Issues > March/April 2007 (#119) > Green Room to Grow In

Green Room to Grow In

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"It's of concern that we're seeing these significant effects from exposures occurring in everyday life in New York City," Perera says, adding that for the Harlem-based study population, these effects, especially those of ETS, "were much worse combined with the psychosocial stress due to poverty." Perera's team works with West Harlem Environmental Action in campaigns that seek to reduce diesel buses, show residents how to eliminate asthma triggers such as dust mites and refer children with developmental problems to programs that can help. "Identification of early life risks can have tremendous benefits," Perera says.

The good news, Perera adds, is that reducing exposures produces positive results. Chlorpyrifos was banned from residential uses in 2001, and in babies born afterwards, "cord blood levels of the pesticide came way down. The harmful effects on fetal growth were no longer seen," she says.

Baby Footprints

In addition to your child's immediate health, there's the environment to consider. U.S. retail sales of products for babies, toddlers and preschoolers reached $8 billion in 2005, up from $3 billion a decade ago. And that's not counting food, clothing and diapers! In 2005, the American birth rate rose 1 percent, adding 4,140,419 babies to the mix. All those baby products add up to an outsize environmental impact.

One sure way to step more lightly on the earth—and your budget—is to recycle and reuse rather than buy new, says Deirdre Dolan, coauthor with Alexandra Zissu of The Complete Organic Pregnancy. "People generously gave us so much wonderful organic cotton stuff, but it kills me that babies outgrow their clothes that fast," says Deirdre, a Brooklyn resident who gave birth to a daughter in November. "So 99.9 percent of her wardrobe is hand-me-downs. My sister gave me her 11-year-old crib." (It meets current Consumer Product Safety Commission standards, such as crib slats spaced no more than 2 3/8 inches apart.) Deirdre's two favorites swaddling blankets are 10-year-old cotton hand-me-downs. Mary and Jesse's newborn son sleeps in a hand-me-down co-sleeper, a crib with one open side and a sleeve that fits under the parents' adjoining mattress.

When she had to buy new, Deirdre went for an organic crib mattress and sheets and a Pure Grow Wool puddle pad. Mary's newborn son napped in an organic Moses basket, and the co-sleeper is outfitted with an organic futon. (This spring, when Jesse's Q Collection debuts its baby furniture line, they'll get a crib made of Forest Stewardship Council-certified wood from well-managed forests.) For a changing table, Deirdre bought a bureau in unfinished hardwood and had her husband coat it with a no-VOC finish from ECO of New York. For a changing pad, she covered a Babies R Us plastic pad with a piece of wool and put a small terry cotton fitted sheet over it.

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