“You don’t leave a mess for someone else to clean up.”

“You share your cookies. You don’t hoard wealth.”

“Be kind to each other,”

“Hold hands crossing the street.”

Back in November, McKibben’s Tar Sands Action gave people e the chance to hold hands surrounding the White House, and to ask President Obama to live up to his campaign promise to “end the tyranny of oil,” by saying no to Tar Sands.

“Our job is to make it easier for him to make the right decision.” McKibben told the crowd at a Green Festival LA I attended (and spoke at) in October 2011. (McKibben on radio about this here.)

Gathered at the L.A. Convention Center to access green wisdom, films, tools, jobs, foods, buildings, techniques, activities, products and social media (offered in twelve stages and endless aisles of booths) those assembled were welcomed by L.A. Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa. Environmental champions, like McKibben, Orr, Amy Goodman, Dolores Huerta, John Perkins, David Korten, Marianne Williamson, Lisa J. Ling, Jodie Evans, Pandora Thomas, Hill Harper, Jessie Carmichael, Atossa Soltani, Reverend Lennox Yearwood., and yours truly offered insight addressing interlocking concerns.

“Some say people can’t handle the truth that we’re speeding into planetary destabilization. But when London was bombed during WWII, Churchill didn’t go on TV and say this is a great thing. No! He spoke of blood and sweat and tears. We’re ready for the truth — we can act,” Orr urged.

“We can all go there together, through the grief and anger — we can transform the threat into effective action,” affirmed CodePink’s Jodie Evans.

Bringing the world to the brink of environmental ruin, Orr called, “The largest market failure in history.”

John Perkins, author of Hoodwinked, agreed, explaining that, “Less than 5 percent of the world populace live in the U.S. and we consume 25 percent of the resources. That’s not a model, it’s a failure. In predatory capitalism, corporations are driven by one goal — to maximize profits whatever the human and environmental costs.

“”It’s class war,” said David Korten, author of The Great Turning.

“As America slips into decline, we’re creating more billionaires? Why? The government should be regulating and taxing excess wealth, rather than subsidizing and protecting them,” Korten said, supporting the voices now raised thanks to OccupyWallStreet.

Back when President Obama was a Senator, he promised to label GMO foods, to support the consumer right to know “where their food comes from. Americans should know what they are buying,” he said  (see video here.) But despite these promises, it hasn’t happened. Family farmers, seed businesses and organic agricultural organizations filed suit against Monsanto in New York court over six months ago, but still no action from the President. According to the Public Patent Foundation (PUBPAT) which filed on their behalf, the plaintiffs were forced to sue preemptively to protect themselves from future accusations of patent infringement when Monsanto’s genetically modified seed contaminates their crops, something which cannot be prevented once GM seeds are released.

“It seems quite perverse that an organic farmer contaminated by transgenic seed could be accused of patent infringement, but Monsanto has made such accusations before and is notorious for having sued hundreds of farmers,” said Dan Ravicher, PUBPAT’s Executive Director and Lecturer of Law at Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law in New York.

A broad array of family farmers, small businesses and organizations from within the organic agriculture community, representing some 270,000 members are plaintiffs in the suit, and many explained the need for the suit in a statement issued by PUBPAT.

“Some say transgenic seed can coexist with organic seed, but history tells us that’s not possible, and it’s actually in Monsanto’s financial interest to eliminate organic seed so that they can have a total monopoly over our food supply,” said Ravicher.

The release of GM canola contaminated organic canola, leading to its near extinction. Organic corn, soybeans, cotton, sugar beets and alfalfa now are now under threat. The agricultural monolith plans to develop GM seed for many crops, which farmers claim threatens the future of food.

“We are rapidly approaching the tipping point when we will be unable to avoid GMOs in our fields and on our plates,” said Dr. Carol Goland, Ph.D. of one of the plaintiff organizations. “That is the inevitable consequence of releasing genetically engineered materials into the environment.”

The challenge to Monsanto’s patents rests on evidence of the negative economic and health effects of GM seed, which the organic groups argue invalidates the legal requirement for “usefulness” under patent law.

