Toxics and Blood Cancer, a Diabetes Link?

Thursday, January 31, 2013

This blog was written on the site of the International Myeloma Foundation in response to a posting by the eminent Myeloma authority Dr. Brian Durie.

http://myeloma.org/MtEntryPage.action?source=/imf_blogs/myeloma_voices/2013/01/broad-concerns-about-toxic-exposures-and-myeloma.html

By Hardy Jones 

I was diagnosed with Multiple Myeloma in 2003. In 1997 I had been diagnosed with chronic mercury poisoning attributed to a diet high in tuna and swordfish - large predatory fish known to carry high levels of heavy metals and organic pollutants.

In 2005 I was tested for organic pollutants such as those derived from agent orange, benzine, DDT, flame retardants etc. I was found to be quite high in some of the congeners. The story is best told in my book, The Voice of the Dolphins, but is also covered on the Bluevoice web site.

I would say (in response to Dr. Durie's intention to test 911 victims) the sooner the better on testing 9/11 victims. Even though it’s slow, POPs (persistent organic pollutants) do break down and diminish. Also, if a person loses weight they will mobilize POPs, which are lipophilic, and excrete them.

When I asked toxics expert Arlene Blum about my POPs levels she said “Oh, too bad you didn’t get tested when you were still eating lots of tuna etc. because your values would now be only a shadow of what they may have been.” I had stopped eating large predatory fish in 1997 after being found to have high mercury levels. My test for POPs was run in 2005. I’m thinking of having myself tested again - 7 years after the last test but the tests are expensive.

I’ve just heard from a top marine mammal toxicologist that there is likely a correlation between levels of mercury and other heavy metals and POPs. There are confounding problems but as a general rule this analogy works.

I will be getting test results from Peruvian dolphin-eating fishermen by Feb. 21. Our tests for mercury etc. should/could be a proxy for POPs. These fishermen have epidemic incidence of diabetes which Dr. Durie has tied to MM incidence.

It's great the IMF is doing this work. Prevention Multiple Myeloma and other cancers is better than suppressing disease with drugs, even though these drugs have been a godsend to me. I would be happy to receive information from people who eat a lot of high food chain predatory fish who have MM.

http://www.bluevoice.org/news_diabetes2.php 

http://www.bluevoice.org/news_sharedfate.php

Hardy Nominated As Ocean Hero

We are working to nominate Hardy for the Ocean Heroes award.
If you can take a minute to also nominate him that would be great.

THANK YOU!

Jennifer

Here's the info/link:

Go to https://www.facebook.com/oceana/app_425004930866752

Fill out nominees info: Hardy Jones, hardyjones@bluevoice.org, 68 years old, http://www.bluevoice.org <http://www.bluevoice.org/>

Then just fill in the large white box with your brief thoughts about why he is so worthy of this recognition. : )

Findings in Dolphin Mortality Event in Peru

By Hardy Jones

I've just spoken with Dr. Carlos Yaipen Llanos in Lima. He has found no evidence of virus or disease such as brucellosis in the dolphins stranded along the coast of northern Peru. He has found indications of internal trauma including indications of rapid ascent. But he emphasized he did not know the cause of this. Many have blamed seismic testing by oil companies but the UME began before the oil companies began testing in 2012. I'm awaiting a full report from him.

Happier news is that the Peruvian Congress summoned Carlos to testify and they were highly alarmed and indicated they would take strong action against deliberate killing of dolphins for food. They are looking at other measures to protect dolphins in Peruvian waters.

 Hardy Jones of BlueVoice.org and Dr. Carlos Yaipen Llanos with dead baby dolphin

It is becoming clear that the pelican mortality is due to starvation probably linked to the el nino/la nina cycle.


More shortly.

Dolphin Mortality in Peru - 2nd Trip

Hardy and Carlos by Dead Baby Dolphin

Tuesday, April 10. We arrive to the stranding site, as I told you before,
on Tuesday, next with my assistant, a Environmental Police officer and
driver. We closed a successfull day collecting 10 periotic bones from
dolphins, blubber samples from new dolphin strandings that were
viable and a fresh baby porpoise for histology analysis collected at
the very end of they. We surveyed 50 Km only, planning to return the
next day. It took us 8 hours in the road since removing periotic bones
is a very delicate process, as Hardy knows from experience. We counted
a dozen new dead dolphins dead a week ago getting stranded by the
ocean.

Conclusion as to Cause of Dolphin Mortality East Coast USA

During the late 1980s a massive die-off of bottlenose dolphins took place first in New Jersey and moved along the entire eastern seaboard, ending finally at Cape Canaveral. Hundreds of dead dolphins were found, many others were never counted. Below is the conclusion of the multidisciplinary committee that investigated this dreadful event.

