Evaluation of the Hazards of Toys and other Products made from Polyvinyl Chloride (PVC)
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An Evaluation of the Hazards of Toys and other Products made from Polyvinyl Chloride (PVC)
AUTHORSHIP of these pages

PVC Home Page

Summary & conclusions

Lead in PVC
(What is vinyl plastic?)

Phthalate Plasticizers

Other hazards

References

Easy-to-print version of this report (26 sec @ 28k)

Most recent list of toys made with PVC (March 1999)

Update, Jan. '99:
Lead, Cadmium, Phthalates still found in Children's Products 

Attribution and Authorship
These pages were compiled by Ed Loewenton, president of 18th Century Industries, Inc., corporate  parent of the Elwood Turner Company, which owns and maintains the turnertoys.com website.

Mr. Loewenton also wrote all the commentary not attributed to other sources.  Mr. Loewenton received an MS in Psychology from the University of Pennsylvania in 1969, and received 16 credits toward a doctorate.   He was a Chemistry minor as an undergraduate at the University of Pennsylvania.   His course work included five semesters of chemistry, including two of organic; with a total of 4 semesters in the laboratory.  As an undergraduate, he worked as a research assistant in the clinical chemistry department of the University of Pennsylvania Hospital (Spruce Street), working on serum protein electrophoresis.  His studies also include four semesters of statistics.  He has published two studies in the field of Psychology: one in the field of Economic Psychology (senior authorship), the other (third of five authors) on attitude formation.  As a graduate student he did unpublished research on collective behavior and physiology of REM sleep in newborn mammals. He worked briefly at Pennhurst State Hospital, where he evaluated staff performance (including that of Psychiatric and Medical personnel) and designed behavior modification programs.  It is Mr. Loewenton's assertion that he is fully capable of  evaluating the research, assumptions, and arguments in the present issue, albeit with continuing background study, in which he is engaged as time permits
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The Greenpeace material on Lead and Cadmium was researched and written by Joseph Di Gangi, PhD and his associates.  Dr.DiGangi  is an employee of Greenpeace, and has facilities in Chicago.  Dr.  Di Gangi provided us with additional material and clarifications via email.  Dr. Di Gangi received a PhD in molecular biology and biochemistry from the University of California at Irvine in 1986, and joined the Greenpeace staff in 1997. The material on Phthalates comes from a variety of sources (authorship specified in each article)..  Three laboratory sources were used for Greenpeace's  work on vinyl toys. The lead/cadmium experimental work was conducted entirely by independent laboratories. 
*Phthalates: Greenpeace Research Laboratories, University of Exeter,   Department of Biological Sciences, Exeter, UK. Greenpeace laboratory with expertise in analysis of organic chemicals and metals.
*Lead and cadmium: Stat Analysis, Chicago, IL. AIHA and NVLAP accredited. Commercial analytical laboratory that peforms work for lead abatement companies and the Chicago Public Schools.
*Lead and cadmium: Environmental Quality Institute, (EQI) University of North Carolina-Asheville. AIHA, NVLAP, ILLAP accredited. One of the foremost lead research laboratories in the U.S. with numerous research projects conducted for the EPA, Attorney General of California, Centers for Disease Control, State of North Carolina, and City of New York.  
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