“None of Monsanto’s original promises regarding genetically modified seeds have come true after 15 years of wide adoption by commodity farmers,” said David Murphy, founder and Executive Director of plaintiff Food Democracy Now! “Rather than increased yields or less chemical usage, farmers are facing more crop diseases, an onslaught of herbicide-resistant superweeds, and increased costs from additional herbicide application.”

In “The Battle for Biodiversity: Monsanto and Farmers Clash,” an article in the Atlantic, Anna Lappe asks, “Does genetic modification lead to more and better crops? Or will it destroy the foundations of our food systems?”

“Corporate control of seeds and relaxed laws for biotech promotion spur innovation and productivity. That may sound good,” Lappe writes. “But many other groups around the world look at the real-world effects of 20 years of patent approvals and the spread of biotech crops. These critics argue that corporate power over seeds has actually undermined biodiversity and food-system resilience.”

While the jury is out on the health effects of these novel foods, some feel concerned that these novel foods could contribute to an increase in allergies, and learning disabilities. But while many health oriented people emphasize eating organic foods, it remains to be seen whether the health conscious will step to take action to protect the foods they champion. Many are unaware that GMOs are undermining their food options.

“Crop biotechnology has been a miserable failure economically and biologically and now threatens to undermine the basic freedoms that farmers and consumers have enjoyed in our constitutional democracy,” said Murphy.

“It is outrageous that one corporate entity, through the trespass of what they refer to as their ‘technology,’ can intimidate and run roughshod over family farmers,” said Mark Kastel, Senior Farm Policy Analyst for The Cornucopia Institute, one of the plaintiffs. He contends that Monsanto and the farmers licensing its technology should be the ones required to ensure that genetically engineered DNA does not trespass onto neighboring farmland.

“This debate is significant,” Lappe contends. “Which side we listen to will largely determine just how well we can continue to feed the planet.”

Although saving seeds from one year to the next is a farming tradition as old as agriculture, due to Monsanto’s aggressive legal action, “Farmers are being intimidated into not saving seed for fear that they will be doggedly pursued through the court system and potentially bankrupted,” detailed Kastel.

“We must protect our world by protecting our most precious, sacred resource of seed sovereignty. People must have the right to the resources of the earth for our sustenance,” said Rose Marie Burroughs of plaintiff California Cloverleaf Farms.

“The building blocks of life are sacred and should be in the public domain. The private profit motive corrupts pure science and increasingly precludes democratic participation,” claimed Jill Davies, Director of plaintiff Sustainable Living Systems.

“Monsanto, and the biotechnology industry, have made great investments in our executive and legislative branches through campaign contributions and powerful lobbyists in Washington,” Kastel points out. “We need the court system to offset this power and protect individual farmers from corporate tyranny.”

Ravicher noted that “Monsanto is the same chemical company that previously brought us Agent Orange, DDT, PCB’s and other toxins, which they said were safe, but we know are not. Now Monsanto says transgenic seed is safe, but evidence clearly shows it is not.”

“Today is Independence Day for America. Monsanto’s threats and abuse of family farmers stops here. Monsanto’s genetic contamination of organic seed and organic crops ends now.” Declared Jim Gerritsen, a Maine family farmer, who is President of the lead plaintiff Organic Seed Growers and Trade Association. “Americans have the right to choice in the marketplace — to decide what kind of food they will feed their families — and we are taking this action on their behalf to protect that right to choose.”

More information about the lawsuit, including list of participating organizations.

