issues and put children at the center of regulatory decisionmaking. 

The last comment I will make is on the observational study of 

children. As we know, the cheers study in 2005 did not follow the 

ethical standards that we have as a Nation. It was withdrawn; 

however, what has been currently proposed doesn’t go far enough 

to address the recommendations of the Senate or has not addressed 

the issues that have been brought up in the courts. I would argue 

that until those issues get addressed it is prudent for this Agency 

to hold back on observational studies. They have canceled RFA, but 

I think it is important that they really address these issues thoroughly before they move forward with an observational study on 

children. 

With that, I conclude my remarks. Thank you very much. 

[The prepared statement of Ms. Marmagas follows:] 

65 


88909.035
66 


88909.036
67 


88909.037
68 


88909.038
69 


88909.039
70 


88909.040
71 


88909.041
72 


88909.042
73 


88909.043
74 


88909.044
75 


88909.175
76 

Senator BOXER. Thank you very much. That really was helpful. 

Dr. Trasande, welcome. 

STATEMENT OF LEO TRASANDE, CO-DIRECTOR, CHILDREN’S 

ENVIRONMENTAL HEALTH CENTER, MOUNT SINAI MEDICAL 

CENTER 

Dr. TRASANDE. Good morning, Madam Chairwoman and members of the Committee. I am Dr. Leo Trasande. I am a pediatrician 

and co-direct the Children’s Environmental Health Center at the 

Mount Sinai School of Medicine, the Nation’s first academic policy 

center devoted to the protection of children against environmental 

threats to health. 

Children are uniquely vulnerable to many of the 90,000 chemicals that are released into the environment every day. Pound for 

pound, they eat more food, they drink more water, and breathe 

more air than adults, so they take proportionately more of the toxins into their little bodies. 

They also do not metabolize, detoxify, and excrete chemicals in 

the same way as adults; thus, the chemicals can reside longer in 

children’s bloodstreams and cause more damage. 

A third reason is that children are undergoing rapid growth and 

development, and those very complex developmental processes are 

easily disrupted. 

Over the past 30 years chronic diseases of environmental origin 

have become epidemic in American children. These include asthma, 

birth defects, brain cancer, developmental disabilities, obesity, preterm birth, leukemia, and testicular cancer. These rapidly rising 

rates of chronic disease threaten the health of our children and the 

future security of our Nation. It may create a situation that has not 

been witnessed since the Great Depression in which our current 

generation of children may be the first to enjoy a shorter life span 

than the generation before them. 

Evidence is increasing that many environmental chemicals contribute to the causation of these diseases. Lead, mercury, PBCs, 

and certain pesticides have been shown to cause brain damage and 

to contribute to learning disabilities and disruption of children’s behavior. Benzene, 1,3-butadiene, and pesticides have been etiologically associated with childhood malignancies. Ambient air pollutants also have been shown to increase incidence of asthma and to 

trigger asthmatic attacks. 

These diseases of environmental origin are also extremely costly 

to our economy. Four of the leading diseases of environmental origin in American children, lead poisoning, asthma, developmental 

disabilities, and childhood cancer have been found to cost our Nation $54.9 billion annually. These additional costs are disproportionately borne by the American taxpayer, and thus the reduction 

of unnecessary toxic exposure to environmental chemicals can be 

an effective and wise investment in our children’s health. 

Federal regulation of environmental chemicals has proven successful in the reduction of childhood disease and disability. The 

elimination of lead from gasoline in the U.S. resulted in IQs among 

pre-school aged children in the 1990’s that were 2.4 to 2.7 points 

higher than they would have been if those children had a distribution of blood lead levels found among children in the 1970’s. Before 

77 

the EPA’s phase-out of diazanon and chlorpyrifos, these two pesticides were frequently detected in the core blood of New York City 

children and associated with decrements in birth weight and 

length. After these phase-outs, the pesticides and their association 

with predictors of cognitive potential were no longer detected. 

In the past, the U.S. has taken a more proactive approach to protecting children from hazardous chemical exposures. The Food 

Quality Protection Act requires that standards for agricultural pesticides be set at levels sufficiently strict to protect the health of infants and children, yet this is the only Federal environmental regulation that embraces scientific reality that children are uniquely 

vulnerable to many environmental chemicals. 

Despite compelling evidence that further efforts are needed to 

prevent further increases in disease and disability of an environmental origin among American children, major gaps remain in the 

regulatory approach taken by the EPA to protect children. 

