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As coal mining declines, community mental health problems linger
By Roberta Attanasio The U.S. coal industry is in rapid decline, a shift marked not only by the bankruptcy of many mine operators in coal-rich Appalachia but also by a legacy of potential environmental and social disasters. As mines close, states, the federal government and taxpayers are left wondering about the costs of cleaning up the abandoned land, especially at mountaintop removal sites, the most destructive type of mining. As coal companies go bankrupt, this has left states concerned taxpayers may have to pick up the environmental cleanup costs. But there are also societal costs related to mountaintop removal mining’s impact on health and mental health. As an immunologist, I…
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Salmon Farming: The Chilean Massive Die-Off
By Roberta Attanasio Salmon farming—the fastest growing food production system in the world—is going through hard times in Chile, the world’s second-largest salmon producer after Norway. Last year, Chile exported $4.5 billion of farmed salmon, but now a deadly algal bloom is killing millions of farmed fish. A few months ago, an estimated 40,000 tons of salmon died in the Los Lagos region, which is known as the Switzerland of the Southern Hemisphere’s—the snow-capped peaks of the Andes Mountains tower over deep mountain lakes and green farming valleys, creating a fairy-tale landscape. Unlike Switzerland, the fairy-tale landscape extends down to the coast and its beaches, which became covered with dead…
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Pharmaceuticals in Drinking Water?
By Roberta Attanasio The problem of contaminated tap water in the U.S. goes well beyond Flint—and also beyond lead. There are many more toxic chemicals in our drinking water that we like to believe. Communities in New York, New Hampshire and Vermont recently found elevated levels of PFOA, a suspected carcinogen, in their water supplies. PFOA, or perfluorooctanoic acid, is a synthetic perfluoroalkyl chemical used to manufacture nonstick pan coatings and water-resistant clothing. And, even more recent is the finding that water discharged from Burlington’s wastewater treatment plant into Lake Champlain—the source of drinking water for tens of thousands of people in the Burlington area—contains concentrations of pharmaceuticals high enough to reflect…
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Quality Water, Quality Life: Aquatic Health and Contaminants in the Midcoast Oregon Salmon Watersheds
A guest post by Ray Kinney From ridge tops to reefs, environmental degradation has caused many salmon populations to decline to one to ten percent of former numbers. Young salmon survival in freshwater is only 2 to 5% from egg to smolt phase just before entering the ocean phase of their life cycle. Many causative effects for this decline are known, but many remain to be clarified. Politics often prevents adequate investigation of contaminant effects for water quality. Chronic low dose accumulative effects of toxic contaminants take a toll that is generally unrecognized by fisheries managers. Our benevolent rainfall flows down out of the Coast Range to become, once again, part…
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Global Threats: Contamination of Surface Waters by Agricultural Insecticides
By Roberta Attanasio The use of agricultural insecticides — toxic substances developed to target and kill insects that damage crops — has sparked controversy since the dawn of the “chemical age”, which started in the 1950s. The benefits of agricultural insecticides — for example, increased food production — are undeniable. Unfortunately, along with benefits, there are considerable unwanted effects. Ideally, insecticides must be lethal to the target insects, but not to non-target species. However, these toxic substances do not target only insects — they target many more organisms, including man. Thus, the toxic brew of agricultural insecticides threatens the ecological integrity of aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems. Indeed, agricultural systems play a…
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Nanoparticles and Sunscreen Products: Toxicity to Sea Life in Coastal Waters
By Roberta Attanasio The debate on the safety of titanium dioxide (TiO2) and zinc oxide (ZnO) nanoparticles contained in sunscreen products is still on. Some scientists have raised concerns about the negative impact that these tiny particles — generally between one and 100 nanometers (between one and 100 billionths of a meter) across — may have on human health. Due to their small size, nanoparticles might do harm to humans by seeping through the skin and into the bloodstream. A few months ago, despite the widespread safety concerns, Paul Wright (a toxicology expert at RMIT University) told The Guardian that sunscreen nanoparticles don’t get past the outermost dead layer of human skin cells. In contrast, Paul Westerhoff (a professor at Arizona…
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Arsenic Contamination of Drinking Water in India Impairs Kala-Azar Treatment
By Roberta Attanasio Visceral leishmaniasis, known in India as kala-azar or black fever, is a parasitic disease that kills an estimated 500,000 people a year, 90 percent of them in India, Nepal, Bangladesh, Brazil and Sudan. In India, the disease is endemic in the northeastern Indian State of Bihar – the epicenter of kala-azar in the region – and in Jharkhand, Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal. It manifests with irregular bouts of fever, substantial weight loss, swelling of the spleen and liver, and anemia. Left untreated, kala-azar is almost always fatal, especially in children, According to the World Health Organization (WHO), “Leishmaniasis is a poverty-related disease. It affects the poorest…
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Arsenic in Drinking Water: Increased Risk of Respiratory Infections and Lung Damage Following Fetal Exposure
By Roberta Attanasio Odorless and tasteless, arsenic lurks everywhere – in rice and in chicken breasts, in apple juice and in drinking water. It’s all around, but not in amounts sufficient to cause acute (short-term) poisoning. On the other hand, chronic (long-term) exposure to lower arsenic doses occurs way too often, and may lead to cardiovascular disease, diabetes, cancers and other human disorders. Contamination of drinking water by arsenic is a global health threat. Presence of arsenic in groundwater is largely the result of minerals dissolving from weathered rocks and soils. In addition, arsenic enters the drinking water supply because of runoff from orchards, electronics production waste or other industrial…
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Arsenic in Rice: Links to Genetic Damage
By The Editors Rice is a staple food for over 3 billion people worldwide. Unfortunately, rice contaminated with arsenic can be found in several regions of our planet. Although serious concerns have been raised in the past few years over the consumption of rice tainted with high levels of arsenic, there was no direct proof of its harmful effects on human populations. Now, results from a new study indicate that staple consumption of cooked rice containing high levels of arsenic leads to genotoxic damage. Arsenic, one of the heavy metals, is a chemical element normally present in water, air and soil. It is released from volcanoes and from the erosion…
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Arctic Pollution
By The Editors The Great White North is not in good shape. It’s one of the most vulnerable and fragile ecosystems of our planet and is contaminated with about everything: furans, cadmium, dioxins, chlordane, selenium, polychlorinated biphenyls, mercury, radioactive fallout. There are 8 countries that possess territories extending beyond the 66th Parallel: Canada, Norway, Sweden, Finland, Russia, the United States (Alaska), Denmark (Greenland) and Iceland. It is estimated that about 4 million people live north of the Arctic Circle, Industrial development in the Arctic is leading to waste accumulation, especially in the vicinity of indigenous villages. However, this is not all. It’s a global problem, a problem of global pollution. Indeed, a…
