They didn't start out as environmental warriors. Clair Patterson was a geochemist focused on determining the age of the Earth. Herbert Needleman was a pediatrician treating inner-city children. But in the chemistry lab and the hospital ward, they met a common enemy: lead. It was literally everywhere-in gasoline and paint, of course, but also in water pipes and food cans, toothpaste tubes and toys, ceramics and cosmetics, jewelry and batteries. Though few people worried about it at the time, lead was also toxic. In Toxic Truth, journalist Lydia Denworth tells the little-known stories of these two men who were among the first to question the wisdom of filling the world with such a harmful metal. Denworth follows them from the ice and snow of Antarctica to the schoolyards of Philadelphia and Boston as they uncovered the enormity of the problem and demonstrated the irreparable harm lead was doing to children. In heated conferences and courtrooms, the halls of Congress and at the Environmental Protection Agency, the scientist and doctor were forced to defend their careers and reputations in the face of incredible industry opposition. It took courage, passion, and determination to prevail against entrenched corporate interests and politicized government bureaucracies. But Patterson, Needleman, and their allies did finally get the lead out - since it was removed from gasoline, paint, and food cans in the 1970s, the level of lead in Americans' bodies has dropped 90 percent. Their success offers a lesson in the dangers of putting economic priorities over public health, and a reminder of the way science-and individuals-can change the world. The fundamental questions raised by this battle-what constitutes disease, how to measure scientific independence, and how to quantify acceptable risk-echo in every environmental issue of today: from the plastic used to make water bottles to greenhouse gas emissions. And the most basic question-how much do we need to know about what we put in our environment-is perhaps more relevant today than it has ever been.

The purpose of the hearings presented in this Congressional document was to highlight the enterprising, inventive, and imaginative ways that people use public information and ways that agencies disseminate it. Witnesses were called who could provide information about: (1) how federal data is used by people who make genuine contributions to the nation's economy and democratic processes; (2) the importance of making information available in electronic formats; (3) innovative and inexpensive ways of making information available; (4) the needs of users of federal information; (5) the techniques and technologies of information access; and (6) the impact of the high cost of public information. This report includes statements from 17 witnesses representing a variety of agencies, such as federal agencies, including the General Accounting Office; the Association of Research Libraries; the information industry, including USA Today and DIALOG; nonprofit organizations, such as the Regional Contracting and Assistance Center, which disseminates public information to assist in economic development; and public interest organizations, including OMB Watch, a research, educational, and advocacy organization that monitors Executive Branch activities. Also included are prepared statements submitted for the record by the witnesses and four appendices, which include three additional statements, an article from the Wall Street Journal, working notes, and a letter. (KRN)

Public service is a way of life for Americans; giving is a part of our national character. But compassionate instincts and generous spirits aren’t enough, says veteran urban activist Robert D. Lupton. In this groundbreaking guide, he reveals the disturbing truth about charity: all too much of it has become toxic, devastating to the very people it’s meant to help. In his four decades of urban ministry, Lupton has experienced firsthand how our good intentions can have unintended, dire consequences. Our free food and clothing distribution encourages ever-growing handout lines, diminishing the dignity of the poor while increasing their dependency. We converge on inner-city neighborhoods to plant flowers and pick up trash, battering the pride of residents who have the capacity (and responsibility) to beautify their own environment. We fly off on mission trips to poverty-stricken villages, hearts full of pity and suitcases bulging with giveaways—trips that one Nicaraguan leader describes as effective only in “turning my people into beggars.” In Toxic Charity, Lupton urges individuals, churches, and organizations to step away from these spontaneous, often destructive acts of compassion toward thoughtful paths to community development. He delivers proven strategies for moving from toxic charity to transformative charity. Proposing a powerful “Oath for Compassionate Service” and spotlighting real-life examples of people serving not just with their hearts but with proven strategies and tested tactics, Lupton offers all the tools and inspiration we need to develop healthy, community-driven programs that produce deep, measurable, and lasting change. Everyone who volunteers or donates to charity needs to wrestle with this book.

