Our Children's Health at Risk: Another Inconvenient Truth

by Arianna Huffington

America's children are at risk not just from the kidnappers, pedophile priests, and horny teens trolling MySpace that fill our headlines and sweeps weeks news broadcasts but from the air they breathe, the water they drink, the food they eat, and the chemicals that fill their homes and schools. And from our own government.

That's right, science is under siege by the Bush Administration. Again.

The latest battle is taking place within the Environmental Protection Agency, where a group of EPA workers are charging the agency with endangering our children by kowtowing to the demands of chemical companies.

According to a letter sent last week to EPA administrator Stephen Johnson, EPA staffers in the agency's Pesticide Program "feel besieged by political pressure exerted by Agency officials perceived to be too closely aligned with the pesticide industry" as well as former EPA officials now lobbying for pesticide manufacturers. The workers claim that EPA higher-ups are essentially doing the bidding of the chemical companies, and in the process are in danger of undermining the Food Quality Protection Act, a law designed to protect children from the harmful effects of pesticides -- many of which have been linked to childhood cancers.

And this isn't the first time EPA workers, including scientists, have blasted Johnson for failing to protect America's children (more toxic details here [PDF] and here).

Which is why it is so important to have groups like the Children's Health Environmental Coalition (CHEC) looking out for the interests of our children -- because the government clearly isn't.

CHEC was founded by Nancy and James Chuda after Colette, their five-year-old daughter, died of a non-hereditary form of cancer -- a cancer the Chudas believed was linked to Nancy's exposure to pesticides during her pregnancy. Since then CHEC has been on the frontlines of gathering data and educating the public about the environmental dangers our kids face, while pushing for more regulatory protection for children.

I started becoming aware of how particularly vulnerable our kids are to environmental contaminants as soon as I became a mother. For starters, their immune systems aren't fully developed. Plus, they take in more air, water, and food than adults relative to their size. And kids tend to come into closer contact with toxins because they spend more time on the ground, play outdoors, and put their hands and other objects in their mouths. No small concern since the National Cancer Institute says that two-thirds of all cancers have an environmental cause.

CHEC is having a fundraising event tonight at which I'm to receive an award, along with two of my environmental heroes, Philip Landrigan and William McDonough. Landrigan is a lifelong public health activist, and a pioneering environmental investigator who first documented the effects of lead poisoning on America's children. And McDonough is a groundbreaking architect who has dedicated his career to designing environmentally sustainable buildings for the likes of Nike, Gap, and Ford -- with whom he is also working to develop the first entirely recyclable car. He's a shining example of how socially-conscious innovation and profitability are not mutually exclusive.

Tonight, CHEC will raise more than $650,000 -- which is wonderful news because, for me, the work of CHEC is where global warming and our children's health come together. All the factors that create the CO2 emissions that cause global warming -- car fumes, coal-burning power plants, pollution from factories and farms -- are also putting our children's lives at risk.

Nine million kids in America have been diagnosed with asthma -- with the percentages particularly high among minorities (who more often live in high-pollution urban areas).

So, at a time when these kids should be growing and discovering and playing with abandon, far too many of them are sent to school supplied with pencils, rulers, and inhalers. In some urban areas, like West Oakland (which is located near a busy port), children are seven times more likely to be hospitalized for asthma than kids in the rest of the state [PDF]. Many are afraid to run and play because they can't tell the difference between being out of breath and having a life-threatening asthma attack.

For many people the signature image of global warming -- brought home so vividly in An Inconvenient Truth -- is the disappearing snowcap atop Mt. Kilimanjaro. But for me, it's the image of those kids on the playground, having to stop playing so they can suck on their inhalers.