To support the plaintiffs’ cause, go to selected links for Food Democracy Now, the Cornucopia Institute,
and Organic Seed Growers.
For radio shows, blogs, and health and environmental activism links, go to www.healthjournalistblog.com

Come hear me present at Green Festival L.A. http://www.greenfestivals.org/la/social-media-hub I’ll be speaking at #greenfestivals about how to promote environmental health activism via social media. @AlisonRoseLevy Connecting the Dots for Health

Back when President Obama was a Senator, he promised to label GMO foods, to support the consumer right to know “where their food comes from. Americans should know what they are buying,” he said  (see video here.) But despite these promises, it hasn’t happened. Family farmers, seed businesses and organic agricultural organizations filed suit against Monsanto in New York court over six months ago, but still no action from the President. According to the Public Patent Foundation (PUBPAT) which filed on their behalf, the plaintiffs were forced to sue preemptively to protect themselves from future accusations of patent infringement when Monsanto’s genetically modified seed contaminates their crops, something which cannot be prevented once GM seeds are released.

“It seems quite perverse that an organic farmer contaminated by transgenic seed could be accused of patent infringement, but Monsanto has made such accusations before and is notorious for having sued hundreds of farmers,” said Dan Ravicher, PUBPAT’s Executive Director and Lecturer of Law at Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law in New York.

A broad array of family farmers, small businesses and organizations from within the organic agriculture community, representing some 270,000 members are plaintiffs in the suit, and many explained the need for the suit in a statement issued by PUBPAT.

“Some say transgenic seed can coexist with organic seed, but history tells us that’s not possible, and it’s actually in Monsanto’s financial interest to eliminate organic seed so that they can have a total monopoly over our food supply,” said Ravicher.

The release of GM canola contaminated organic canola, leading to its near extinction. Organic corn, soybeans, cotton, sugar beets and alfalfa now are now under threat. The agricultural monolith plans to develop GM seed for many crops, which farmers claim threatens the future of food.

“We are rapidly approaching the tipping point when we will be unable to avoid GMOs in our fields and on our plates,” said Dr. Carol Goland, Ph.D. of one of the plaintiff organizations. “That is the inevitable consequence of releasing genetically engineered materials into the environment.”

The challenge to Monsanto’s patents rests on evidence of the negative economic and health effects of GM seed, which the organic groups argue invalidates the legal requirement for “usefulness” under patent law.

“None of Monsanto’s original promises regarding genetically modified seeds have come true after 15 years of wide adoption by commodity farmers,” said David Murphy, founder and Executive Director of plaintiff Food Democracy Now! “Rather than increased yields or less chemical usage, farmers are facing more crop diseases, an onslaught of herbicide-resistant superweeds, and increased costs from additional herbicide application.”

In “The Battle for Biodiversity: Monsanto and Farmers Clash,” an article in the Atlantic, Anna Lappe asks, “Does genetic modification lead to more and better crops? Or will it destroy the foundations of our food systems?”

“Corporate control of seeds and relaxed laws for biotech promotion spur innovation and productivity. That may sound good,” Lappe writes. “But many other groups around the world look at the real-world effects of 20 years of patent approvals and the spread of biotech crops. These critics argue that corporate power over seeds has actually undermined biodiversity and food-system resilience.”

While the jury is out on the health effects of these novel foods, some feel concerned that these novel foods could contribute to an increase in allergies, and learning disabilities. But while many health oriented people emphasize eating organic foods, it remains to be seen whether the health conscious will step to take action to protect the foods they champion. Many are unaware that GMOs are undermining their food options.

“Crop biotechnology has been a miserable failure economically and biologically and now threatens to undermine the basic freedoms that farmers and consumers have enjoyed in our constitutional democracy,” said Murphy.

“It is outrageous that one corporate entity, through the trespass of what they refer to as their ‘technology,’ can intimidate and run roughshod over family farmers,” said Mark Kastel, Senior Farm Policy Analyst for The Cornucopia Institute, one of the plaintiffs. He contends that Monsanto and the farmers licensing its technology should be the ones required to ensure that genetically engineered DNA does not trespass onto neighboring farmland.

“This debate is significant,” Lappe contends. “Which side we listen to will largely determine just how well we can continue to feed the planet.”

Although saving seeds from one year to the next is a farming tradition as old as agriculture, due to Monsanto’s aggressive legal action, “Farmers are being intimidated into not saving seed for fear that they will be doggedly pursued through the court system and potentially bankrupted,” detailed Kastel.

