Culture and Coexistence into the Great Unknown
Environmental health addresses assessment and control of external physical, chemical, and biological factors as part of the natural and built environment that can potentially affect health. It is a public health service with an orientation toward environmental protection, geared towards preventing and curing disease and creating health-supportive environments, lifestyles, and communities.
As the President’s Cancer Panel report says, about 41 percent of Americans will be diagnosed with cancer at some time in their lives, and some 21 percent will die of it. In the last few years “[a] growing body of research documents a myriad established and suspected environmental factors linked to genetic, immune, and endocrine [hormonal] dysfunction that can lead to cancer and other diseases.”
One method to rescue this unsustainable, fossil-fuel-addicted, disease-inducing polluted mega-metropolis from its sterile streetscape of cars, exhaust, and non-descript sidewalk-life, is to provide alternative transportation that cuts out the need for parking and forces people to walk.
Shopping in grocery stores without understanding origins and processes involved in food production can be hazardous to your health. Genetically Modified Organisms (GMOs) were originally allowed into our foods without labeling despite US Food and Drug Administration scientists warning that they could create unpredictable, hard-to-detect side effects, including allergens, toxins, new diseases, and nutritional problems.
California’s Proposition 23 pits two Texas oil companies, Valero and Tesoro, billionaire-brothers Koch Industries, and a host of fossil fuel industry supporters, aiming to “suspend the implementation” of the state’s landmark global warming legislation, AB 32. It failed.
Keep in mind the ongoing scientific research regarding the undersea plume of oil and dissolved methane gas in the Gulf of Mexico from 3,200 to 4,300 feet below the surface. Studies estimated it more than a mile wide, 650 feet thick and at least 35 kilometers (22 miles) long, but probably longer, as the researchers had to break off because of Hurricane Alex.