372 Gender Bending Chemicals as a cause of Transexuality

Gender Bending Chemicals as a cause of Transexuality

If the epidemic of Transexuality is caused by chemical hormones in foods, medicines and industry, we should treat it as a contingent event, and not make changes to the social structure - eg recognizing "Gay Marriage" to accopmodate it - to accomodate it.

In item 4, the full bibliography on Gender Bending Chemicals as a cause of Transexuality is included. The large number of scientific articles show that this is a serious issue - yet it's rarely mentioned in internet forums.

(1) Alarm at gender-bending chemicals
(2) Wikipedia article on DES mentions gender-bending (transsexual) effects
(3) Young boys exposed to "feminizing" gender-bending chemicals (plastics etc)
(4) Scientific Paper: Prenatal Exposure to DES in males and Gender-Related Disorders

(1) Alarm at gender-bending chemicals

By Lorna Duckworth Health Correspondent

The Independent (UK)
Monday, 12 August 2002

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/alarm-at-genderbending-chemicals-639630.html

The World Health Organisation will urge governments today to establish an immediate inquiry into the effects of gender-bending chemicals on human and animal populations.

Strong evidence links reproductive abnormalities and population declines in some species of birds, fish, reptiles and amphibians with the chemicals, known as hormone disruptors or EDCs (endocrine-disrupting chemicals).

But concerns are also being raised that EDCs have contributed to the increase in breast, testicular and prostate cancers among humans and a decline in sperm counts.

In response to the threat, the WHO will publish a report today, written by a team of scientists, calling for an international programme of research. The report details a large body of evidence pointing to the way wildlife has been harmed by exposure to EDCs, including industrial chemicals such as phthalates, alkylphenols, dioxins and PCBs, as well as herbicides, insecticides and fungicides.

But evidence that human health has been damaged by EDCs remains weak – largely because of the lack of sufficiently robust studies, the report is expected to say.

This means that the effects on adults of low-level exposure to EDCs over a long period of time, and the impact on unborn babies and young children, are poorly understood. But the WHO is expected to conclude that recent health trends are sufficient to warrant concern.

Concerns have been raised about a decline in human sperm quality in several countries, the increased incidence of a congenital malformation of the penis called hypospadias, and a trend towards earlier puberty.

Increases in the incidence of cancer in hormonally sensitive tissues such as the breast, testes and prostate have also led to suggestions that environmental chemicals could be involved. But no studies have established a link. Wildlife studies have, however, shown a link between exposure to hormone disruptors and changes in physiology, sexual behaviour and fertility.

Female fish downstream from pulp and paper mills have developed male sex organs and try to mate with other females.

After a chemical leak in Lake Apoka, Florida, male alligators developed abnormal hormone levels, small penises and feminised gonads that diminished their reproductive success. And fish-eating birds, including gulls and terns, have in the past few decades given birth to an excess of female chicks and chicks with birth defects.

(2) Wikipedia article on DES mentions gender-bending (transsexual) effects
Yet the Wikipedia article on Gender identity disorder makes no mention of such chemical causes:
 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gender_identity_disorder

Gender identity disorder http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diethylstilbestrol

Diethylstilbestrol {DES} http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diethylstilbestrol

... Clinical use

DES (in tablets up to 5 mg) was approved by the United States Food and Drug Administration on September 19, 1941 for four indications: gonorrheal vaginitis, atrophic vaginitis, menopausal symptoms, and postpartum lactation suppression to prevent breast engorgement.[3] The gonorrheal vaginitis indication was dropped when the antibiotic penicillin became available. ...

In the 1940's, DES was used off-label to prevent adverse pregnancy outcomes in women with a history of miscarriage. On July 1, 1947, the FDA approved the use of DES for this indication. ...