“We must protect our world by protecting our most precious, sacred resource of seed sovereignty. People must have the right to the resources of the earth for our sustenance,” said Rose Marie Burroughs of plaintiff California Cloverleaf Farms.

“The building blocks of life are sacred and should be in the public domain. The private profit motive corrupts pure science and increasingly precludes democratic participation,” claimed Jill Davies, Director of plaintiff Sustainable Living Systems.

“Monsanto, and the biotechnology industry, have made great investments in our executive and legislative branches through campaign contributions and powerful lobbyists in Washington,” Kastel points out. “We need the court system to offset this power and protect individual farmers from corporate tyranny.”

Ravicher noted that “Monsanto is the same chemical company that previously brought us Agent Orange, DDT, PCB’s and other toxins, which they said were safe, but we know are not. Now Monsanto says transgenic seed is safe, but evidence clearly shows it is not.”

“Today is Independence Day for America. Monsanto’s threats and abuse of family farmers stops here. Monsanto’s genetic contamination of organic seed and organic crops ends now.” Declared Jim Gerritsen, a Maine family farmer, who is President of the lead plaintiff Organic Seed Growers and Trade Association. “Americans have the right to choice in the marketplace — to decide what kind of food they will feed their families — and we are taking this action on their behalf to protect that right to choose.”

More information about the lawsuit, including list of participating organizations.

To support the plaintiffs’ cause, go to selected links for Food Democracy Now, the Cornucopia Institute,
and Organic Seed Growers.
For radio shows, blogs, and health and environmental activism links, go to www.healthjournalistblog.com

Come hear me present at Green Festival L.A. http://www.greenfestivals.org/la/social-media-hub I’ll be speaking at #greenfestivals about how to promote environmental health activism via social media. @AlisonRoseLevy Connecting the Dots for Health

With his wife, Holly, Richard Giles typifies this new breed. He owns and runs Lucky Dog Farms, (in Hamden, New York). Sited near the West Branch of the Delaware River, the region of one of New York City’s two watersheds, the farm supplies Swiss chard, kale, and other greens to downstate farmer’s markets, restaurants, wholesalers, and the Park Slope Food Coop. As Irene approached, Giles and his farm staff were up before sunrise harvesting all they could. As the storm hit, they worked in fields in standing water up to their ankles, within two hours, the water had risen to their knees, and a half hour later they had to evacuate waters six feet high, that had yet to fully subside when I spoke with Giles ten days later. Lucky Dog lost nearly the entire Fall crop.

“When Irene happened, most of the group of farmers in our area were saying, “We just have to suck it up,” Martin Stosiek
rt of Markristo Farms in Hillside, New York explained. “Then when Hurricane Lee happened, it was even worse.” Some lost crops but with a whole lot of hard work will survive the coming winter. Some may not. Stosiekrt who sells organic greens to restaurants, farmer’s markets, and wholesalers downstate, detailed his losses: cabbage unsaleable, green beans sitting in a swamp of water, un-harvestable, leafy greens, diseased due to the damp.

But will such losses register with the farmer’s customers, New Yorkers, the poster children for the busiest people on earth? Although NYC has a strong dining out tradition, for everyday meals, NY-ers are famed for eating on the run. No one has the time to look beyond the local farmer’s market to the plight of the farmers who grow New York’s food. While the rains may have passed from the headlines, their impact on area farmers is long-term.

“We can’t plant cover crops (like rye) in flooded fields, which we usually do to protect the soil over the winter months,” says Stosiek
rt. With weeds going to seed just now, com Spring, this unprotected soil will yield a weed, rather than a vegetable harvest. “An organic farm can’t use pesticides for weed management,” Stosiekrt says.

A few winters back, I attended a special dinner at Park Slope’s Applewood Restaurant, which featured the produce grown at Lucky Dog. After a wonderful dinner, that blend of organic sustainable and New York connoisseurship that makes for a delicious meal, the chef told us diners that, “You can vote with your pocketbook to support organic and sustainable farms in our region by going to the farmer’s market and eating at restaurants that use regionally grown food.”