Without enforcement of the Clean Air Act, mercury emissions 

from coal-burning power plants will continue to poison the next 

generation of America’s children. Clean air standards that regulate 

pollutants known to cause or worsen childhood respiratory diseases 

have been weakened, and new research suggests the existing 

standards require their strengthening. 

Despite the fact that ten million children live within four miles 

of Superfund sites containing high levels of known toxic chemicals, 

the Superfund program remains chronically under-funded. 

As studies like the one published today in the Journal of the 

American Medical Association document the health effects of 

bisphenol A and other chemicals, families are forced to choose products with incomplete information about their safety and placed into 

panic when studies are released documenting their health effects. 

Legislation like the Kid-Safe Chemicals act would empower EPA 

to ensure pre-market testing of chemicals that are used in consumer products, and broader reform of TSCA is needed to ensure 

that gaps do not remain in testing of chemicals in all products. 

It can take 15 or even more years for epidemiologic studies to determine whether children are harmed by these exposures after the 

fact, and this approach represents an ongoing, unsafe, and unnatural experiment on American children. 

Finally in this testimony I wish to point out the critical need for 

funding the national children’s study, which will unearth so much 

information of the health effects of the many chemicals for which 

toxicity data exists. 

I would like to thank the chairwoman, as well as Senators Harkin, Specter, and Senator Clinton, as well, for their strong support 

of the National Children’s Study. This study will take the extra 

steps to ensure that participation is completely voluntary, that environmental and health concerns are reported as soon as they are 

detected, and that families are empowered to protect themselves 

against known harmful exposures. 

The National Children Study is an investment in our children 

and in America’s future and will give our Nation the ability to understand the causes of chronic disease that cause so much suffering 

and death in our children. It will give us the information that we 

need on the environmental risk factors and the gene environment 

78 

interactions that are responsible for rising rates of morbidity and 

mortality. It will provide a blueprint for the prevention of disease 

and for the enhancement of the health in America’s children today 

and in the future. It will be our legacy to the generations yet unborn. 

Thank you. I shall be pleased to answer your questions. 

[The prepared statement of Dr. Trasande follows:] 

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Senator BOXER. Thank you very much. 

Dr. Brent. 

STATEMENT OF ROBERT BRENT, DISTINGUISHED PROFESSOR 

OF PEDIATRICS, RADIOLOGY AND PATHOLOGY, THOMAS 

JEFFERSON UNIVERSITY, A.I. DUPONT HOSPITAL FOR CHILDREN 

Dr. BRENT. Good morning. Good morning, Senators. 

My name is Robert Brent. I am a Distinguished Professor of Pediatrics, Radiology, and Pathology at the Jefferson Medical College, 

and at the duPont Hospital for Children. I have been there 51 

years, and I have a great-grandchild, Senator Boxer. 

Senator BOXER. That is great. 

Dr. BRENT. Besides 11 grandchildren. 

Senator BOXER. Well, I am catching up to you slowly, seriously. 

Dr. BRENT. I am here as a scientist. I have had no interaction 

with the Children’s Health Protection Advisory Committee’s relationship with the EPA at all. I learned about it here today. But I 

have had an interaction with the EPA. I have been funded by the 

NIH and the Department of Energy my entire scientific life. I have 

never had a grant from a chemical company or pharmaceutical 

company, and so I am a scientist. 

The most important thing a scientist has to do with regard to environmental exposures is risk analysis, and in order to do risk 

analysis you have to know the exposure that the population receives. That is the tremendous value of the National Children’s 

Study, because we are going to get exposures. 

Not only that, I can tell you most of you weren’t even born when 

the collaborative perinatal project was done in 1957 to 1965. They 

saved that serum. We were able to go back and take that serum 

and find out whether AIDS was present in 1957. it wasn’t. They 

looked at 500 prostitutes in 1960 to see whether the AIDS virus 

was there. It wasn’t. We did the same thing with caffeine. So we 

are going to save these serum samples, and not only will it be prospectively helpful, but it will be retrospectively. Ten years later you 

can go back and look at the samples. 

So we need to obtain information where we can do risk analysis, 

and that means serum levels, urine levels of the constituents, and 

we need to be able to relate that to some type of risk analysis. 

Well, to do, for instance, a bisphenol study, Rochelle Till did a 

bisphenol study. It cost $2.5 million to do one animal study on one 

chemical. We can’t afford that. 

