Environmental Working Group

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A bunch of tree-huggers

Environmentalism

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Environmental Working Group, or EWG for short, is an American environmental organization headquartered in Washington, D.C. The organization focuses on six issues:[1] consumer products, energy, farming, food, water, and toxics. Their stated mission is "to use the power of public information to protect public health and the environment."

Contents

[edit] Positions

The EWG has the following positions:

  • Opposes fracking and oil drilling.
  • Opposes biofuels, especially corn ethanol, due to biofuel plantations encroaching on wilderness.
  • Opposes uranium mining near national parks; does not seem to oppose nuclear power, or such opposition is very low on the priority list.
  • Opposes excessive farm subsidies.
  • Promotes organic food while opposing genetically modified food.[2]

[edit] Activities

[edit] Dirty Dozen list

Every year, EWG publishes a list of twelve fruits and vegetables with the highest level of pesticide residue, called the "Dirty Dozen". The list is based on data from the Pesticide Program Residue Monitoring of the Food and Drug Administration,[3] which conducts random screening tests of these products every year. The list is always accompanied by recommendations to buy organic food instead, to avoid the supposed dangers.[4]

The metodology by which the Dirty Dozen list is compiled is completely unscientific. For each investigated fruit or vegetable, six indicators of contamination are obtained:

  1. Percentage of samples with detectable residues.
  2. Percentage of samples with two or more pesticides detected.
  3. Average number of pesticides found on a single sample.
  4. Average amount of all pesticides found.
  5. Maximum number of pesticides found on a single sample.
  6. Total number of pesticides found.

None of those indicators reflect possible pesticide intake. There is also no comparison of possible intake with toxicological data on pesticides, such as Acceptable Daily Intake values or the reference dose. Estimates of exposure to pesticides based on the same data are hundreds of times lower than the reference dose, which in turn is a hundred times lower than the dose at which any effects are observable in animal studies.[5] In other words, even the "worst" fruits and vegetables on the list are completely safe to eat. Moreover, organic produce is not in fact completely free from pesticides either, and there is less data on it.[6]

[edit] Superbugs in meat

In April 2013, EWG issued an alarmist press release which claimed that antibiotic-resistant bacteria are widespread in meat sold in supermarkets.[7] The claim was based on a misinterpretation of data released by the National Antimicrobial Resistance Monitoring System, run by the FDA. In reality, antibiotic resistance did increase in some cases, but all four important pathogenic bacteria remain susceptible to the drugs used to treat them.[8]

[edit] Cell phone radiation scaremongering

EWG disseminates information intended to frighten the users of cell phones.[9] This is partially based on the World Health Organization's reclassification of cell phone radiation as a "possible human carcinogen". However, this does not mean that evidence of carcinogenicity has been found, only that this risk cannot be ruled out yet.[10] Overall, the evidence indicates that a link between mobile phone use and cancer is unlikely, and the few associations found in studies on humans to data are due to chance.[11]

[edit] Footnotes

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