Chemical Alert! a Community Action Handbook

In the 1978 Love Canal toxic waste crisis concerned citizens did a far better job of evaluating the health of the community than did the professionals of the New York Health Department asserts Marvin Legator. In Chemical Alert! A Community Action Handbook he and coeditor Sabrina Strawn offer a step-by-step guide that can be used by any lay person or citizens'' group to determine whether a health risk exists in their area.Writing for the general reader with no scientific expertise environmental medical and legal professionals instruct communities on the organizational and investigative techniques that will produce a valid scientific case study. With these tools citizens living near petrochemical plants or waste disposal areasor who may have simply noticed a high incidence of certain health problems in their communitycan determine for themselves whether a problem really exists and seek remediation. Given the reality that government agencies often lack the resourcesor the willto detect health hazards before they affect a community an informed citizenry should be its own best environmental watchdog.