Despite an absence of evidence supporting the use of DES to prevent adverse pregnancy outcomes, DES continued to be given to pregnant women through the 1960's. In 1971, a report published in the "New England Journal of Medicine" showed a link between DES and vaginal clear cell adenocarcinoma in girls and young women who had been exposed to this drug in utero. Later in the same year, the FDA sent a FDA Drug Bulletin to all U.S. physicians advising against the use of DES in pregnant women. The FDA also removed prevention of miscarriage as an indication for DES use and added pregnancy as a contraindication for DES use.[11] ...

From the 1950s through the beginning of the 1970s, DES was prescribed to prepubescent girls to begin puberty and thus stop growth by closing growth plates in the bones. Despite its clear link to cancer, doctors continued to recommend the hormone for "excess height." [13] ...

In 1973, in an attempt to restrict off-label use of DES as a postcoital contraceptive (which had become prevalent at many university health services following publication of an influential study in 1971 in JAMA) to emergency situations such as rape, an FDA Drug Bulletin was sent to all U.S. physicians and pharmacists that said the FDA had approved, under restricted conditions, postcoital contraceptive use of DES.[16][17] ...

In 1978, the FDA removed postpartum lactation suppression to prevent breast engorgement from their approved indications for DES and other estrogens.[21]

In the 1990s, the only approved indications for DES were treatment of advanced prostate cancer and treatment of advanced breast cancer in postmenopausal women.

The last remaining U.S. manufacturer of DES, Eli Lilly, stopped making and marketing DES in 1997. ...

DES daughters

DES gained notoriety when it was shown to cause a rare vaginal tumor in girls and young women who had been exposed to this drug in utero. In 1971, the New England Journal of Medicine published a report showing that 7 of 8 girls and young women (ages 14 to 22) who had been diagnosed with vaginal clear cell adenocarcinoma had been exposed prenatally to DES.[22]  ...

In addition to its carcinogenic properties, DES is a known teratogen, an agent capable of causing malformations in daughters and sons who were exposed in utero. DES-exposed daughters are at an increased risk of abnormalities of the reproductive tract, including vaginal epithelial changes, an increased cervical transformation zone, and uterine abnormalities such as T-shaped uterus. These anomalies contribute to an increased risk of infertility and adverse pregnancy outcomes in prenatally DES-exposed daughters. Daughters with prenatal exposure to DES may also have an increased risk of uterine fibroids in adulthood.[23]

Studies have not established a link between in utero exposure to DES and autoimmune diseases or sexual orientation.

DES sons

While early reports demonstrated significant risks of adverse effects on females who had been exposed prenatally to DES for a number of medical conditions, there were fewer publications documenting similar increased risks of adverse effects from exposure to DES Sons prior to 2000. ...

After 2000, increased attention turned to other possible effects of prenatal exposure to DES in males.[24][25]

While earlier research on DES sons focussed on documenting the incidence of external physical malformations recognizable at birth, or sought to determine if prevelence of certain cancers increased over the lifetime of the exposed children, more recent published research has explored the possibility that some of the effects of prenatal exposure to DES might be in the area of behavioral and or neurological change. In particular, "the high prevalence of individuals with confirmed or strongly suspected prenatal DES exposure who self-identify as male-to-female transsexual or transgender, and individuals who have reported experiencing difficulties with gender dysphoria."[24]

Various neurological changes occur after prenatal exposure of embryonic males to DES and other estrogenic endocrine disrupters.[26] Animals that exhibited these structural neurological changes were also shown to demonstrate various gender-related behavioral changes (so called "feminisation of males").

Clinical studies of transgendered individuals whose brains showed sexually dimorphic characteristics of their professed gender identities and counter to their chromosomal genders, consistent with what was observed in the animal models as noted above.[27]

Research and exploration of various potential causes of transgender psychology and behavior continues and professional opinions remain divided at this time.[28]

...References

... 24.^ a b Kerlin SP (2006-08). "prenatal exposure to diethylstilbestrol (DES) in males and gender-related disorders: results from a 5-year study" . International Behavioral Development Symposium 2005.

25.^ "des-sons : DES Sons International Research Network" . Yahoo Groups.

