The Second Wave

The Baltic Sea is an important indicator of how chemicals are influencing the environment and scientists now warn against a new wave of certain pollutants that strikes the sensitive inland sea. Wildlife in and around the Baltic Sea are suffering or drastically decreasing in numbers.

Several species are under threat or have decreased all together. At the same time welfare diseases such as cancer, infertility and allergies have increased and a new report from the UNEP points to a link between the diseases and new endocrine disrupting chemicals found in the Baltic Sea.

Cecilia, an archipelago dweller, has been told that foetuses and infants are the most exposed to environmental toxins. When she becomes pregnant, Cecilia learns that she has 35 different kinds of environmental toxins in her body and she wants to know which of these substances have been transferred to her newborn son Alfred.

This is the first time scientists have the opportunity to analyse an infant’s blood. And when it turns out that Alfred’s blood contains even higher levels of certain toxins than his mother’s, scientists are both surprised and worried.