So what has my interaction been with the EPA? In 2003 Michael 

Weitzman and I got a grant from the EPA to write a supplement 

to pediatrics on environmental risks. The title of the book was, The 

Vulnerability, Sensitivity, and Resiliency of the Developing Embryo, Infant Child, and Adolescent to the Effects of Chemicals, 

Drugs, and Physical Agents. 

In the second chapter we then reviewed all the toxicants that are 

known to find out how sensitive children are. The first thing that 

we found is that about 20 percent of chemicals, adult is more vulnerable than a child. That was very surprising. Well, it is because 

146 

very frequently the infant hasn’t developed the metabolic ability to 

convert the toxic substance to a toxic agent. 

So you can’t say that just because the child or an infant is a child 

that they are going to be more sensitive to a toxicant. You have got 

to do the studies. 

So my next interaction was I was put on the Developmental Toxicology Committee of the National Academy of Scientists. I happen 

to be a member of the National Academy of Scientists. We spent 

3 years developing a program, and the book was published in 2007. 

It was called, Toxicology in the 21st Century. In there we proposed 

high throughput toxicity testing where we could do thousands of 

chemicals a year testing. You can’t do all those chemicals with an 

animal study. 

I am telling you my good interactions with the EPA. The EPA 

adopted our recommendations before we even finished our committee report, and Robert Cadlock, the Ph.D., got a $50 million 

grant from the EPA. They have initiated these high throughput 

tests, and they are completing the first phase of the study. I don’t 

know whether it will be successful, but it is worth pursuing that. 

So these are two areas that we have to pursue. The scientists at 

EPA—I can’t tell you about the administrators, but the scientists 

at EPA are working hard to try to solve our problem with determining reproductive toxicity. And that is the answer—science. That 

is where I spend my time. I don’t get involved in these political 

things. 

I would point out to you, Senator Boxer, you mentioned the fact 

that there is an epidemic of birth defects. I spent my whole life 

studying birth defects. It is not an epidemic of birth defects. What 

happened is it tells you we solve problems. In 1908 8 percent of 

children died from birth defects. In 1988 25 percent of children died 

from birth defects in the first year of life. Why? Because we got rid 

of scarlet fever, dyptheria, whooping cough, all the diseases, infantile diarrhea. So what happens is birth defects make up a higher 

proportion of deaths. It is not because they are increasing. See, you 

have to be careful that you misinterpret the information erroneously. You say we have an epidemic of birth defects; we don’t 

have an epidemic of birth defects. I wish we could prevent all birth 

defects, but we can’t. 

Anyway, my recommendation is science. We have got to support 

the EPA to do the scientific studies. We have got to develop risk 

analysis procedures. When we can’t do it with the chemical high 

throughput test, we then take an animal study and try to do it. 

That is our answer. We have got to support science. We need more 

science. We need pharmacokinetics, we need tahokinetics, and we 

have got to use that data to determine which of those chemicals out 

there are at most risk. So you have got to depend on science here. 

Senator BOXER. Thank you, Doctor. 

Dr. BRENT. By the way, Senator Lautenberg, I hope your child 

is on inhalation steroids, because if he is not in inhalation steroids 

he is going to keep having asthma attacks. 

[The prepared statement of Dr. Brent follows:] 

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Senator BOXER. Thank you, Doctor. 

I want to correct the record. I never said there was an epidemic 

of birth defects. You must have misheard it. I was quoting from Dr. 

Trasande’s work in which he says over the past 30 years chronic 

diseases of environmental origin have become epidemic in American children and are the diseases of greatest current concern. So 

that is a fellow doctor who didn’t say birth defects, he said diseases 

of environmental origin, so let’s set the record straight. 

Speaking of that, I notice in 2004 in a New York Times interview, Dr. Brent, you said Love Canal was an example of a terrible 

environmental problem that should be cleaned up but there is no 

evidence of risk to the people who live there. Many fears are irrational. EPA scientists concluded that, taken together, the studies 

suggest significant health risk. Do you still stand by what you said 

in 2004. 

Dr. BRENT. What I said was that you have got to determine the 

exposure. If people live around a contaminated area, you can’t 

make an assumption that they have a risk because they live there. 

Senator BOXER. OK. I am just asking you if you stand by the 

statement, since you said that many fears are irrational and the 

EPA said that the scientific studies suggest significant health risks. 

Do you still stand by what you said in 2004 is my question. 

Dr. BRENT. I think that many, many fears are irrational. 

Senator BOXER. OK. Very good. OK. Trying to get at that. 