26.^ Ferguson SA (2002). "Effects on brain and behavior caused by developmental exposure to endocrine disrupters with estrogenic effects". Neurotoxicol Teratol 24 (1): 1–3. doi:10.1016/S0892-0362(01)00196-9 . PMID 11836066 .

27.^ Swaab DF (September 2007). "Sexual differentiation of the brain and behavior". Best Pract. Res. Clin. Endocrinol. Metab. 21 (3): 431–44. doi:10.1016/j.beem.2007.04.003 . PMID 17875490 .

28.^ Meyer-Bahlburg HF (April 2010). "From mental disorder to iatrogenic hypogonadism: dilemmas in conceptualizing gender identity variants as psychiatric conditions" . Arch Sex Behav 39 (2): 461–76. doi:10.1007/s10508-009-9532-4 . PMID 19851856 . PMC 2844928 . ...

This page was last modified on 18 August 2010 at 20:43.

(3) Young boys exposed to "feminizing" gender-bending chemicals (plastics etc)

http://www.hormoneimbalanced.com/danishstudy.html

Danish Scientific Study Concludes Chemical Estrogens Causing Decreased Fertility and Maculinity

CHEMICALS FOUND IN HOUSEHOLD PRODUCT CONTAIN CHEMICAL ESTROGENS

Two-year-old children are being exposed to dangerous levels of hormone-disrupting chemicals in domestic products such as rubber clogs and sun creams, according to an EU investigation being studied by the government.

The 327-page report says that while risks from "anti-androgen" and "oestrogen-like" substances in individual items have been recognised, the cumulative impact of such chemicals, particularly on boys, is being ignored.

The EU's environment council of ministers is due to agree on a regulatory approach to the use of so-called "gender-bender" compounds before Christmas. On Monday, EU officials will try to work out a strategy for creating risk assessments of products causing concerns. Environmental campaigners fear controls will favour industry and not be sufficiently robust.

Phthalates, one of the main anti-androgen chemicals, which are used as softeners in soap, rubber shoes, bath mats and soft toys, have been blamed for blocking the action of testosterone in the womb and are alleged to cause low sperm counts, high rates of testicular cancer and malformations of the sexual organs.

Research has suggested that male foetuses around 8-12 weeks after conception can be effectively demasculinised by exposure to such chemicals.

The report presented to the environment council and passed on to the Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) comes from Denmark, which has experienced a significant increase in the rates of testicular cancer.

The warnings are backed by the Chem (Chemicals Health and Environment Monitoring) Trust, a UK charity which has taken over campaigning work on toxic chemicals from the WWF (World Wildlife Fund).

The Danish study, Survey and Health Assessment of the exposure of two-year-olds to chemical substances in consumer products, concludes: "A few exposures to a high content of an endocrine-disruptor, such as that of [the phthalate] DBP in rubber clogs may result in a critical risk for the two-year-old.

"...The amounts that two-year-olds absorb from the [preservative] parabens propylparaben and butylparaben can constitute a risk for oestrogen-like disruptions of the endocrine system. This contribution originates predominantly from cosmetic products such as oil-based creams, moisturising creams, lotions and sunscreen.

"Not only is there a need to reduce exposure to anti-androgens and oestrogen-like substances from food products, indoor air and dust, but also to reduce exposure to [domestic] products, as these contribute to both indoor air and dust and to direct exposure.

"There is also a need to reduce possible contributions from other sources, such as propyl-, butyl- and isobutyl paraben in cosmetics, and phthalates in footwear (such as light-weight sandals and rubber boots)."

Gwynne Lyons, director of Chem Trust, said she feared the recommendations would not be heeded. "There are worries that Poland and the UK are more focused on protecting industry. Without public pressure, these countries will only agree to wording that sounds good, but actually falls short of ensuring that regulation is based on total exposure to, for example, so-called gender-bender chemicals.