Back then that suggestion still made good sense.

Flash forward two years: In Lucky Dog’s region, entire towns (like Fleischmann’s and Prattsville) were leveled by rains andwinds. “This is the worst flood in everyone’s living memory,” Giles told me. “We didn’t lose our house and the kids are okay. But the fields were flooded. We lost all our crops — lettuce, cabbages, and greens. We’re losing the root vegetables, like potatoes, and onions, which are sitting in water and deteriorating underground.”

Unfortunately, “The crop we lost is the crop we use to pay large bills,” Giles told me. “Like the farm loans, financed by the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) Farm Service Agency (FSA).”

Farmers don’t fall under FEMA (the Federal Emergency Management Administration), but are administered by the FSA. Obviously, a renegotiation of loans will be needed. But will it be forthcoming in the current political climate? And who will notice when these crucial matters of public policy, impacting New York’s foods, are determined?

“People don’t expect a product like cars to just appear. There are industries and infrastructures that make that happen,” Giles says. “Because we farmers love farming, we put forth that effort. But it shouldn’t be our sole responsibility to supply New York’s food in the absence of policies that sustain that.”

“I choose to farm here and it’s really good soil, and it’s my choice and with these weather changes, it’s becoming a poorer and poorer choice,” Giles ruminates. “But if we admit it, we all know we have contributed to changing weather and flood patterns. We stand by and allow the gas drilling upstate to proceed. We leave it to farmers to go through whatever hardships to get the food to us. We cross our fingers and hope it will be okay.”

“Is this really what food’s worth?” he asks.<strong>So my question to you is this, do <em>you</em> still believe that acting as a consumer and showing up to buy sustainable and healthy food is all you need to do to help farmers make that food available? If so, why? If not, why not?</strong>

To support Lucky Dog Farms and other upstate sustainable farms harmed by the flood, please contact them.

To get the coverage of health, environment, food, public policy, and activism I’ve supplied on Huffington since 2007, please sign up for me free ezine at http://www.healthjournalistblog.com

Come hear me present at Green Festival L.A. http://www.greenfestivals.org/la/social-media-hub I’ll be speaking at #greenfestival about how to promote environmental health activism via social media. @AlisonRoseLevy  or Join me on Facebook at Connecting the Dots for Health

The GMO Roundup Ready crops are designed to be used with the Monsanto herbicide, Roundup, a glyphosate that leads to severe micronutrient deficiencies in soil, that scientists now say are leading to increased crop failure. Scientists have detected a higher prevalence of the opportunistic pathogen in the depleted glyphosate treated soil. It is also found in higher rates in the livestock that feed off of the Roundup crops. Infertility and spontaneous abortion are on the rise within these cattle and dairy populations, with infertility at 20% and a 45% abortion incidence in certain animals. “It’s infectious to cattle, pigs, poultry and horses, and will kill a fertilized egg,” says Huber in one of a series of video interviews posted on YouTube. “It can readily reproduce, and it’s compatible with other organisms.” Watch video here: http://youtu.be/nzlwAAf9DRg

In his January 2011 letter Huber cautioned against expanding GMO into alfalfa, which he characterizes as “the Number One forage crop” that nourishes livestock. “Why place it in jeopardy?” Huber asked in the series of videos, predicting that “In five years you won’t have anything but Roundup Ready alfalfa. If we see a new organism which makes it a hazard to animal survival–what’s the urgency?”

Organic farmers have sued Monsanto pre-emptively to protect themselves from legal action from the GMO producer, when the GMO alfalfa contaminates organic seed, which cannot be prevented once GMO alfalfa is planted. Food Democracy Now is circulating a letter asking President Obama and Secretary Vilsack to “halt the sale and planting of Monsanto’s recently approved Roundup Ready® GMO alfalfa and sugar beets until independent, peer-reviewed studies can be conducted to determine whether or not these products pose a threat to plant, animal and human health.”

