Episode 26

Frederica Perera, PhD founded Columbia's Center for Children's Environmental Health and is a professor of Environmental Health Sciences at Columbia's Mailman School of Public Health.  Recently, her book Children's Health and the Perils of Climate Change was published by Oxford University Press, (2022).  

Dr. Perera wrote this book as a wake up call, a call to action.  From her research, she knows that children are particularly at risk from air pollution, mostly caused by fossil fuels.  This book is timely because the cures for children's health are the same as the ones we can employ for climate health, which is considered to be in Code Red Alert, by the UN.  

This book is a resource and a reference for both children's ill health (eg: SIDS, Asthma, ADHD, Autism Spectrum Disorder, anxiety/depression, loss of IQ, mental health) and the more hopeful solution-focused examples that have been demonstrated effective, around the globe. 

Governments have a large role to play in the fix, but Dr. Perera recognizes that individual choices influence others and make a real difference.  Organizations that she recommends:
Fridays for Future
Sunrise Movement
International Youth Climate Movement,
Zero Hour
Earth Uprising
Extinction Rebellion
Moms Clean Air Force
The Society of Fearless Grandmothers
The Elders

Dr. Perera says, "Now's the time" to act.  Our actions can alleviate suffering, costly medical treatments, and death.  Positive changes will benefit us by slowing climate change, making green jobs, recovering human potential  and a creating healthier population/planet, for all species. 

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Episode 25

​Dr. Roopa Krithivasan, recently published a 68 page report called Problem Plastic: How Polyester and PET Plastic Can Be Unsafe, Unjust and Unsustainable Materials.  Dr. Krithivasan is the Director of Research for Defend Our Health and has a background in social, ecological and conservation research.  

Dr. Krithivasan discusses the hidden health hazards from the hundreds of chemicals used to make plastics.  For instance, antimony is a chemical used in the plastic finishing process for PET and polyester (plastic bottles, clothing, stuffed animals, packaging), and it is toxic to the liver and heart.  More than 99% of PET and polyester is made from non-renewable fossil gas and oil and is very often created in plants located next to "fenceline communities."  Serious environmental justice issues have been created In these exposed communities.  Often young children and people of color face the greatest harm  to the chemicals used in the plastic plants next door.

Roopa Krithivasan calls for greater corporate responsibility with regard to reducing and/or eliminating the toxics used in plastics production.

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Episode 23

​Mindi Messmer is an environmental and public health scientist (Clinical and Translational Science, MS) so other parents reached out to her when local families began experiencing a tragic pediatric cancer cluster in Rye, NH 2014. Her empathy for their terribly scary situations led her to become involved as a local activist, leader, and public servant.

Mindi Messmer was elected to the New Hampshire House of Representatives (2016-2018) where she worked to protect public health through bills on PFAS, arsenic and lead poisoning prevention. She remains committed to cancer prevention and environmental and drinking water protection.

Mindi is the author of Female Disruptors, Stories of Mighty Female Scientists (2022), which she discusses in this interview. 

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Episode 22

Corey Hinton is a lawyer at Drummond Woodsum in Portland, ME.  He is the leader of the firm's Tribal Nations Practice Group.  Recently, he represented the Passamaquoddy Tribe in a fight for clean drinking water.  
Maine Legislation LD 906:  Clean Water For Passamaquoddy Tribe at Sipayik was successfully passed and signed into law on April 21, 2022.  After living with unreliable, odorous and toxic drinking water for decades there is finally movement toward several short, medium, and long range solutions.  Regarding toxics in the water supply, he believes we simply must reduce our toxic inputs into the natural world, which benefit only a select few people's short term gains. 

Additionally, Hinton discusses environmental and social justice issues that have been gaining some recent traction.  These ideas are not new, however, he can reference Maine Legislature notes from the 1870's in which Passamaquoddy leaders were seeking many of the same measures around social justice and respectful environmental stewardship which the still seek today.

FMI:  www.wabinakialliance.org.

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Episode 21

Dr. David Kriebel is an epidemiologist and Professor Emeritus at the University of Massachusetts in Lowell.  

Dr. Kriebel discusses the known and suspected health risks associated with tattoo inks, tattoos, and the tattoo removal process.  As an epidemiologist, he implores scientists to actually conduct a study so we can use that information to help protect people.  

"Although a number of color additives are approved for use in cosmetics, none are approved for injection into the skin." FDA.  Tattoo inks can include untested toxic ingredients in colored synthetic dyes and pigments such as: mercury, cadmium, chromium, cobalt, aluminum, cinnabar, nickel, manganese, acrylic, and more.  One question might be, why do consumers feel tattoos are safe? 

In January of 2022 the European Union banned toxic tattoo inks and investigators in some European countries have begun studying not only the unsafe inks, but also the possibility of long-term health risks of tattoos. 
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Dr. Kriebel is also the Director of the Lowell Center for Sustainable Production, which collaborates with industries, government agencies, unions, and community organizations on the redesign of systems of production to make them healthier and more environmentally sound.

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Episode 20

Ruth Hennig was the Executive Director of the John Merck Fund which supported public policy and research for improved human health, specializing in developmental disabilities and environmental health.  While working to fund projects advocating for and studying the health implications of chemical exposures, she herself was diagnosed and treated for cancer. 