First of all, this was a terrific panel. I wanted to underscore and 

make sure, Dr. Trasande, that I heard you right. You said that 

lead, asthma, developmental disabilities, and you added childhood 

cancer, and I am not sure I left anything out of that, adds up to 

$59 billion per year cost. 

Dr. TRASANDE. Just a minor correction to your statement, Senator. 

Senator BOXER. Yes? 

Dr. TRASANDE. It is $54.9 billion, and you did State them correctly. 

Senator BOXER. That is 4.9 billion? I wrote down 59. I wanted 

to make sure. So 4.9 billion. And do you believe that that number 

is being incorporated into most of these risk benefit studies? 

Dr. TRASANDE. I believe in general that they have not been fully 

incorporated. All too frequently, the costs of childhood disease are 

not being incorporated, and we have seen before efforts to discount 

children’s health care costs and children’s economic productivity at 

higher rates than most health economists would accept as thoughtful. 

Senator BOXER. Well, we have seen this across the board where 

the EPA is devaluing our productivity, and we have a bill that we 

are readying now be dropped because we want to correct that. They 

have lowered the dollar value they put on a human life and the 

worth of it, which is unbelievable to me. 

Dr. Trasande, GAO’s report shows that EPA rejected the advice 

of its clean air science advisors, because we are talking about 

science advisors. And I agree with Dr. Brent. Scientists are terrific 

at the EPA and I support them. What I rail against is the politicians over there that just don’t follow the scientists. Frankly, we 

are all elected officials and our job is to balance everything. The 

207 

scientists are supposed to tell the Administration what is the right 

thing to do, and from there he has got to stand by that. That is 

his mission. 

So I am asking you, Dr. Trasande, GAO’s report shows that EPA 

rejected the advice of its clean air scientific advisors and its children’s health experts in setting clean air standards for dangerous 

soot called particulate matter. Could you use your doctor-to-parent 

way of explaining what are the impacts of particulate matter on 

children’s health? 

Dr. TRASANDE. Well, based on what we currently know, and 

based on what the scientific evidence would permit us to say, we 

know that children who are exposed to higher levels of particulate 

matter who are susceptible can develop more asthma exacerbations, which is an added economic consequence besides the 

health consequence and the consequence to families’ lives. So by allowing and permitting higher levels of particulate matter in the 

air, levels at which health effects have been documented, you are 

permitting children to suffer the long-term consequences of more 

asthma hospitalizations, emergency room visits, and other medically preventable events. 

Senator BOXER. OK. I want to ask you about another time that 

EPA went against its scientific advisors, which is Dr. Brent’s point. 

He said they are terrific, and they are, those scientific advisors. 

GAO’s report shows that EPA’s proposal on a new Clean Air Act 

lead standard goes against the advice of its clean air science advisors and its children’s health experts. Could you describe the impacts of lead on children’s health, including recent studies on the 

health impacts of low-dose exposures to lead? 

Dr. TRASANDE. Well, what we know now is that, especially with 

lead, is that the dose doesn’t necessarily make the poison. I think 

there are a number of studies that have documented that even the 

lowest level of lead exposure in a child’s blood stream can have significant consequences. We used to think that it was the levels of 

25 and 40 micrograms per density level—that is the terminology 

that pediatricians use to measure the levels—were the ones that 

were unsafe. We now know that levels at one and two, three, four, 

five—levels that you really can’t do anything about in a clinical 

practice setting, we simply can advise parents to do their best to 

prevent it. Those are levels that are associated with impacts on 

learning and cognition. Those are impacts that not only have consequences for children’s learning and long-term capacity; it has to 

do with their long-term economic productivity. A large amount of 

that economic cost that I quoted you is lost lifetime economic productivity from low-level lead exposure. 

Senator BOXER. OK. My time is gone, so I am just going to put 

in the record—and I hope all of you could take a look at this—testimony on behalf of the American Academy of Pediatrics. This is a 

whole different subject which we will get into next year as we write 

our global warming bill. This is stunning. We are told here that as 

the climate changes, environmental hazards will change and often 

increase, and children are likely to suffer disproportionately from 

these changes. So once again the red flag is up here. Anticipated 

health threats from climate change include extreme weather, 

208 

weather disasters, increases to certain infectious diseases, air pollution, and thermal stress. 

Within all of these categories, children have increased vulnerability compared to other groups. This is something we haven’t 

looked at, colleagues in the Committee, but we are going to take 

this up very soon after we either have a lame duck, which is possible. We may take it up in the lame duck, or we may take it up 

next year. So I will place that in the record and call on Senator 

Barrasso, to be followed by Senator Lautenberg, Senator Clinton, 

and then we will be done. 

