Center for Health, Environment & Justice
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Identifying Disease Clusters – What Comes Next?

It’s hard to say how many disease clusters have been identified. The website of the National Disease Cluster Alliance (NDCA) which held a national conference last week has a map that identifies 73 clusters. Several people attending the meeting pointed out that their cluster was not on the map and there are no doubt many others not on the map. While identifying clusters is an important step, knowing how to respond and what steps to take once a disease cluster (even a suspected disease cluster) has been identified is, perhaps,

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September 17, 2012

Phthalates and Asthma: What's going on with NYC children?

I have asthma.   Just like millions of other Americans. That’s why I was upset when only a week after we released our new report that found high levels of phthalates in children’s vinyl back-to-school supplies, researchers at Columbia University published a major new study linking phthalates to asthma in NYC children. “While many factors contribute to childhood asthma, our study shows that exposure to phthalates may play a significant role,” says Allan Just, PhD, first author on the new Center study and current postdoctoral researcher at the Harvard School of

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September 15, 2012

The Answer to Climate Change-A Floating City

For years I’ve thought that those who advocate “clean coal” or hydro fracturing, oil drilling off shore or even nuclear power plants thought that once the earth has been totally contaminated, climate change has dried up our lakes and streams and deserts have replaced once lush farmland that they believed there was another planet where they could rebuild the new America. It is the only plan that made sense to me since they, their children and their children’s children have to live somewhere. All the money in the world can’t

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September 12, 2012

Health Study at Huge Toxic Spill

After forty years, the NYS Department of Health is finally launching a health study of people who lived in an area affected by a huge toxic chemical spill south of Rochester, NY. About 35,000 gallons of trichloroethene, or TCE, was released during a 1970 train derailment in Le Roy, Genesee County, creating a 4 ½-square-mile plume of contaminated groundwater. People in several dozen homes drank and bathed in private well water containing TCE for two decades until officials finally provided public water. Others inhaled indoor air containing trace amounts of

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September 9, 2012

EPA Proposes Short-term Limit on TCE Exposures

The U.S. EPA has made a remarkable decision recently to protect the health of people exposed to trichloroethylene (TCE) in indoor air, primarily as a result of vapor intrusion of TCE vapors from groundwater. The Region 9 EPA has proposed a Remedial Action Level (RAL) for acute (short term) exposure to TCE of 15 micrograms per cubic meter (ug/m3) or 2.8 parts per billion by volume (ppbv). RALs are developed to protect residents exposed to chemicals in indoor air. The regional EPA staff is awaiting approval from EPA headquarters. This

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September 5, 2012

Ohioans letter to NY Governor

Dear Governor Cuomo: We, the undersigned Ohioans, are writing to request that you oppose shale gas extraction via ‘fracking’ in all areas of New York, to include the Southern tier. Such development would be irresponsible not only for the reasons outlined below, but also due to the lacking infrastructure for proper disposal of fracking waste products within your state. Because neighboring New Jersey will not accept out of state fracking waste, Ohio becomes a likely target for the disposal of the fluid by-products of fracking. Ohio relies on class II

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August 31, 2012
Blog Roll
Greenpeace’s The Witness
Grist
Groovy Green
Healthy Child Healthy World
Inside Prevention
It’s Getting Hot in Here
Moms Rising
Pharos
Safe Mama
Safer Chemicals Healthy Families
The Soft Landing
Treehugger
Zero Waste World