Taking Action Saving Lives

In the United States alone industrial and agricultural toxins account for about 60000 avoidable cancer deaths annually. Pollution-related health costs to Americans are similarly staggering: $13 billion a year from asthma $351 billion from cardiovascular disease and $240 billion from occupational disease and injury. Most troubling children the poor and minorities bear the brunt of these health tragedies.Why asks Kristin Shrader-Frechette has the government failed to protect us and what can we do about it? In this book at once brilliant and accessible Shrader-Frechette reveals how politicians campaign contributors and lobbyists--and their power over media advertising and public relations--have conspired to cover up environmental disease and death. She also shows how science and regulators themselves are frequently captured by well-funded polluters and special interests. But most important the author puts both the blame--and the solution--on the shoulders of ordinary citizens. She argues that everyone especially in a democracy has a duty to help prevent avoidable environmental deaths to remain informed about and involved in public-health and environmental decision-making. Toward this end she outlines specific concrete ways in which people can contribute to life-saving reforms many of them building on recommendations of the American Public Health Association. As disturbing as it is Shrader-Frechette''s message is ultimately hopeful. Calling for a new democratic revolution she reminds us that while only a fraction of the early colonists supported the American Revolution that tiny group managed to change the world. Her book embodies the conviction that we can do the same for environmental health particularly if citizens become the change they seek.Influential and impressive. - Nicholas A. Ashford Massachusetts Institute of TechnologyImportant and compelling clearly written accessible. I enthusiastically recommend this book. - James F. Childress University of VirginiaThis book shakes the reader. - Avner de-Shalit Hebrew University of JerusalemPowerful perspicuous convincing. Essential reading for today. - Inmaculada de Melo-MartinA must-read - a book you won''t want to put down. - Kevin Elliott University of South CarolinaAn eloquent and persuasive plea to scientists and citizens. - George W. Fisher Johns Hopkins UniversityEngaging compelling - deserves to be read by nearly everyone. - William R. Freudenberg University of California Santa BarbaraBy one of America''s foremost philosophers and public intellectuals; immensely readable courageous often startling insightful. - Richard Hiskes University of ConnecticutTimely accessible and written with enviable clarity and passion. A distinguished philosopher sounds an ethical call to arms to prevent illness and death from pollution. - Sheila Jasanoff Harvard UniversityA blistering account of how advocacy must be brought to bear on issues of justice and public health. - Jeffrey Kahn University of MinnesotaBreaks new ground in linking environmental protection with social justice. A brilliant inquiry. - Sheldon Krimsky Tufts UniversityPowerful lucid disturbing poignantly hopeful lively; deserves to be widely read. - Hugh Lacey Swarthmore CollegeA powerful call to action that needs to be heard by consumers and policymakers alike. - Anna C. Mastroianni University of WashingtonNo other author can so forcefully bring together ethical analysis government policy and environmental science. Outstanding. - Colleen Moore University of WisconsinAccessible thoughtful exceptional. It made me want to go out and slay a few dragons of my own! - Felicity Sackville Northcott Johns Hopkins UniversityConvincing with an impressive command of scientific knowledge. No book more clearly demonstrates the need for citizen action. - Mark Sagoff University of MarylandLike Rachel Carson''s Silent Spring - brilliant brave. - Sylvia Hood Washington University of Illinois ChicagoThis book is inspirational as much as it is scientific....Highly recommended. -- CHOICE