Persons Advised Not to Purchase Products That Contain POPs

Citizens are being advised not to purchase products that contain persistent organic pollutants (POPs), as they can adversely affect human and environmental health.

The call came from the National Environment and Planning Agency (NEPA) Pollution Prevention Branch Manager, Bethune Morgan, who participated in the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) ‘Stop the POP Help Series’, held virtually on Monday, July 31.

POPs are a group of organic compounds that have toxic properties, persist in the environment, accumulate in food chains and pose a risk to human health and the environment.

Ms. Morgan explained that by virtue of its very name, these pollutants, which can be transported by wind or water, can remain in the environment for years after use, affecting people and wildlife in areas far from where they were used or released.

“They do not degrade. They bioaccumulate, and as such, even long after use one can detect them whether in receptors such as soil, or they may be found in human and animal tissues,” she pointed out.

Highlighting some of the most common POPs that can be found in people’s homes, Ms. Morgan noted that “the ballast in the fluorescent lights have polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs).”

These PCBs, she said, can also be found in some transformers that provide electricity.

Other items in homes that may include POPs are carpets and older versions of television and monitors.

She added that persons may also encounter unintentional POPS (UPOPs), which are not voluntarily produced or released into the environment, but they are derived from human-caused sources, such as open burning.

Once these pollutants are released into the environment, “whether at the manufacturing stage or during use or disposal, they come in contact with the soil and water and affect organisms in that ecosystem”.

On health, Ms. Morgan shared that as humans, “we have the potential to directly inhale [these pollutants] or consume organisms that live in the aquatic environment that have been impacted by the POPs”.

“From the standpoint of our health, some of these chemicals mimic our endocrine system chemicals, and as such they can cause developmental impairment biologically,” she said.

“POPs can also mimic our hormones and lead to fertility issues,” the Pollution Prevention Branch Manager continued.

Ms. Morgan is, therefore, encouraging persons to read labels when purchasing products and to avoid open burning as much as possible, in an attempt to reduce POPs in the home.