Senator BARRASSO. Thank you, Madam Chairman. 

Dr. Trasande, thank you. Looking through your testimony, there 

are a couple of areas that I took some exception with. You said 

children are uniquely vulnerable to many of the 90,000 chemicals 

that are released into the environment every day. By our numbers, 

there are actually only 82,000 chemicals on inventory. An estimated no more than 12,000 are currently in commerce. I think you 

may want to re-check your numbers on that. 

Dr. TRASANDE. If I may respectfully respond, the estimate of 

82,000 is a very old number. There are 1,000 to 3,000 new chemicals introduced into commerce each year. I think it is fair to say 

that that number has increased to 90,000 at the present time. 

Senator BARRASSO. You go on to say of the 3,000 most highly 

used chemicals, fewer than half have any toxicity testing, but you 

take a look at what has been submitted to the EPA and now publicly available on the EPA website, 97 percent of the chemicals on 

that high-production volume chemical challenge program are already out there. 

I know you are very bright, Harvard undergraduate, Harvard 

Medical School, Harvard master’s program. You worked for Senator 

Clinton’s staff. I understand. I imagine you are going to continue 

to testify over the years. Just, if we could, make sure we have all 

that accurate. 

Dr. Brent, it is a privilege to have you here. The incredible background. I have known of your name and admire all that you have 

done in your incredible career. 

I have three-and-a-half minutes left. You had a lot more to say 

when you were talking. I would be happy to just give you the 

three-and-a-half minutes to say continue talking about what you 

wanted to talk about in terms of what you really see as important 

for children’s health and what we need to do in terms of safety factors for protecting our children. 

Dr. BRENT. First of all, it is a privilege to be here. 

I want to say that we find out that some of our beliefs with 

science turn out to be wrong. For instance, in 1956 Alice Stewart 

in England wrote a paper about the fact that a fetus was very sensitive to the leukemogenic effect of x-rays. She said the fetus was 

100 times more sensitive than the child or the adult to the leukemia effects of x-rays. Well, we got a contract from the Atomic Energy Commission and Robert Drew at Columbia got a contract from 

the Atomic Energy Commission and we did animal studies and we 

didn’t get one or two rads, which she had from pelvimetry, very low 

doses she claimed that cause leukemia. We get 30, 60, and 90 rads. 

We couldn’t produce tumors in an animal model. 

209 

Well, I am schooled in the fact that you don’t refute human epidemiology studies with animal studies. You just don’t. 

Well, in March of this year Dr. Preston from the Atomic Energy 

Commission in Japan just did the 60-year followup study on the 

fetuses, and they found that the fetus was much less sensitive to 

the leukemogenic effects than the children. In fact, there was a 

threshold. You have to get way above the diagnostic level before we 

even begin to see any tumor induction. 

So we learn with research, you know. Unfortunately for the Japanese they have learned a lot about radiation, but that is exactly 

what the animal studies told us. Alice Stewart was wrong in her 

study, a case control study. So we are learning all the time, and 

that is why I am so warm on the fact that we have got to continue 

investigations at the animal level, the in vitro studies, and human 

epidemiology, and that the child study is so crucial for our future 

to get information and find out how important environmental toxicants are, because there are big question marks about so many of 

them. 

Senator BARRASSO. Anything else in terms of how we are doing? 

I mean, you were a graduate of medical school when I was 1 year 

old, and I was probably graduating when Dr. Trasande was 1 year 

old, so you look at this. How are we doing? 

Dr. BRENT. How do you know I didn’t start when I was seven? 

Actually, I started college when I was 15, so I got a head start. 

Well, I just think, you know, as a scientist I just believe in the 

importance of science. There is no other. I mean, I happen not to 

agree with my colleague over there. I think he exaggerates a great 

deal, I mean really exaggerates a great deal. Those numbers that 

he pulls out of his hat, I don’t know where he gets them from with 

regard to—certainly, there is no question there is an asthma epidemic, and I wish I knew the etiology. I can tell you this about 

asthma, though: when I became chairman of the Department of Pediatrics, the allergists in our department requested a four-bed intensive care unit for status asthmatic. That is when children would 

come in with intractable asthma. We don’t need it any more because we can manage asthma now. 

Now, the fact that the disease is there is terrible, but we don’t 

have children dying from asthma like we did 30 or 40 years ago, 

so our treatment has gotten better. Now if we could only find out 

what the etiology is, because I can tell you for some people tobacco 

smoke does it, perfume does it, air pollution does it. I mean, it is 

a trigger there. We just don’t know the answer. 

