What are some known endocrine disruptors and their effects?
For decades, physicians have prescribed numerous synthetic hormonal substances to modify human reproduction. One such drug, diethylstilbesterol (DES), a synthetic estrogen, was given to some pregnant women in the 1950s and 1960s under the mistaken belief that it would prevent miscarriage and promote fetal growth. It wasn’t until several decades later that it was discovered that DES has an adverse effect on the reproductive system of some females exposed to the drug in utero. Many of these women suffered reproductive deformities, while others experienced rare cancers of the vagina. In the 1970s, a paper in the New England Journal of Medicine reported that seven out of eight young women with cancer of the vagina had mothers who had taken DES during their first three months of pregnancy.2 Certain pesticides, such as DDT, also have been shown to have endocrine activity, which is not surprising, since many were designed to have a deleterious effect on the reproductive capabilities of the pe