"Both the public and wildlife are inadequately protected from harm, as regulation is based on looking at exposure to each substance in isolation, and yet it is now proven beyond doubt that hormone disrupting chemicals can act together to cause effects even when each by itself would not."

Defra said: "Public safety is the government's priority, and we will be reading the Danish report with interest. The potential for "cocktail effects" from different chemicals should not be ignored, and we support the European Union's Environment Council's upcoming work on regulating combinations of chemicals."

The government's Interdepartmental Group on Health Risks from Chemicals has recently published a report offering a framework for assessing the risks of mixtures to human health. It suggested that cumulative risk assessment should not be the only way of approaching "cocktail effects".

Hormone disrupting chemicals in household products

• Phthalates are used in the manufacture of rubber clogs, rubber boots, soap packaging, products made from PVC, bath mats and soft toys. They are also found in food products as a result of environmental pollution, according to the Danish study.

• Oestrogen-like substances, including chemicals known as parabens, occur in cosmetics, sun creams and moisturising lotions.

• Pesticides, such as DDT, dioxins and PCBs, are also known hormone-disruptors.

YOUNG MEN LESS FERTILE, MORE LIKELY TO PLAY WITH DOLLS

Here's something rather rotten from the State of Denmark. Its government yesterday unveiled official research showing that two-year-old children are at risk from a bewildering array of gender-bending chemicals in such everyday items as waterproof clothes, rubber boots, bed linen, food, nappies, sunscreen lotion and moisturising cream.

The 326-page report, published by the environment protection agency, is the latest piece in an increasingly alarming jigsaw. A picture is emerging of ubiquitous chemical contamination driving down sperm counts and feminising male children all over the developed world. And anti-pollution measures and regulations are falling far short of getting to grips with it.

Sperm counts are falling so fast that young men are less fertile than their fathers and produce only a third as much, proportionately, as hamsters. And gender-bending chemicals are increasingly being blamed for the mystery of the "lost boys": babies who should normally be male who have been born as girls instead.

The Danish government set out to find out how much contamination from gender-bending chemicals a two-year-old child was exposed to every day. It concluded that a child could be "at critical risk" from just a few exposures to high levels of the substances, such as from rubber clogs, and imperilled by the amount it absorbed from sources ranging from food to sunscreens.

The results build on earlier studies showing that British children have higher levels of gender-bending chemicals in their blood than their parents or grandparents. Indeed WWF (formerly the World Wildlife Fund), which commissioned the older research, warned that the chemicals were so widespread that "there is very little, if anything, individuals can do to prevent contamination of themselves and their families." Prominent among them are dioxins, PVC, flame retardants, phthalates (extensively used to soften plastics) and the now largely banned PCBs, one and a half million tons of which were used in countless products from paints to electrical equipment.

Young boys, like those in the Danish study, could end up producing less sperm and developing feminised behaviour. Research at Rotterdam's Erasmus University found that boys whose mothers were exposed to PCBs and dioxins were more likely to play with dolls and tea sets and dress up in female clothes.

And it is in the womb that babies are most vulnerable; a study of umbilical cords from British mothers found that every one contained hazardous chemicals. Scientists at the University of Rochester in New York discovered that boys born to women exposed to phthalates had smaller penises and other feminisation of the genitals.

The contamination may also offer a clue to a mysterious shift in the sex of babies. Normally 106 boys are born for every 100 girls: it is thought to be nature's way of making up for the fact that men were more likely to be killed hunting or in conflict. But the proportion of females is rising, so much so that some 250,000 babies who statistically should have been boys have ended up as girls in Japan and the United States alone. In Britain, the discrepancy amounts to thousands of babies a year.

A Canadian Indian community living on ancestral lands at the eastern tip of Lake Huron, hemmed in by one of the biggest agglomerations of chemical factories on earth, gives birth to twice as many girls as boys. It's the same around Seveso in Italy, contaminated with dioxins from a notorious accident in the 1970s, and among Russian pesticide workers. And there's more evidence from places as far apart as Israel and Taiwan, Brazil and the Arctic.