Connecting the Dots from personal health to our total health environment. Subscribe for free to make your voice heard for health, food, water, and the environment at: www.healthjournalistblog.com On Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/ConnectingtheDotsforHealth

Last week’s show, a conversation on radiation and our disconnect from our environment with writer, Susan Griffin can be heard here.

News flash: Become a friend of mine on Facebook and follow me on Twitter @AlisonRoseLevy to receive more health information.

To support the organic growers who are fighting for our food supply, go to selected links for Food Democracy Now, the Cornucopia Institute,and Organic Seed Growers.

Our second action this week is curbing the nuclear threat here in the U.S. There are two featured actions. First, tell President Obama not to use taxpayer dollars to fund nuclear power. Second, let’s close down all GE Mark nuclear reactors here in the U.S. Third, while we’re at it, let’s ask GE to pay their taxes. That’s right, they’re not paying any. Hey, how could that be? I thought corporations are people?

There is no pill you can swallow, food you can buy, nor gizmo that confers complete protection from pervasive toxicity, skewed societal consensus or invisible radiation. There’s no place you can go, nowhere you can hide and no authority — scientific, medical or spiritual — who can help you to escape what we’ve all created (or allowed to happen) here on planet Earth. Whether you are rich, poor, young, old, sick, healthy, right or left, no health manna, rural organic garden, island dwelling, nor spiritual belief can give you, me or us an out if we keep on screwing up.

Unless we turn around and heal the disconnect that allows us to misguidedly pursue personal goals, without sufficient care for the health of our society and the earth, than it’s likely our health problems will go from bad to worse.

Unless we turn around and heal the disconnect that allows us to misguidedly pursue personal goals, without sufficient care for the health of our society and the earth, than it’s likely our health problems will go from bad to worse.

If facing this sad reality seems disheartening, don’t worry — a lot of us are in the same boat. It’s called planet Earth. We’re worried about it, and we can use your help. Health-conscious people need to do more than take potassium iodide; we need to take action.

However, if this truth is too uncomfortable, or violates your subscription to the All Good News, All the Time network, then retreat to whatever offers you temporary relief. We’ll still be right here when you get back.

Lots of people send me their suggestions and questions, not to mention their latest e-books and requests to blog on The Huffington Post. In the current crisis, they either want, or give, answers: Isn’t it over yet? Are we sure? Take this — no, take that. Don’t take anything. We’ll tell you what to take, and when.

One email boosts a superfood, another social activism, while a third person despairs that industries disseminating toxins or radiation don’t seem to care about the gradual, ongoing, cumulative pollution of our bodies, our waterways and our world by their stuff.

People tell me they feel helpless, believing that they’ve no more influence than a mosquito buzzing round an impervious colossus.

I agree that it’s scary to go from the supposed certainty of taking a pill (or an attitude adjustment) to the uncertainty of stepping up to social activism. Unlike other corners of our market-driven society, restoring skewed societal priorities comes with no guarantees.

Instead, some soul-searching is required. Can we live with ourselves if we don’t come together and make a solid, determined, all-out effort to protect the health of our children, the wildlife and the earth?

Who will call government and industry to task, if not you, me and millions more like us? If more and more people do that, it gets easier. And if we don’t, what is the alternative? Give up on planet Earth, and leave a poisoned mess to our children?

The President’s Cancer Panel told us that the total cumulative effects of toxins are major contributors to rising cancer rates, spectrum disorders in children and increased illness in children at younger and younger ages.

I won’t go through the litany here, but you can go to my website for blog posts on that. These toxins travel the world and add up, accumulating in air, water, food, earth and us. They combine with radiation. While today West Coast radiation levels from the Japanese nuclear calamity seem okay, it’s not possible to make absolute statements about tomorrow, next month or next year. Not to mention the radiation we generate right here in the U.S. How much capacity does the earth have to absorb them? How much do we have? Does asking questions about that mean you’re “hysterical,” or a concerned citizen?

