More on Dr. Ernie Lykissa

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W. Lieberman, M.D., Ph.D.,

Department of Pathology

Baylor College of Medicine

Houston, Texas 77030

Press Conference remarks 12/1/98

I want to begin by saying that I think the panel Judge Pointer convened did an excellent job in sifting through a voluminous stack of data. The task was not an easy one and they are to be commended. However, I would like to call attention to several important studies from Baylor College of Medicine that I believe have received insufficient attention from the panel and one that is scheduled to be published in April that the panel has not yet seen.

As many of you know, the material in silicone breast implants is composed primarily of polymer, that is, high molecular weight compounds that are made up of many repeating units called monomers. These polymers form a gel used in implants. In the manufacture of polymers the process can be incomplete and result in the formation of compounds that have only 3 to 20 repeating units instead of the great number that are present in the polymerized gel. These incomplete units are called oligomers or low molecular weight siloxanes.

Research on silicones at Baylor College of Medicine has focused on these siloxane oligomers. All the work I am going to tell you about has appeared or has been accepted for publication in nationally recognized research journals.

I want to emphasize four significant findings. First Dr. Ernest Lykissa and his colleagues have demonstrated that breast implant material is not pure polymer, but contains these siloxane oligomers. In addition the implants contain platinum, the catalyst used to help form polymers from nonomers.

A second finding of Dr. Lykissa and his colleagues is that these materials can migrate out of intact implants. That is, if an intact implant is placed in fluid and maintained at body temperature, the siloxane and the platinum can be found in that fluid. Simply put, these siloxane oligomers and platinum can escape through the intact implant capsule into the surrounding environment.

In a third line of investigation, I have worked with Dr. Lykissa and others to investigate the fate of these oligomers. Our results have demonstrated that these siloxane oligomers, if injected under the skin of mice, are taken up and deposited in organs of the mice and in their fat. We have found these compounds in the lymph nodes, uterus, ovary, fat, and seven other organs. They persist for at leas a year which is approximately 40% of the life span of a mouse. They may be present for longer periods of time, but we have not examined periods longer than one year.

The fourth point I wish to make is that these siloxane oligomers are toxic to mice. In fact, they are lethal. This work has not yet been published. It is scheduled to appear in the April issue of Environmental Health Perspectives, the official journal of the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences. Normally, one is not supposed to talk about unpublished work in public. But I felt that this work was so important that I have contacted Dr. Olden, the Director of NIEHS, and he has assured me that there is no conflict if I present this material that is still in the process of being published. The story is this: If one injects these compounds into the abdomen of female mice, they produce severe liver and lung injury and mice die approximately 7 days after the injection.

We have studied one of these siloxane oligomers, known as D4, in more detail. Injection of approximately 0.2ml (about 4% of a teaspoon) will kill approximately 50% of the mice in this time period. This degree of toxicity is about the same as that of carbon tetrachloride and trichloroethylene, two compounds that are widely recognized as model toxins and in fact are used by many researchers in their work to understand how toxic chemicals harm the body.

Let me conclude by noting that I believe there is significant evidence that components of breast implants are highly toxic and may cause serious health effects.

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NOTE FROM SALLY:

The news conference was called by Congressman Gene Greene. Others in attendance were, besides Dr. Lieberman: Dr. Lykissa, Rick Laminik, Dave Fenton (I think that is his name), Marilyn Sapp, Keeling along with other women that have an interest in this matter.