History: -- K.D. Watson, P. Wexler, and J. Everitt. -- Highlights in the History of Toxicology. -- Selected References in the History of Toxicology. -- A Historical Perspective of Toxicology Information Systems. -- Books and Special Documents: -- G.L. Kennedy, Jr., P. Wexler, N.S. Selzer, and L.A. Malley. -- General Texts. -- Analytical Toxicology. -- Animals in Research. -- Biomonitoring/Biomarkers. -- Biotechnology. -- Biotoxins. -- Cancer. -- Chemical Compendia. -- Chemical--Cosmetics and Other Consumer. -- Products. -- Chemical--Drugs. -- Chemical--Dust and Fibers. -- Chemical--Metals. -- Chemicals--Pesticides -- Chemicals--Solvents. -- Chemical--Selected Chemicals. -- Clinical Toxicology. -- Developmental and Reproductive Toxicology. -- Environmental Toxicology--General. -- Environmental Toxicology-- Aquatic. -- Environmental Toxicology--Atmospheric. -- Environmental Toxicology--Hazardous Waste. -- Environmental Toxicology--Terrestrial. -- Environmental Toxicology--Wildlife. -- Ep ...

This electronic version has been made available under a Creative Commons (BY-NC-ND) open access license. Debates over science, facts, and values are pivotal in the struggle for environmental justice. For decades, environmental justice activists have campaigned against the misuse of science, engaging in community-led citizen science that champions knowledge produced by and for ordinary people living with environmental risks and hazards. However, post-truth politics have threatened science itself. Toxic truths examines the relationship between environmental justice and citizen science, focusing on enduring issues and new challenges in a post-truth age. The volume features a range of community-based participatory environmental health and justice research projects that seek to establish different ways of sensing, witnessing, and interpreting environmental injustice. From struggles in American hog country and contaminated indigenous communities, to local environmental controversies in Spain and China, this volume examines political strategies for seeking environmental justice. With international, interdisciplinary contributions from distinguished authors, emerging scholars and community activists, Toxic truths is essential reading for those seeking to understand the cutting edge of citizen science and activism around the world.

An interdisciplinary environmental humanities volume that explores human-environment relationships on our permanently polluted planet. While toxicity and pollution are ever present in modern daily life, politicians, juridical systems, media outlets, scholars, and the public alike show great difficulty in detecting, defining, monitoring, or generally coming to terms with them. This volume’s contributors argue that the source of this difficulty lies in the struggle to make sense of the intersecting temporal and spatial scales working on the human and more-than-human body, while continuing to acknowledge race, class, and gender in terms of global environmental justice and social inequality. The term toxic timescapes refers to this intricate intersectionality of time, space, and bodies in relation to toxic exposure. As a tool of analysis, it unpacks linear understandings of time and explores how harmful substances permeate temporal and physical space as both event and process. It equips scholars with new ways of creating data and conceptualizing the past, present, and future presence and possible effects of harmful substances and provides a theoretical framework for new environmental narratives. To think in terms of toxic timescapes is to radically shift our understanding of toxicants in the complex web of life. Toxicity, pollution, and modes of exposure are never static; therefore, dose, timing, velocity, mixture, frequency, and chronology matter as much as the geographic location and societal position of those exposed. Together, these factors create a specific toxic timescape that lies at the heart of each contributor’s narrative. Contributors from the disciplines of history, human geography, science and technology studies, philosophy, and political ecology come together to demonstrate the complex reality of a toxic existence. Their case studies span the globe as they observe the intersection of multiple times and spaces at such diverse locations as former battlefields in Vietnam, aging nuclear-weapon storage facilities in Greenland, waste deposits in southern Italy, chemical facilities along the Gulf of Mexico, and coral-breeding laboratories across the world.