News & Press
Defend Our Health Applauds EPA’s Designation of PFOA and PFOS as Hazardous Substances Under the Federal Superfund Law
Washington D.C – Today, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) finalized rules under the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA), more commonly known as the Superfund law, to help ensure that companies that are responsible for contamination will be responsible for the costs of cleaning up contamination of dangerous PFAS chemicals. The EPA’s designation of… Read more »
Defend Our Health Applauds The New EPA Standards for PFAS in Drinking Water
The new standards will protect thousands of Mainers Defend Our Health applauds the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) announcement of a first-ever national safe drinking water standard for PFAS. The new health-protective standards are significantly lower than Maine’s interim 20 parts per trillion (ppt) PFAS standard and will extend further protection to more than 134,000 Mainers… Read more »
More ‘Forever Chemicals’ Reported in Products Sold in Maine
Advocates Decry Industry Lobbying to Repeal Most of Maine PFAS Products Law Portland, Maine – Bic razors, Sterno canned heat, Barbour jackets, and Epic Designers work pants and vests – these are a few of the thousands of brand name products sold in Maine that contain PFAS – the ‘forever chemicals’ that have widely polluted drinking… Read more »
Defend Our Health welcomes new President and CEO
Portland, ME, January 23, 2024 – Defend Our Health is proud to announce the hiring of Emily Carey Perez de Alejo as the new President and Chief Executive Officer of the nonprofit public health and social justice organization. The organization’s founder and outgoing executive director, Mike Belliveau, will move into a new staff role as Founder and Senior… Read more »
Serious Disease Burden Attributed to Plastics, New Study Says
50 thousand early deaths, 4 million cases of obesity, and 30 thousand intellectual disabilities among the harms caused every year by plastics, resulting in $250 billion in health care costs Widely used plastics are making Americans sick, disabled and die early, according to a new peer-reviewed scientific study published today in the Journal of the Endocrine Society. A… Read more »
PFAS Use Widespread in Products Sold in Maine, Industry Reports Reveal
First-Ever Reports Reveal Use of ‘Forever Chemicals’ in Many Common Consumer Products Hair spray, shampoo, cosmetics, school supplies, swim suits, gloves, dog treats, and cookware are among the nearly 1,000 brand-name products sold in Maine that contain PFAS, according to a first-ever analysis of industry reports submitted last year under a Maine law passed in… Read more »
EPA takes first steps to regulate highly dangerous chemical used to make plastic
Washington D.C.–Today, the Environmental Protection Agency announced that the chemical vinyl chloride is a candidate for high-priority designation under the Toxic Control Substances Act (TSCA). The announcement sets into motion a years-long process that could culminate in the designation of vinyl chloride as a high-priority chemical under TSCA. The first step in the process is… Read more »
Diane Wilson, Fourth-Generation Shrimper, Protests Plastic Pollution – Goldman Environmental Prize Winner from Texas Speaks in Maine
Diane Wilson, an acclaimed author, fisherwoman and activist arrives in Maine today to speak out against petrochemical plastic pollution at two Maine events, just as the next round of negotiations on a Global Plastics Treaty to end plastic pollution in Nairobi, Kenya. Wilson is the director and founder of Calhoun County Resource Watch and the executive director of San… Read more »
Plastics packaging continues to balloon, despite company commitments
Today, the Ellen MacArthur Foundation released its fifth annual Global Commitment 2023 report, showing that signatories of the commitment will miss their own 2025 targets. The report illustrates how in 2022 Global Commitment signatories failed to bring down virgin plastic use meaningfully, and have not made significant progress to expand reuse systems. In response, Defend… Read more »
Defend Our Health Calls for More from Coca-Cola
This week, the Coca-Cola Company announced a temporary program that will give customers free pizza and a plastic bottled Coca-Cola beverage, in return for their depositing empty plastic bottles, in select markets. The scheme purports to increase awareness of the company’s new 100% recycled PET bottles, also available only in select markets at this point,… Read more »