SOUTHBOROUGH -- Two MetroWest organizations received dubious honors
yesterday, landing on an environmental group's "Dirty Dozen" list for worst
polluters in the state this year.
The Boston-based Toxics Action Center named the Massachusetts Dental Society
in Southborough, for mercury pollution, and the city of Marlborough's
Easterly Wastewater Treatment Plant, for phosphorus pollution, as two of the
12.
For the past six years, the center has selected organizations it feels pose
a serious public health or environmental threat.
"These are places and sites throughout the state that are or could be having
serious effects on neighbors and communities," said Jay Rasku, the center's
director.
"(Honoring) the Massachusetts Dental Society is a little unusual," he said.
"We usually target hazardous waste sites and power plants but mercury is a
big problem."
The Massachusetts Dental Society, part of the American Dental Association,
is a professional organization with around 4,500 practicing and retired
dentists.
"Mercury is one of the most toxic chemicals out there," Rasku said. "It
causes severe neurological problems, especially in children."
For dentists, mercury comes from the amalgam fillings used for cavities.
Nationwide, dentists use approximately 40 metric tons of mercury each year,
most of which is released into the environment, according to Tiffany
Skogstrom, Boston campaign organizer for Health Care Without Harm, the
organization that nominated MDS for the award.
"Dentists are the largest source of mercury in Massachusetts, discharging 36
pounds of mercury down the drains into the Massachusetts Bay every year,"
Skogstrom said.
The mercury, she said, especially harms woman of child-bearing age and
children under 12. "It gets into the food chain and then into our bodies."
The Massachusetts Department of Public Health has issued warnings against
eating fish caught in the waterways because of their high concentration of
mercury, Rasku added. Hospitals around the state have specific regulations
on mercury disposal, Skogstrom said.
"In 1995, the Greater Boston Area Hospital dumped 22 pounds of mercury into
the water. In 2001, they had 1 pound," she said. "Hospitals are forced to
comply but dentists still are unregulated today."
In 2001, the MDS signed a memorandum with the Executive Office of
Environmental Affairs for the reduction of mercury, but according to Rasku,
the agreement focused on education outreach instead of action.
"We need MDS to step up and require regulations and advocate for mercury
filters for dentists throughout the state," he said. "The simple solution is
to require the dentists to install these filters."
Choosing products that don't contain mercury, Rasku said, is another step
dentists can take.
More than 90 percent of the mercury used by dentists is caught before going
into the waterways, according to Dr. Shepard Goldstein, president of the
Massachusetts Dental Society.
Seventy percent of mercury from the fillings is caught with two filters from
the suction equipment dentists use, Goldstein said. More than 20 percent is
then removed from the waste management companies.
Although there is no official regulation, Goldstein said the MDS sends out a
card stating the best practices for handling and recycling mercury wastes
and other chemicals.
The dental society also met with the Massachusetts Water Resources
Authority, which Goldstein said is happy with its management of mercury
disposal.
"We are really right up on it," he said. "Most of the (mercury) reaching the
fish is already in the air from power plants...We are not getting into the
ponds and lakes like that."
In response to using another product besides amalgam, Goldstein said based
on research it is the best and most cost-effective product.
"In the present moment with everything out there we are doing a very good
job," he said. "We are certainly always open to other approaches."