Yet gender-benders are largely exempt from new EU regulations controlling hazardous chemicals. Britain, then under Tony Blair's premiership, was largely responsible for this – restricting their inclusion in the first draft of the legislation, and then causing even what was included to be watered down.Confidential documents show that it did so after pressure from George W Bush's administration, which protested that US exports "could be impacted".

Now the Danish government is planning to lobby to have the rules toughened up. It is particularly concerned by other studies which show that gender-bending chemicals acting together have far worse effects than the expected sum of their individual impacts. It wants this to be reflected in the regulations, citing its discovery of the many sources to which the two-year-olds are exposed – modern slings and arrows, as it were, of outrageous fortune.

(4) Scientific Paper: Prenatal Exposure to DES in males and Gender-Related Disorders

http://forum.mesomorphosis.com/mens-health-forum/prenatal-exposure-diethylstilbestrol-des-134253671.html

Cryptochid 

Prenatal Exposure to Diethylstilbestrol (DES) in Males and Gender-Related Disorders: Results from a 5-Year Study

by Scott P. Kerlin, Ph.D.

DES Sons International Network
Vancouver, B.C., Canada
Skerlin2000@yahoo.com
July 2005

Paper prepared for the International Behavioral Development Symposium 2005 Minot, North Dakota

An earlier version of this paper was presented at E.Hormone 2004, New Orleans http://e.hormone.tulane.edu

{p. 2} Abstract

For many years, researchers and public health specialists have been assessing the human health impact of prenatal exposure to the estrogenic antimiscarriage drug, diethylstilbestrol (commonly known as DES or stilbestrol).

The scope of adverse effects in females exposed to DES (often called DES daughters) has been more substantially documented than the effects in males (DES sons). This paper contributes three areas of important research on DES exposure in males: (1) an overview of published literature discussing the confirmed and suspected adverse effects of prenatal exposure in DES sons; (2) preliminary results from a 5-year online study of DES sons involving 500 individuals with confirmed (60% of sample) and suspected prenatal DES exposure; (3) documentation of the presence of gender identity disorders and male-to-female transsexualism reported by more than 100 participants in the study.

{p. 3} Introduction and Background

During the 1970s and 1980s an increased amount of public and scientific attention was paid to the health and medical problems of individuals whose mothers were prescribed diethylstilbestrol (DES). ...

While DES usage with pregnant women was banned by the FDA in 1971, the drug continued to be used in several European countries into the early 1980s (Schrager and Potter, 2004). ...

It has been estimated that as many as four to five million American women were prescribed DES during pregnancy. Estimates of the numbers of DES daughters and DES sons born in the U.S. are between one million and three million each (Edelman, 1986). Hundreds of thousands of DES sons and daughters were also born in Canada, Europe and Australia between the 1940s and 1980s. ...

Because DES proved popular as a growth-stimulant in the cattle industry (Raun and Preston, 2002) for more than forty years (McLachlan, 2001), many consumers have also been exposed to unknown amounts of DES as it entered the food chain through beef consumption.

Following the FDA restrictions on DES prescriptions in the U.S. in 1971, researchers began to document a range of confirmed and suspected adverse effects of prenatal DES exposure in females and males (Edelman, 1986). ...

{p. 4} ... John McLachlan (2001), a pioneering DES researcher whose studies have assessed the effects of DES exposure in laboratory animals and mechanisms of DES toxicity for the past three decades, was among the first researchers to classify DES within a broader family of chemical compounds called environmental estrogens, xenoestrogens, or endocrine disrupting chemicals because of their common ability to mimic and interfere with normal hormonal processes associated with reproductive development. He has observed:

Developmental feminization at the structural or functional level is an emerging theme in species exposed, during embryonic or fetal life, to estrogenic compounds. Human experience as well as studies in experimental animals with the potent estrogen diethylstilbestrol provide informative models (2001).

