I have read nearly half of Living Downstream by Dr. Sandra Steingraber in the last week and continue to be fascinated by the topic! It's led me to searching the internet and I stumbled upon more information.
Living Downstream is currently in development with The People's Picture Company Inc,. Here, I found a link to the trailer for the movie. It is short and well worth the download time. It gave me goosebumps.
Inspiring and powerful!
Monday, January 26, 2009
Toxins Don't Discriminate
There's a fable about a village along a river. The residents who live here according to parable, began noticing increasing numbers of drowing people caught in the river's swift current and so went to work inventing ever more elaborate technologies to resuscitate them. So preoccupied were these heroic villagers with rescue and treatment that they never thought to look upstream to see who was pushing the victims in.
(Dr. Sandra Steingraber; Living Downstream)
My quest to see what is upstream (like Steingraber's in Living Downstream) began in 2006 after being diagnosed with thyroid cancer. I began to ask myself, what is in the environment around me? How does this environment influence the lives of every person on this planet? Are we safe? Or do we blissfully go through our days blind to environmental hazards that are in the soil, air and water?
These questions have led me to explore the food I eat, the hygiene products I use on my body, the methods I use to clean my home, medications, the production of paper products, furniture and carpet, the clothing I wear, etc.
The Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) 2006 Toxic Chemical Release Inventory (TRI) report, states that over four billion pounds of chemicals of varying toxicity were disposed of and or released in the United States. Roughly 75,000 chemicals are now in common commercial use and of these, only about 1.5 to 3 percent have been tested for carcinogenicity. According to the National Research Council, only 10 percent of pesticides in common use have been adequately assessed for hazards. Chemicals classified as known, probable, and possible human carcinogens are still allowed to be manufactured, sold, released, dumped, imported, and exported. It would be comfortable to assume such substances are automatically expelled from human society as soon as their cancer-causing potential is demonstrated, but this is not the case.
Given these statistics, it seems to me that the responsibility lies in the hands of the consumer to make educated choices about the products we use and consume. These series of blogs in the coming months will (I hope) provide a glimpse of what I have discovered. I am passionate about sharing what I have learned and how I have changed my life.
(Dr. Sandra Steingraber; Living Downstream)
My quest to see what is upstream (like Steingraber's in Living Downstream) began in 2006 after being diagnosed with thyroid cancer. I began to ask myself, what is in the environment around me? How does this environment influence the lives of every person on this planet? Are we safe? Or do we blissfully go through our days blind to environmental hazards that are in the soil, air and water?
These questions have led me to explore the food I eat, the hygiene products I use on my body, the methods I use to clean my home, medications, the production of paper products, furniture and carpet, the clothing I wear, etc.
The Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) 2006 Toxic Chemical Release Inventory (TRI) report, states that over four billion pounds of chemicals of varying toxicity were disposed of and or released in the United States. Roughly 75,000 chemicals are now in common commercial use and of these, only about 1.5 to 3 percent have been tested for carcinogenicity. According to the National Research Council, only 10 percent of pesticides in common use have been adequately assessed for hazards. Chemicals classified as known, probable, and possible human carcinogens are still allowed to be manufactured, sold, released, dumped, imported, and exported. It would be comfortable to assume such substances are automatically expelled from human society as soon as their cancer-causing potential is demonstrated, but this is not the case.
Given these statistics, it seems to me that the responsibility lies in the hands of the consumer to make educated choices about the products we use and consume. These series of blogs in the coming months will (I hope) provide a glimpse of what I have discovered. I am passionate about sharing what I have learned and how I have changed my life.
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