Senator BARRASSO. And Teddy Roosevelt’s dad believed that 

cigar smoke was actually a good treatment, so he would have 

Teddy Roosevelt at the age of eight, when he was having asthma 

problems, be treated with cigar smoke. 

Dr. BRENT. Cigars are all right if you don’t light them up. 

Senator BARRASSO. Thank you very much, Dr. Brent. 

Thank you, Madam Chairman. 

Senator BOXER. Thank you. 

Chairman’s prerogative here. First of all, asthma is controllable. 

We know diseases are controllable. We all know that. But you 

should have been here when Jonah Ramirez testified, 11 years old, 

what his life is like. Frankly, Doctor, you have it all over me on 

210 

degrees in medicine. I am just a Jewish mother and grandmother. 

I know about chicken soup and other things. 

Dr. BRENT. Well, that works. 

Senator BOXER. But this is the first time I ever heard we don’t 

know the cause of asthma, but maybe I have missed the boat and 

not done enough reading. But let me just say you and Senator 

Barrasso have attacked Dr. Trasande. You said what he said was 

wrong, and I think we are going to give him 2 minutes to respond 

at that point. 

I just need to reiterate this. I don’t know who Alice Stewart is 

and I never mentioned her name. I do know that the scientists at 

the EPA have given advice to the EPA Administrator and he has 

ignored it, so you keep raising the need for science, and so does 

Senator Barrasso, without making the necessary next step, which 

is that is all we are fighting for on our side here is that the science 

that is being given to Mr. Johnson has been ignored. 

I am going to let Dr. Trasande have 2 minutes. 

Dr. TRASANDE. I thank the Chair. I don’t think I will take the 

whole 2 minutes, but I will flesh out some points in response. 

I know Senator Barrasso commented about some of the data that 

have been preliminarily put up about the voluntary children’s 

chemical evaluation program. The EPA has essentially produced 

data on essentially a total of six chemicals at this current juncture, 

and are well behind any goal that would have been realistic to expect of the EPA to achieve. I think we all had hoped that the VCEP 

would be a tremendous opportunity to identify chemical safety 

thresholds in a way that was driven by the science. I would fully 

respect that, and I supported it when I saw the idea. It just has 

not delivered and we still have major gaps. 

I do stand by my estimates. They are the most recently publicly 

available EPA estimates about the percentage of chemicals for 

which there are data regarding their safety. 

With regard to a number of the comments that perhaps some of 

the data I presented might be exaggerated, I would be happy to 

show Dr. Brent and Senator Barrasso, I would be happy to introduce for the record a manuscript published in pediatrics about a 

year after Dr. Brent’s package of manuscripts was published in 

which we document the case for the National Children’s Study, and 

every one of the points that I have made and documented in this 

testimony is supported in reference and quote and chapter and 

verse in that manuscript, so I would be happy to submit that for 

the record. 

I am not a fearmonger. I simply State the science. I stick to it. 

I State what we can make in terms of logical consequences of that. 

I think we can agree to disagree about policy implications of that 

science, but I think we can agree about the science. 

I appreciate the thoughts. We will always have a vigorous debate 

about them. 

I thank the Senator, and I have great respect for Dr. Brent, as 

well. Thank you. 

Dr. BRENT. Can I say one word? 

Senator CLINTON. [Presiding] Yes, you can say one word. 

Dr. BRENT. When you use the word safe, that a compound is safe, 

that is an unscientific term because a compound is safe or not safe 

211 

depending on its exposure, and so you have to know the exposure. 

If the compound is going to be in parts per trillion, any compound 

will be safe. If it is going to be in milligrams per kilogram, most 

compounds are going to be unsafe. So you can’t label a compound 

as safe or unsafe; you have to know what the population is going 

to be exposed to. 

Senator CLINTON. You know, Dr. Brent, I think we are having a 

vigorous agreement here. I believe that your emphasis on science 

and doing the best science is exactly in line with Dr. Trasande’s 

similar commitment. Sometimes when you put into lay language 

what it is you are talking about you might use terms that are not 

scientific but which are understandable. But I think it is important 

that each of our witnesses has underscored the significance of the 

National Children’s Study, something that we must proceed on. I 

am hoping that we will get a lot of support to do that from both 

sides of the aisle, because that is the best way for us to proceed— 

to have the rigorous scientific inquiry that we know will lead to answers. 

