The incredible shrinking man.

• Author: Fantle, Will
• Position: Hazardous chemical pollution and genetic deformities

Theo Colborn is alarmed. Her wildlife research in the Great Lakes region has convinced her that common chemicals widely used in American homes and industries are affecting males of all species, causing dramatic reductions in fertility and a growing number of gross deformities in the male anatomy, including shrunken penises and testicular problems.

"I think we have reached the point where there are measurable changes in humans and the environment from the chemical soup we carry around in us," says Colborn, a zoologist who earned her Ph.D. from the University of Wisconsin and is now a staff scientist for the World Wildlife Fund. "There are too many parallels between what's going on in the field and in the lab."

Colborn believes popular chemicals used for growing food, treating and purifying water, manufacturing plastics, and producing pulp and paper are damaging the endocrine, immune, and reproductive systems of animals. and the chemicals are creating these effects at exposure levels far below accepted safety limits--thresholds typically set for measuring cancer risks.

By far the most troubling impacts occur in the womb, where the chemicals circulating in the mother's body may deliver a profound punch to the developing embryo and fetus. Colborn calls this a "transgenerational effect." Any fetal damage is permanent and irreversible, although the results may not appear until early adulthood. And, she notes, the pollutants could have been absorbed years earlier by the body, only to wreak havoc during childbearing.

"The effects are being seen in the offspring more than the parents," says Colborn. "The problem is that people don't understand that these chemicals are affecting fertility, the doorway to population."

From her office in Washington, D.C., Colborn is mobilizing the scientific community. Twice in the past three years she has convened an international gathering of scientists at the Wingspread conference center in Racine, Wisconsin, to discuss chemical pollution, animal health, and fertility. All of the researchers carried pieces of the puzzle from their own specific investigations to the conferences. As they compared notes, they were startled by the emerging picture and they began to speak out.

"Every man in this room is half the man his grandfather was," Louis Guillette told a group of lawmakers at a recent Congressional hearing. Along with the other Wingspread scientists, the University of Florida researcher was in Washington to spread...