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Photo essay: China's hi-tech toxics
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Environmental impact
A cathode ray tube sits by what was previously a drainage ditch. It has now been filled with crushed glass from computer monitors. The glass contains lead oxide, to protect users from potentially harmful X-rays, and is classed as a hazardous waste under the international Basel Convention. Single samples taken by the BAN researchers in the region tested 190 times the World Health Organisation’s safe level for lead, had chromium levels 1338 times the level deemed safe in the US and tin levels 152 times the US threshold. “For money, people have made a mess of this good farming village… Every day villagers inhale this dirty air; their bodies have become weak. Many people have developed respiratory and skin problems. Some people wash vegetables and dishes with the polluted water, and they get stomach sickness,” a 60 year-old resident of the region told them.
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