After reaching an agreement with Baxter, investors withdrew a shareholder resolution calling on the company to phase out use of PVC materials in its intravenous health care products. In exchange for shareholder withdrawal of the resolution, Baxter will identify all PVC-containing products it manufactures and provide a timetable for replacement with non-PVC IV bags. The company will update shareholders on its steps to replace all PVC products with suitable alternatives. Baxter will also request that the Vinyl Institute, American Plastics Council and Chlorine Chemistry Council refrain from using its name in their public ad campaigns. Baxter maintains that it is already supplying many products without PVC, and that as viable alternatives arise they plan to use them.
The sponsors, ICCR’s (Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility) International Health Issue Group and health care activists, argue that chemicals used to manufacture PVC products include suspected carcinogens, hormone disrupters and reproductive toxicants. Research shows one such chemical, DEHP, leaches out of PVC medical devices and into the fluids they carry, and has been linked to adverse effects in premature infants and other vulnerable persons, such as dialysis and AIDS patients. When incinerated, PVCs produce dioxin. 90 percent of dioxin exposure to humans comes from waste incinerators.
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FROM The Corporate Examiner
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