The evolving research on endocrine disruptors has implicated DES in a variety of sexual differentiation disorders of the brain and body in males (Colburn et al, 1993; McLachlan et al., 2001; Sharpe, 2001; 2004; Sultan et al, 2001; Toppari et al., 1996), including testicular dysgenesis syndrome (Boisen, et al., 2001; Skakkebk, Meyts, and Main, 2001). In 1993, Sharpe and Skakkebk observed:

Treatment of several million pregnant women between 1945 and 1971 with a synthetic oestrogen diethylstilbestrol (DES) is now recognized to have led to substantial increases in the incidence of cryptorchidism and hypospadias and decreased semen volume and sperm counts in the sons of these women. DES exposure may also increase the incidence of testicular cancer and cryptorchidism. The similarity between these effects and the adverse changes in male reproductive development and function over the past 40-50 years raises the question of whether the adverse changes are attributable to altered exposure to oestrogens during fetal development. This possibility is not unlikely given the view that humans now live in an environment that can be viewed as a virtual sea of oestrogens (Sharpe and Skakkebk, 1993). ...

{p. 5} ... It has been hypothesized that prenatal DES exposure may also have led to behavioral effects in humans (Meyer-Bahlburg and Erhardt, 1986; Meyer-Bahlburg, et al., 1995). Primary studies exploring possible behavioral and psychiatric effects of prenatal DES exposure in males first appeared in the literature during the 1970s. DES exposure has been associated with increased potential for major depressive disorders and other psychiatric effects in males (Katz, et al., 1987; Meyer-Bahlburg et al., 1985; Pillard et al., 1993; Saunders, 1988; Vessey et al., 1983). ...

The data on prenatal exposure to synthetic estrogen derive primarily from subjects exposed to diethylstilbestrol (DES). DES-exposed male subjects appeared to be feminized and/or demasculinized, and there is some evidence that DES-exposed female subjects were masculinized. ...

While it is not possible in this paper to review the extensive array of experimental animal research involving prenatal and neonatal DES exposure, two recent wildlife studies of the effects of DES on the reproductive function and behavior of male Japanese quail are notable. One study by Halldin et al. (2004) included DES in a primary assessment of the effects of estrogenic chemicals administered during the sexual differentiation phase in Japanese quail. ...

{p. 6} ... A separate study of sexual behavior in male quail by Viglietti-Panzica et al. (2004) led to the conclusion:

The present data demonstrate that embryonic treatment with diethylstilbestrol induces a full sex reversal of behavioral phenotype as well as a significant decrease of vasotocin expression in the preoptic-limbic region in male Japanese quail. ...

This present study was initially conceptualized as an Internet-based outreach campaign for locating DES sons from around the world and inspired by the need for more primary research involving DES sons. ...

{p. 7} ... Upon launch of the DES Sons online network in 1999, announcements about the network were made through a variety of DES print and online outreach resources from DES Action USA, DES Action Canada, and DES Action Australia. ...

{p. 8} ... By July 2004, a sample of approximately 500 males with confirmed (60% of total) or strongly suspected DES exposure (40% of total) participated in the DES Sons International Network research and provided a summary of major health, medical, and psychological issues they had encountered across the lifespan. Among the 60% of participants who indicated they had confirmed their exposure, the majority of confirmations came from the mothers verification of having been given DES at some time during the pregnancy. ...

Approximately 85% of network members were born in the U.S., while 5% each indicated they were born in Canada, Europe (chiefly UK) or Australia.

{p. 9} ... Among the most significant findings from this study is the high prevalence of individuals with confirmed or strongly suspected prenatal DES exposure who self-identify as male-tofemale transsexual or transgender, and individuals who have reported experiencing difficulties with gender dysphoria.

