Early Puberty Cases Rising

Take a look around you. Does it seem to you that children are growing up faster around you? Not only in how they act or the clothing they wear, but physically developing. Well it is happening around us. McCune-Albright Syndrome, and spina bifida with hydrocephalus are normal causes of early puberty, but there are hormones, steroids, and chemical contaminants in our food and products that could be having an effect. It hasn�t become an epidemic, though it is occurring and could become a larger problem soon.

Causes
Recent concerns over drug and hormone contamination of meat from animals treated with steroid growth enhancers have prompted many European countries to ban the use of steroids in food animals as well as bannning the import of meat from countries where the use of steroids is legal.

Hormones are used in the food industry because they speed up the growth of the animal allowing the cycle of birth-to-slaughter time to speed up. In some cases the hormones or steroids allow rapid weight gain and also increased milk production. This increases the profitability of the companies within these industries.

In the 1950�s synthetic estrogens such as DES began being used to increase the size of cattle and poultry. It has been found that DES caused cancer and was phased out of the food industry in the late 1970�s.

In 1993 the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved the use of recombinant bovine growth hormone (rbGH), or bovine somatotropin (rbST), for increasing milk output in the dairy industry. Estimates done by the manufacture of this hormone claim that as many as 30% of cattle in the United States use rbGH.

The FDA has approved 6 steroid hormones for use in the food industry for cattle and sheep, but not poultry or hogs. The approved include estradiol, progesterone, testosterone, zeranol, trenbolone acetate, and melengestrol acetate.

Estradiol and progesterone are natural female sex hormones while testosterone is the natural male sex hormone. This may be one of the reasons behind early puberty in populations consuming these animals.

Though large scale studies have not been done to detect if puberty is made to occur earlier due to ingestion of these treated animals, some small scale studies have occurred. Puerto Rico�s government raised concern in the 1980�s because of the age of puberty was noticeably getting younger. Studies of random chicken in one Puerto Rican market showed higher levels of estrogen in the food. Some of the Puerto Rican girls reaching puberty at a younger age showed levels of zeranol in their blood. These reports could not be verified by additional labs and therefore was discounted. Similar situations were reported in Italy.

Foods that were contaminated in Michigan in 1973, when a fire retardant containing the chemical polybrominated biphenyl (PBB) was accidentally mixed with animal feed, have been associated with an early onset of menstruation and pubic hair in some daughters of the women exposed to PBB.

One of the most popular theories to why early puberty occurs involves insecticides that break down into compounds that may trigger estrogenic activity in young girls. Others believe the increase in obesity rates of young girls is speeding up the process.
Hair products containing oestrogens, hormones, and placenta are also believed to cause premature puberty.

�Under FDA regulations, over-the-counter products containing hormones are drugs, and thus require specific approval. However, there appears to be a grey area regarding products marketed before 1994. The FDA failed to respond to a request to clarify the position. At least five companies are still making hormone-containing hair products, a source within the industry - who preferred not to be named - told New Scientist�

Is There Proof
Though small studies have found the above causes responsible for early puberty, why haven�t larger studies been performed? It relates to costs, time, and a lack of pressure. Concentrated studies of this are very difficult to control and monitor, but there is no doubt that early puberty is occurring more now than ever before. The cost of such a large study is very expensive and easily disputed. The amount of pressure put on the government to perform these studies is minimal.


www.dazereader.com...
www.mercola.com...
www.ars.usda.gov...
envirocancer.cornell.edu...
www.med.umich.edu...
www.newscientist.com...
archives.cnn.com...
www.007b.com...



[edit on 10/19/2004 by infinite8]

There is a thread around here somewhere on this...or maybe it was about something else and then went into this ...........aaaaaaaanyway...this is very true! My niece started her menstrual cycle at 9....and our deceased are not decomposing as they should due to the amount of preservatives in our foods...all the hormones in the feed and the injections that are given to the animals.....it's just gotten out of control!

Do you know why your niece was having cases of early puberty? 9 is very young.

I tried a search to see related topics to this, but I didn't find one. I have put a lot of information in from numerous sources, so hopefully the information here will be helpful if not all new.