Ruth discusses the way having cancer, twice, caused her to ask some broader questions and engage in her own care choices.  The process ultimately led her to become more activated and involved in preventing harmful chemical exposures for others.  Presently, Ruth serves on the board of Defend Our Health and is a member of the Maine State Advisory Board for the Conservation Law Foundation.  

Some places to get more information on toxics, which Ruth recommends:
Environmental Working Group
Healthy Babies, Bright Futures
Defend Our Health
​Toxic Free Future
Columbia Center for Children's Environmental Health

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Episode 16

Laurene Allen is a clinical social worker who also became a citizen activist in 2016 when she and her community of Merrimack, NH learned they had been exposed to PFAS in their drinking water for 15-20 years from the Saint-Gobain factory (formerly called Chemfab).  Laurene co-founded Merrimack Citizens for Clean Water as they sorted through the sad realities of what extended exposures mean to public health. 
  
The scope of the problems with PFAS far exceeded her small town and Laurene joined other community leaders around the nation to co-found the National PFAS Contamination Coalition, to help people learn to use the available resources to learn about PFAS and protect themselves, with the support of others who understand and can share their roadmap.  

It is traumatic for communities to learn they have been exposed, and are sick or waiting for worried about getting sick and protecting their loved ones.  Laurene recommends that each household get a reverse osmosis water filter for drinking water, and directs people to these resources:
For stress: ATSDR
For community support and solidarity: NPCC
In the Merrimack area: MCFCW
And on this site's page: WMW Resources

Merrimack's PFAS water contamination story was documented, along with three similar towns, in the 2019 movie called Bad Water. Small Towns. Deaf Ears.  Director Victor Pytko says it's "Everything you need to know about PFAS, but don't know how to ask." Laurene is one of the featured activists in the film.

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Episode 15

Dr. Rachel Massey is Senior Associate Director and Policy Program Manager at the Toxics Use Reduction Institute (TURI) at the University of Massachusetts Lowell. TURI's program was established as part of the Toxics Use Reduction Act of 1989, designed to protect public health and the environment while enhancing the competitiveness of MA businesses.

Three partners work together to make the Toxics Use Reduction legislation effective in reducing pollution:  
1. Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection (MassDEP).
2. Office of Technical Assistance and Technology
3. TURI
This is the gold standard practice, in the field of toxics reduction.   They focus on reducing chemical hazards, not just limiting exposure.  This is how Massachusetts was able to reduced their toxic use by 234 million pounds.  Less chemicals, less exposures. 
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Rachel's work includes policy development and program management internally and throughout the state of Massachusetts. She also manages TURI’s community grant program.  Dr. Massey speaks on this show about examples of companies reducing toxics and saving money, such as dry cleaning vs. wet cleaning and artificial turf vs. organic grass fields.

For lots more information:
TURI's video page, click here. 
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Episode 14
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​Jaime and Ayesha, best friends since college, started the Nantucket PFAS Action Group after learning that Ayesha's husband, Nate Barber, had contracted testicular cancer, likely from workplace exposures to PFAS.  Their desire to better understand how firefighters were being impacted led them to create a study, funded by TURI, to measure PFAS levels in fire service professional's turnout gear.

Ayesha and Jaime may be new to the PFAS activist roles they have assumed, but they are unstoppable and have some recommendations of good places to start learning more about PFAS.
Start here:
1. The PFAS Exchange. Community driven resources backed by excellent research and links. And it includes a tool for water testing comparisons regarding PFAS exposure.
2. Green Science offers PFAS research and policy advocacy. 
3. PFAS-Free PPE Turnout Gear for firefighters. 

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Episode 12

Dr. Diana Cunningham, ND, practiced for 23 years as a Naturopath, with a special interest in environmental illness. Currently, she is Director of the Friends of Cathedral Trees Sanctuary and is a Conservation and Restoration Burial Advocate who is an expert on environmentally-responsible deathcare. She talks about Conservation and Restoration Burial cemeteries being simple, relatively inexpensive, and a mercury-responsible form of deathcare. 

Diana has written the 21st century answer to Jessica Mitford's formerly bestselling book of the last century; Cunningham's book is The New American Way of Death: Everybody’s Guide to the Revolution In Lifecare and Deathcare for the Millennium. (Available in 2023).

Diana's wisdom is steeped in a strong science background with an in-depth understanding  the “catch-22” of our deathcare choices: creating mercury air pollution from the cremation of our bodies. Although our bodies are heavily polluted, she states that our bodies can be managed most efficiently with environmentally-responsible burials which sequester mercury and other heavy metals, back to the depths of the earth.

Diana sounds the alarm, regarding mercury in our lives, but also offers some hope-filled solutions to this extremely toxic challenge. She speaks of a new chelating medicine called Emeramide (presently in FDA drug trials), which is designed to help people have access to safe removal of mercury, without the side effects of common chelators. This information is illustrated in the documentary film “Evidence of Harm” (2015), featuring Professor emeritus Dr. Boyd Haley and members of the International Academy of Oral and Medical Toxicology (IAOMT).

Mercury causes severe health effects including Alzheimer's and other neurological diseases; for more information from the IAOMT click here,  and the EPA, click here.  

Diana recommends Minamata, a film based on a true story about Japan's mercury pollution, and cover up. It helps viewers to understand the seven stages of methyl-mercury poisoning and the lasting effects on a culture.  

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