Turf toxins under fire
From the Courant's Regine Labossierre:
Citizens groups in Connecticut have asked their town officials to stop installing the material, which some studies say can cause asthma, eye and skin irritations, cancer, and a decline in plant growth and aquatic life.
Local groups and state officials want to know for sure whether the turf being used in more than 80 municipalities across the state is really dangerous. A bill before the state legislature is asking the government to appropriate $250,000 to the state Department of Environmental Protection to study the issue...
What's unclear is which chemicals and how much of each are getting into the systems of the people using the fields, said Nancy Alderman, president of Environment and Human Health....
Not everyone has the same reaction to artificial turf. School officials say they have found nothing wrong with it and say their athletes enjoy playing on it....
Vincent McDermott, senior vice president of Milone & MacBroom, a Cheshire consulting firm of engineers, landscape architects and environmental scientists, said there is a significant body of scientific literature that supports the environmental safety of artificial turf. He said Milone & MacBroom conducts studies of the runoff from artificial fields.
Tim White
8 comments:
What a complete surprise from somebody at Milone & McBroom. They found there is no harm in turf fields. If they did find harm they would never get any business in the turf field area. I'm completely shocked by this revelation.
http://www.ci.wellesley.ma.us/Pages/WellesleyMA_Sprague/EHHI%20DPH%20responses
Here's a review done by a company in North Haven on the State's report on turf fields.
Worth reading.
http://www.ci.wellesley.ma.us/Pages/WellesleyMA_Sprague/EHHI%20DPH%20responses%20to%20fact%20sheet%20(2).doc
This should be the correct link to that site.
We will have a white elephant on one side of the street and the green monster on the other. What are we thinking? Wouldn't it be wise to wait and see the reports first? Also who is going to foot the cost of replacement in ten years? Let's look into this more carefully than the pool. We have a field to use for now.
Brought to you by the same wizards who brought us MTBE and the mercury laden light bulb
Prep athlete's death revives MRSA artificial turf concerns
Jan 6, 2008
Athletic Turf News
AUSTIN, TX — An abrasion caused by artificial turf is being blamed for the death of a high school football player here in December, according to a report by Bloomburg News on Dec. 21. Sixteen-year-old Boone Baker, a wide receiver on the Austin High School team died from an infection of methicillin-resistant staphylococcus aureus (MRSA), which he contracted from the abrasion on the field, said his doctor, according to the Bloomburg article.
The article, quoting sources, reported that 18% of the high school fields in Texas sport artificial turf, and that the infection rate among players is 16 times higher than the estimated national average.
Several studies have investigated the incidence of football players contacting MRSA infections. The studies, one involving members of the St. Louis Rams professional football team, seem to suggest a link between field-related abrasions and infections. However, an investigation headed by turfgrass expert Andy McNitt, in a report in 2006, found no cause for concern for infections from staphylococcus bacteria in tests he and fellow researchers carried out with sections of synthetic turf at a number of sports fields, both outdoors and indoors, in Pennsylvania. (Access the report below.)
In terms of athletics, football players are only slightly less likely than wrestlers to contract a MRSA infection, according to 2004 Texas study relying upon reports from more than 440 licensed athletic trainers in the state. Sixty of the trainers reported MRSA in their athletic departments. The largest MRSA outbreak of 23 players occurred in football players.
At least 276 football players were infected with MRSA from 2003 through 2005, a rate of 517 for each 100,000, according to the Texas studies. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta reports a rate for the general population of 32 in 100,000, reported Bloomberg.
HOW MANY ATHLETES SHOULD WE SACRAFICE?
"Milone & MacBroom conducts studies of the runoff from artificial fields."
Looks like the come to rescue again. They are expert on everything. All they have to do is find out what results the pro-turf people want. Here we go again, just like the the Northend.
Maybe they should have an office at the Town Hall.
They don't need one at the Town Hall. They have better.
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