My book contains the entire story, politics, bureaucracy and unanswered questions.

 

The process of reviewing evidence and getting it peer-reviewed takes time. In September 1994, I received a report of the conclusions of the interagency team that had gathered in Beaufort, North Carolina, with additional experts to bring together all information produced by investigations into the die-off. The report concluded, “The results for the beach-cast specimens (dead dolphins) obviously reflect the levels of contaminants in the nearshore environment where the dolphins accumulate these substances.” 

But no definitive answer was ever found. 

Catastrophe for dolphins along the north coast of Peru

Hardy Jones reporting from Chiclayo Peru, March 28th:

During February of this year there had been rumors of as many as 260 dolphins dead on the north coast of Peru. But some authorities dismissed the report. I backed off the story. But on March 23rd I received an email from Dr. Carlos Yaipen Llanos, Lima-based director of the marine mammal rescue organization, ORCA Peru, stating there had been approximately one thousand dolphins stranded along the north coast of Peru. Lest there be any doubt, stranded means dead in virtually all cases.

For a night I stared at the ceiling. What was the truth of what was happening along that bleak, desert coast, one of the most abundant fisheries in the world and mating and feeding habitat for huge numbers of dolphins, sea lions and birds? If the numbers were even close to accurate this would be perhaps the greatest dolphin mortality event ever recorded. I called Dr. Yaipen. He had a man on the ground north of Chiclayo who confirmed large numbers of dolphins stranded along 200 kilometers of the coast.

I immediately packed my bags and book a Delta flight for Lima the following day. Carlos met me at Jorge Chavez International Airport. Our 6:25am flight to Chiclayo was cancelled due to Lima’s pea soup fog so we grabbed an overnight bus. We linked up with three young ORCA women who had done some scouting for Carlos. They confirmed dead dolphins on nearby beaches but had not traveled most of the coast.

At 11am we packed into a four wheel drive Toyota pickup with a back seat cab and drove through San Jose to the beach, cranked a right turn and headed north at low tide on a beach that was mostly firm.  Our goal was to find the thousand beached dolphins and were told the greatest concentration was three hours drive north. That was our goal and we determined we would not stop for anything else.

Within a few hundred yards we began to see dead dolphins.  In ones and twos, then Carlos saw a Burmeister’s Porpoise. Some were highly decomposed while others were in the surfline freshly stranded. All were dead.

Carlos and his team performed necropsies on a couple of the dolphins. Seeing a new born common dolphin, umbilicus still attached was wrenching.

We raced along the hard sand at the edge of the surfline crying out when we saw a dead dolphin. At first they came every couple minutes. But then we’d hit intervals when the cries would go “dolphin! Delphin! Otro! Dos mas! There’s another one up by the dune.”

When I asked for a total from Carlos’ s assistant I was stunned to hear we’d counted over 200 dolphins. We hit a length of beach no more than 100 yards long in which we found ten dolphins of varying levels of decomposition.

The numbers continued to mount. By the time the rising tide forced us off the beach the count had reached 615, counted over 135 kilometers. 

Dr. Yaipen and I had known each other for some four years. We’d become involved in a study of Peruvian fishermen who eat dolphin meat. While illegal, this is commonly done and the authorities do not have the resources to prevent it. But Dr. Yaipen had discovered something important. The fishermen who ate dolphin meat regularly had a disproportionately elevated incidence of diabetes. I had found diabetes in Taiji, Japan in two men who ate dolphin meat; not in itself significant but these were men who had no other symptoms. Both were lean, didn’t eat sugar. What they did eat was dolphin meat and a certain fish that is known to have high levels of endocrine disrupting chemicals – chemicals that also disrupt the way the human body utilizes insulin.

Dolphin Hunting Season Ends at Taiji - Reason for Hope?

  There is potentially good news from Taiji. The number of dolphins killed this year was 615. Half of last year.
  They are ending the hunting season Feb 28, which is the normal ending time for the hunt on dolphins (Iruka). But last year when they came up short of their quota they got an extension to make up for the deficit. This year they did not ask for one. The question now is whether they will continue to hunt gondo (pilot whales, Rissos, melonheads – i.e. what they call small whales but we in the west classify as dolphins). By tradition they hunt them through April. If they do not hunt them it would be a good sign. But as in all things related tdo Taiji I urge caution. 
  The most likely cause of this decline in take is that there is less demand. But it is also possible that water temperatures have moved the most often taken species to different waters in search of prey. Distribution of fish is mostly governed by water temperature. A final possibility is that the prized species have become depleted and are difficult to find.
   There were also 160 dolphins taken for captivity during the past season.
   I believe the best course of action for BlueVoice is to continue to test dolphins and dolphin eaters for contamination and publish that information to depress the demand for dolphin meat.