Originally posted by infinite8
Do you know why your niece was having cases of early puberty? 9 is very young.

I tried a search to see related topics to this, but I didn't find one. I have put a lot of information in from numerous sources, so hopefully the information here will be helpful if not all new.

You have a u2u

Here's a great post to help prevent children to oestrogens that help cause cancers and early puberty.

www.007b.com...

1. Try only eat organic meat and dairy products from cattle that have not been fed additional hormones. Consider goat's milk or nut milks as substitutes for milk. Or, choose low-fat milk, skim milk yogurt etc., because the hormones cling to the milk fat.

2. Either avoid plastic wraps and plastic drinking bottles or at least do not heat food in them, because heating releases these estrogen-like substances from the plastic into the food.

3. Avoid pesticide and herbicide use on your own yard - they do end up in your house too. There are natural methods to combat the bugs. Messing with these poisons is not worth your or your children's health. Also, wash all produce prudently and if possible, buy organically grown food to avoid pesticide and herbicide residue.

4. Consume freshly ground flaxseed and/or cold-pressed flax oil. The flax oil contains some lignans but the whole flax seed contains far more. You can grind it in a coffee grinder, and sprinkle on oatmeal, skim yogurt, or into a fruit smoothie.

5. Certain shampoos contain estrogen, many times listed as "placenta" or "natural hormones". Don't let children use those. (See an article Early Puberty linked to Shampoos Containing Estrogen www.migraine101.com... ).

6. Avoid soy infant formula and giving children soy products - except possibly a small amount of fermented soy products.

Great post!

I also remember reading about studies done on WATER containing trace amounts of hormones from the discarding of pills and the urine of people taking them. All of this stuff ends up in our rivers from human use as well as animal use.

I'm trying to find a source...

EDIT:

Here it is ... USGS Report

[edit on 10/19/2004 by Gools]

Could it possibly be that in our collective unconscious as a race, we see the change in the world that we've caused, and knowing that soon we will be subject to harsher environmental conditions, we are simply increasing our capacity to reproduce and increase our numbers in preparation for survival?

You know, like the animals do.

[edit on 19-10-2004 by DeltaChaos]

Gools, you are very right. It is happening in Europe while they are finding Prozac in fish from all of the human waste containing it.

Not only are they found in some of the things listed above, but estrogens are found in suntan lotion as well.

Here is some more helpful information regarding harmful affects of estrogen.

PREGNANCY: Estrogens should be avoided during pregnancy since they increase the risk of fetal abnormalities.

NURSING MOTHERS: Estrogens are secreted in milk and cause unpredictable effects in the infant. In general, they should not be used by women who are breast-feeding.

SIDE EFFECTS: Among the most common endocrine side effects are breakthrough vaginal bleeding or spotting, loss of periods or excessively prolonged periods, breast pain or enlargement, and changes in sexuality (increases or decreases in libido). Estrogens cause gallstones, and the gallstones may result in abdominal pain and require surgery. Rarely, estrogens may cause hepatitis. Migraine headaches have been associated with estrogen therapy. Estrogens can cause retention of water (edema). Melasma--tan or brown patches-- may develop on the forehead, cheeks, or temples. These may persist even after the estrogen is stopped. Conjugated estrogens may increase the curvature of the cornea, and patients with contact lenses may develop intolerance to their lenses.

Blood clots are an occasional, serious side effect of estrogen therapy and are dose-related. (The higher the dose of estrogen, the greater the risk of blood clots.) Cigarette smokers are at a higher risk than non-smokers for blood clots, and patients requiring estrogens should be encouraged to quit smoking.

Estrogens can promote thickening of the lining of the uterus (endometrial hyperplasia) and increase the risk of uterine cancer. At diagnosis, endometrial cancers in recipients of estrogens are generally at an earlier stage and are less aggressive when they are discovered. Survival from endometrial cancer also is better in women taking estrogens than in those not taking estrogens. The addition of a progestin to estrogen therapy offsets the risk of endometrial cancer.

Conflicting data exists on the association between estrogens and breast cancer. There may be a small increase in risk. The effect of concomitant progestin therapy on the risk of estrogen-induced breast cancer is unclear.