The “Poison Papers” represent a vast trove of rediscovered
chemical industry and regulatory agency documents and correspondence
stretching back to the 1920s. Taken as a whole, the
papers show that both industry and regulators understood the
extraordinary toxicity of many chemical products and worked together to
conceal this information from the public and the press. These papers
will transform our understanding of the hazards posed
by certain chemicals on the market and the fraudulence of some of the
regulatory processes relied upon to protect human health and the
environment. Search instructions for the Poison Papers.
The Poison Papers are a compilation of over 20,000 documents obtained
from federal agencies and chemical manufacturers via open records
requests and public interest litigation. They include internal
scientific studies and summaries of studies, internal memos and reports,
meeting minutes, strategic discussions, and sworn testimonies. The
majority of these documents have been scanned and digitized by us for
the first time and represent nearly three tons of material. The
regulatory agency sources of these documents include: the EPA, the USDA
Forest Service, the FDA, the Veterans Administration, and the Department
of Defense. Chemical manufacturers referenced in the documents include:
Dow, Monsanto, DuPont, and Union Carbide, as well as many smaller
manufacturers and the commercial testing companies who worked for them.
The Poison Papers are a project of the Bioscience Resource Project and the Center for Media and Democracy. The Poison Papers were largely collected by author and activist Carol Van Strum.
The Poison Papers catalogue both the secret concerns of industry and
regulators over the hazards of pesticides and other chemicals and their
efforts to conceal those concerns.
Corporate concealment is not a new story. What is novel in the Poison Papers is abundant evidence that EPA and other regulators were, often, knowing participants or even primary instigators of these cover-ups. These regulators failed to inform the public of the hazards of dioxins and other chemicals; of evidence of fraudulent independent testing; even of one instance of widespread human exposure. The papers thus reveal, in the often-incriminating words of the participants themselves, an elaborate universe of deception and deceit surrounding many pesticides and synthetic chemicals.
The chemicals most often discussed in the documents include herbicides and pesticides (such as 2,4-D, Dicamba, Permethrin, Atrazine, and Agent Orange), dioxins, and PCBs. Some of these chemicals are among the most toxic and persistent ever manufactured.
Corporate concealment is not a new story. What is novel in the Poison Papers is abundant evidence that EPA and other regulators were, often, knowing participants or even primary instigators of these cover-ups. These regulators failed to inform the public of the hazards of dioxins and other chemicals; of evidence of fraudulent independent testing; even of one instance of widespread human exposure. The papers thus reveal, in the often-incriminating words of the participants themselves, an elaborate universe of deception and deceit surrounding many pesticides and synthetic chemicals.
The chemicals most often discussed in the documents include herbicides and pesticides (such as 2,4-D, Dicamba, Permethrin, Atrazine, and Agent Orange), dioxins, and PCBs. Some of these chemicals are among the most toxic and persistent ever manufactured.
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