In this study, more than 150 individuals with confirmed or suspected prenatal DES exposure reported moderate to severe feelings of gender dysphoria across the lifespan. For most, these feelings had apparently been present since early childhood. The prevalence of a significant number of self-identified male-to-female transsexuals and transgendered individuals as well as some individuals who identify as intersex, androgynous, gay or bisexual males has inspired fresh investigation of historic theories about a possible biological/endocrine basis for psychosexual development in humans, including sexual orientation, core gender identity, and sexual identity (Benjamin, 1973; Cohen-Kettenis and Gooren, 1999; Diamond, 1965, 1996; Michel et al, 2001; Swaab, 2004).

Mental health and psychiatric issues (including depression and anxiety disorders) are relatively significant among the population of DES sons participating in this research. This studys findings provide fresh evidence of psychiatric disturbances among individuals exposed to DES. ...

{p. 10} ... Undoubtedly the results of this study--particularly the findings with regard to the prevalence of gender-related concerns among a significant number of individuals with confirmed and/or suspected prenatal DES exposure--will come as a surprise for some. It is worth noting that investigations regarding the possible effects of prenatal DES exposure on sexual differentiation (brain and body), and sexual orientation have been undergoing discussion for quite some time (Baron-Cohen, 2004; Hines, 1998; Hines 1999; Meyer-Bahlburg et al., 1995; Toppari and Skakkebk, 1998), though more emphasis in the published research has tended to be placed on possible effects in DES daughters than in DES sons.

{p. 11} While prior to this current study there have been no primary research studies of DES sons which have documented the prevalence of transsexualism or other gender identity disorders, there are publications in which prenatal DES exposure is listed among the potential factors associated with transsexualism or sexual differentiation disorders. For example, Michel, Mormont, and Legros (2001) in their psycho-endocrinological overview of transsexualism observe the following:

Gender identity disorders may be the consequence of an atypical hormonal environment such as congenital adrenal hyperplasia, resistance to androgens or even exogenous hormonal impregnation (the absorption of diethylstilboestrol treatment during pregnancy). In the majority of cases, these subjects do not develop towards transsexualism (2001, p. 366).

In the 6th edition of the widely-consulted Dictionary of Organic Compounds (1996) the DES entry appears on pages 2175-2176 and includes within its array of documented adverse effects, causes male impotence and transsexual changes particularly in offspring exposed in utero. In the text, Human Embryology & Teratology, Second Edition (1996), ORahilly and Muller list DES among their directory of hormonal teratogens, stating, Exposure of a female conceptus to DES, which can act as an estrogen, can lead to bisexuality. In a male conceptus, the secretion of testosterone can be suppressed, resulting in hypomasculinization. (ORahilly and Muller, 1996, p. 111).

The term gender-bending chemicals has become relatively popular with the news media in their latest reports on the toxic effects of endocrine disrupting chemicals such as phthalates on male reproductive development (Sample, 2005; Swan et al., 2005). Scarcely more than a decade ago, the concept was almost unheard of. Its introduction into early news stories describing documented and suspected but unconfirmed effects of endocrine disrupting chemicals (EDCs) no doubt provoked both amusement and angst in the public imagination (see Gender-Bending Pollution, 1995). By the time the World Health Organizations International Programme on Chemical Safety had released its Global Assessment of the State-of-the- Science of Endocrine Disruptors (IPCS, 2002), the story of DES had become part of the story of an entire group of environmentally-present toxic chemicals thought capable of creating a variety of reproductive abnormalities in humans as well as animal populations (Alarm at Gender-Bending Chemicals, 2002). In that same year, Dutch researchers studying male and female childrens play behavior documented apparent feminizing effects in boys resulting from perinatal exposure to PCBs and dioxins (Vreugdenhil, et al., 2002). ...

{p. 12} Acknowledgments

I wish to thank Milton Diamond, Ph.D., University of Hawaii, John McLachlan, Ph.D., Center for Bioenvironmental Research at Tulane/Xavier Universities, Dana Beyer, M.D., (DES Sons International Network), Kathy Cochrane, and Christine Johnson for their helpful comments, suggestions and generous support.

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{p. 20} APPENDIX
DES Sons International Network 5-Year Summary Statistics ...