Editorial: Stop Dumping Hazards

On January 15, 1981, in the final days of his administration, President Carter signed an executive order sharply limiting the export of products that are banned or restricted from use in the United States. On February 17, 1981, as one of his first acts in office, President Reagan revoked Carter's 34-day-old executive order.

As president, Bill Clinton has the opportunity by simply signing an executive order to reverse a policy which is based on the appalling hypocrisy that products deemed too hazardous for use in the United States are still "good enough" for sale in the Third World.

 The Carter policy was formulated in the wake of massive exports of the pesticide leptophos and of children's sleepware containing TRIS (2,3-dibromoprophyl), a cancer- causing chemical used as a fire retardant. Leptophos was never registered for use in the United States, and has been shown to produce lasting damage to the human nervous system. From 1971 to 1976, however, the chemical was sold to countries including Colombia, Egypt and Indonesia; in Egypt, the pesticide was blamed for the death of several farmers and over 1,200 water buffalo. Clothing treated with TRIS was banned in the United States in 1977, but exports continued abroad for over a year, eventually totalling 2.4 million garments.

Carter's order applied across the board to hazardous pharmaceuticals, pesticides, industrial chemicals, medical devices and consumer products. The order required that importing governments be notified, through the State Department, of all U.S. regulatory actions on a substance they seek to import, with all proven hazards spelled out. Products deemed "extremely hazardous" were to be placed on the State Department's commodity control list, and the Commerce Department would only grant export licenses if the importing country, when fully informed, had no objection to the product. Carter also called for the publication of an annual summary of all U.S. regulatory actions that banned or restricted a product, and for an intensified effort toward international hazard labeling, notification and alert systems.

 Throughout the Reagan and Bush administrations, U.S. corporations have been allowed to export products considered too dangerous to sell in the United States. Most of these products - with pesticide and pharmaceutical companies leading the way in this vicious trade - have been dumped on people in Third World countries, where information on their effects is scarce and consumer protections are often weak or nonexistent.

No law prohibits the export of pesticides that are banned or restricted in the United States. According to Greenpeace, U.S. corporations annually produce approximately $1 billion worth of banned and unregistered pesticides for export overseas. The results of such regulatory lapses are well-documented and devastating. Recent World Health Organization reports estimate that over 25 million cases of pesticide poisoning occur among agricultural workers in the Third World every year; many of these workers lack protective clothing and are unaware of the dangers associated with the chemicals.

Pharmaceutical manufacturers have a tougher time than pesticide companies in dumping unsafe products. U.S. drug companies are barred from exporting drugs that are banned or not registered in the United States. In 1986, however, the law was weakened to allow the export of drugs not yet approved for use in the United States to 21 countries that have regulatory agencies to review the safety and efficacy of pharmaceuticals. And companies that want greater leeway have managed to get around the degraded law in a variety of ways. Upjohn, for example, manufactured the contraceptive Depo-Provera through its Belgium subsidiary and exported it to over 80 countries. Until October, Depo- Provera was banned in the United States because it has been shown to cause cancer in test animals.

 Carter, under intense pressure from chemical and pharmaceutical manufacturers, could only be convinced by health and safety advocates to sign the executive order five days before he left office, leaving it wide open to a Reagan revocation.

A Clinton order banning hazardous exports could prod Congress into passing similar legislation (such as the Circle of Poison Prevention Act, introduced in 1991 by Senator Patrick Leahy, D-Vermont, and Representative Mike Synar, D-Oklahoma, and killed by pressure from the chemical manufacturers' lobby). At the very least, the order would offer four years of global protection from U.S. industrial profiteering - and ensure that substances banned as health or safety hazards in the United States will not be dumped in the Third World.