Senator Lautenberg? 

Senator LAUTENBERG. Thank you very much, Senator Clinton. 

A couple things here strike me immediately, and I thank you, Dr. 

Brent, for the advice that I will send up to my daughter right 

away. I think we have probably tried everything. 

Dr. BRENT. Children are uncompliant. It is one thing to get an 

adult to inhale a steroid every day; the next thing is to get a child 

to do it every day. That is the problem. 

Senator LAUTENBERG. Well, I thank you. And I assume this 

comes without charge. 

Dr. BRENT. I don’t charge anybody. 

Senator LAUTENBERG. In any event, it has been very interesting, 

and you have a role as a grandfather. You said you have 11. 

Dr. BRENT. Great. 

Senator LAUTENBERG. A great-grandfather? 

Dr. BRENT. Both. 

Senator LAUTENBERG. Both. I don’t have any great-grandchildren, but I have 11 grandchildren, composed of my wife’s family 

and mine. So we thank you for your contribution, all of you. 

Dr. Trasande, with that youthful appearance, how did you get so 

much knowledge in this period of time? Do you know Dr. Holland? 

Do you know who he is? 

Dr. TRASANDE. I can’t say I know him. 

Senator LAUTENBERG. He is at Mount Sinai as well. 

Dr. TRASANDE. Oh, Dr. Eric Hollander? Yes, I mis-heard you. I 

apologize. 

Senator LAUTENBERG. Holland. Jim Holland? 

Dr. TRASANDE. Jim Holland? I am sorry. I can’t say I do. 

Senator LAUTENBERG. In any event, as the use of chemicals in 

everyday products has increased, so have the rates of autism. Autism has grown nationally over the last 10 to 17 percent annually. 

In my State of New Jersey it has been an annual growth rate over 

a period of some years of 22 percent. 

Now, as the use of chemicals in everyday products, so have rates 

of autism, birth defects, and other health problems. Now, are these 

212 

coincidental relationships? Are they real? I kind of held off by Dr. 

Brent’s view on things, and respectfully so. 

Dr. TRASANDE. Well, respectfully, I would agree that the evidence 

is not Mount Kilamanjaro in size, but it is increasing in consistency 

and reproducibility. Those are the criterion by which, in our field, 

we make decisions about what consequences to communicate to 

families for prevention and for management of conditions. I think, 

based upon what we know, there is very strong and compelling evidence to support that air pollutants contribute to asthma, and potentially even to the causation of asthma. I would say the evidence 

is much stronger with regard to the exacerbation of asthma. 

With regard to the origin of developmental disabilities, there is 

a National Academy of Sciences report that documented that 28 

percent of developmental disabilities can be attributed at least in 

part due to environmental factors. The majority of that is probably 

a complex mix of genetics and environment, the gene being the gun 

and the environment being the trigger, to borrow a poor analogy. 

But, based on that evidence, at least just for those two examples, 

there is enough to drive what I think you are in a position to do, 

to make decisions about what policy actions need to be taken 

proactively to prevent disease and to prevent costly diseases. 

These diseases are clearly extremely complex. The National Children’s Study, because of its sample size of 100,000, will be able to 

get at all of the potential interacting factors and really tease them 

out. That is really what has made determining the role of chemicals in human disease after the fact so difficult. Ideally we would 

have the chemical data for toxicity before they would go on the 

market, but we are now back-peddling constantly as scientists and 

clinicians, and that is really why I see a two-pronged approach, an 

approach through toxic chemical reform simultaneously with moving proactively with the National Children’s Study so that we can 

work at it from both ends and really prevent childhood morbidity. 

Senator LAUTENBERG. We are kind of running out of time. I want 

to say thank you for your comments about my bill, Kid-Safe Chemical Act, because I believe I have used the term right to know for 

several things that I have done, chemical hazards in areas, bottled 

water most recently. I wanted to know more about what is in those 

bottles. And kid-safe chemicals is that type of thing where the information is given in advance so it can be examined. 

We thank you for your testimony, Ms. Marmagas and Dr. 

Trasande and Dr. Brent, of course. We respect what you had to 

say. 

With that, Madam Chairman, I assume that we will keep this 

record open so that we can submit questions to the witnesses in 

writing? 

Senator CLINTON. Without objection, we will. 

