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MCS Conference for the Chemical Industry
Chemical Causation: an interface between chemical toxicity and psychology
On Monday 20 November 2006, the Occupational and Environmental Toxicology group held a conference at the Society of Chemical Industry, London, to explore the implications of chemical sensitivity in relation to the chemical industry. Speakers included: Paul Illing (COEH, Manchester/Independent Consultant), Kevin Perret (HPA Rotherham), Richard Stevens (Keele University), Andrew Povey (COEH, Manchester), Simon Wessely (InstPsych, London).
“Increasingly, medically unexplained physical symptoms are being ascribed (at least by the general public) to chemical exposure. As such, they present as toxicological problems. They often are heavily publicised by those affected by the syndromes, and the finger of guilt pointed at the chemicals industry. This has led to the definition of Idiopathic Environmental Illness, Multiple Chemical Sensitivities, etc. Do we have the tools to tackle them or should we be calling in the psychologist?”
Two representatives from Allergy UK attended, giving a position statement on chemical sensitivity that you can read on the Allergy UK website here
We found that attitudes at the seminar were pretty much as suspected from the title of the conference! It does seem as though MCS is now recognised but has been re-named Idiopathic Environmental Illness. This basically means that chemical sensitivity has been accepted as a real problem but as there is no way of proving what causes it, and without the ability for accurate testing, they cannot help sufferers. It also came across that even though they know that there are a few very poorly people, on the whole they still believe it is mostly psychological, because as far as they are concerned tests carried out to show reproducible symptoms in MCS sufferers were inconclusive. Several of the speakers were research scientists and were looking at 'results' and so were totally emotive.
The whole seminar was heavily hinged on the psychological effects of possible exposure to chemicals where it led to mass hysteria. Examples given included strange smells in schools that could not be identified, where members of staff became ill even though all tests on the school were clear and a case where cans of Coca Cola that had a 'funny smell' led to people becoming ill all over Belgium. In the latter case, there was absolutely no evidence that there was anything wrong with the Coke and it had come from different sources.
It was a very interesting seminar but we feel that it was more of a sociological study and we do not think it will get MCS, as we know it, better understood.