I want to thank all of our witnesses. I want to take a moment 

to tout the work of New York’s Mount Sinai Medical Center. I am 

very proud to represent it as part of my constituency. It is a leader 

in children’s environmental health research and home to one of the 

EPA-funded pediatric environmental health specialty units. It is 

also a vanguard site for the National Children’s Study. I am very 

proud of Dr. Trasande, who is a pediatrician and assistant professor of community and preventive medicine in pediatrics at 

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Mount Sinai and co-directs the Children’s Environmental Health 

Center, the first academic policy center devoted to learning more 

about the environmental threats to the health of children. 

As I said earlier, I think we are in vigorous agreement. There is 

a lot of work to be done. None of us has the answers. The purpose 

of this hearing was to point out that in many ways the current Administration and certainly the leaders of the EPA have been disregarding science. We saw the big chart from the GAO where several scientific advisory groups made a certain recommendation with 

respect to particulate matter in the quality of our air, both of which 

were disregarded. 

I have a personal experience going back to 9/11 where the scientists at EPA wanted to issue warnings for vulnerable populations 

with respect to the air quality following the collapse of the World 

Trade Center and the enormous number of chemicals that were unfortunately heated and brought together in those terrible events. 

The scientists were very clear that warnings should go out—people 

subject to asthma, people whose immune systems were vulnerable, 

et cetera. Changed in the White House for political reasons. 

So our goal in this Committee is not to have a Republican or a 

Democratic view of science; it is to respect the work of science and 

to try to provide a pathway for scientific research to inform and 

guide our decisionmaking. 

There will be differences on policy, but I think we are united in 

our efforts to try to support scientific research in appropriate ways 

and to fund it adequately. That is why I am so committed to the 

support of the National Children’s Study. It is going to be essential 

if we are going to find answers to a lot of these questions. 

I agree with Dr. Brent. There are so many complex factors at 

work—the level of toxicity, the vulnerability of the person who is 

exposed. There is all of that. But we are at a point now where we 

have got to begin to understand the variations and to be able to 

provide adequate information to people to protect themselves. I appreciate the testimony from Ms. Marmagas about her service on 

the Children’s Health Protection Advisory Committee. That was an 

effort to try to bring together somewhere in our Government, appropriately at EPA, the expertise and the resources to help us further our understanding as to what we need to do to better protect 

our children, as well as adults. 

So I am looking forward to continuing the work on this Committee, and particularly summoning up support for the National 

Children’s Study and getting it funded so that we can have these 

benchmarks that we need to educate the public and to inform our 

policymaking. 

With that, Senator, unless you have any further questions I want 

to thank the witnesses very much. We will keep the record open 

so that additional questions and information can be submitted. 

[Whereupon, at 12:12 p.m., the committee was adjourned.] 

[Additional material submitted for the record follows.] 

STATEMENT OF HON. JAMES M. INHOFE, U.S. SENATOR

FROM THE STATE OF OKLAHOMA

Today we will again examine the adequacy of EPA’s regulatory process by hearing 

testimony regarding whether the Agency appropriately considers children’s health 

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concerns. As a father and grandfather, protecting the health and well-being of children is of great personal importance to me. That is precisely why I believe that 

EPA’s risk based regulatory process and science based review is the best way to ensure that human health—particularly the health of children—is protected in a way 

that also protects the way of life enjoyed by the American family. 

This morning, we will hear from the official who directs the science of EPA’s regulatory process, as well as from a representative of the agency tasked with critiquing 

EPA’s success. We will also hear from stakeholders with their own views about how 

best to protect the health of our nation’s children. I believe in the integrity of EPA’s 

scientific process, and particularly in the Agency’s ability to evaluate risk and formulate regulations that properly mitigate those risks. 

Whether the concern is air, water, chemicals or other environmental factors, assessment of risk based on validated science must rule the day. Uncertainty, fear and 

precaution are not based in science, and actually prevent us from enjoying the benefits of technology and innovation. 

I do believe that it is important for EPA to seek out and consider the advice of 

non-governmental experts and public opinion. However, the ultimate responsibility 

to the implement the law falls squarely on the Agency’s doorstep. EPA is barraged 

with formal and informal advice from a variety of sources—it is their duty to sort 

through that information and seek balance among the many competing perspectives. 

It is no secret that I have certainly disagreed with some of the Agency’s actions and 

decisions. However, at the end of the day, I firmly believe that EPA holds the preeminent expertise in evaluating the risks posed to human health from environmental exposures. That expertise makes EPA most qualified to establish how best 

to protect the health of every man, women and child. 

I look forward to hearing from each of the witnesses, and I thank you for taking 

the time to be here and share your perspectives on protecting children—born and 

unborn—from environmental risks. 

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