From years of looking into (and trying) many kinds of health treatments, I can tell you that if we allow toxic exposures to progress from not-so-good, to bad, to worse, at a certain point, individual health solutions won’t be enough to protect anyone, unless you are counting on mutating into a hardier species, like the cockroach.

Does that mean we should just live on French fries and pizza, and forget about healthy food, lifestyle, purchasing and energy use choices as individuals? Of course not. Those choices will remain vitally important, but they were not designed to target societal choices, and they haven’t.

Up until now, many have hoped that one day our incremental choices would add up to to a society that reflects and serves our values.

Has that happened?

Just look around. What feedback are we getting from nature and the world? What do we see happening in our society and political life? How well are our kids doing? Is it getting better? Worse? Do we need a scientific study to answer that question?

Speaking for myself, I see ecological shifts accelerating, and colliding with unsafe business practices to produce a series of calamities, each one worse than its predecessor. In just the last year, this has happened more than once, and we could go back further and retrace the gradual buildup to this moment. But for right now, let’s not.

Instead, what can we do? Here are some choices I’ve heard:

• Build your immune system
• Stock up on superfoods
• Watch the calendar and wait for a magical date when everyone else suddenly wakes up to the results of our collective choices
• Search for a remote, rural enclave to wait it out with your organic coconut and other goodies
• Expect divinity to descend in helicopters and bail us out
• Hope to ascend beyond the earthly cares of this troubled planet.
• Wait for the next crisis that will wake up all those other people.

Confession: Maybe it’s just me, but I don’t find it all that spiritual to leave behind the mess our society has created. That’s like a person who leaves a pile of dishes in the kitchen sink for months on end, and then hopes to sell the house to get rid of them.

In the current critical moment, the Japanese calamity has shown all the world the harsh downside risks of just a few of the societal compromises we’ve made. In response to this wake-up call, a shift could happen, but there’s no guarantee that it will. Unless we step up.

If we all roll up our sleeves and commit ourselves to social activism that addresses our problems at the individual, community and societal levels, things can change. Each of us must play a part. Unless you are raising small children, or are seriously ill, or tending to the seriously ill, then I invite you all to find concrete ways to contribute via social activism. Going to the farmer’s market and buying an organic mesclun mix is not enough. And if you don’t have any good ideas about where you are needed, then by all means, do ask me.

Do you have suggestions about where people can pitch in to help bring about societal changes? Please share them here! For more information, visit www.HealthJournalistBlog.com.

Send a message to President Obama demanding a safe and sensible approach to fracking.

Read the entire letter to President Obama from Catskill Citizens and Catskill Mountainkeeper.

Although the ten million residents of New York City and Philadelphia rely on the Delaware Basin for their drinking water, no public hearings will be spent in either of those cities, as the Delaware River Basin Commission prepares to green light drilling of test wells in river areas that could effect the drinking water of 15 million people. What are they drinking?

By taking action here, you can demand an extended comment period and additional public hearings before the DRBC greenlights fracking in the Delaware Basin.

If you want to receive regular action alerts, and blogs about health concerns like these, please sign up in the box to your right. Also don’t forget to pass this along to your friends. Thank you for being a Health Activist!

The two citizens, the actor Mark Ruffalo, nominated for an Oscar for his performance in The Kids Are All Right, and the documentary film-maker, Josh Fox, nominated for an Oscar for his film, Gasland, are holding a press conference, meeting with Congressional representatives, and screening the film, in an effort to safeguard the people’s right to the life essential, safe drinking water. As detailed in Gasland, hundreds of news stories, state and federal government reports, and expert scientific analysis, this right can no longer be taken for granted, thanks to widespread water contamination by hundreds of proprietary chemicals used in hydraulic fracturing, (or fracking), a novel form of an old gas drilling practice. Fox and Ruffalo are calling for an immediate federal moratorium on drilling, permitting, and fracking until appropriate safety measures are in place.

Fox points out that, “Fracking has never been proven to be safe. Thousands of contamination cases, and testimonials across the country, point to a massive failure to protect water, air and human health.”

In an open letter to Congress and the president, Fox alerts these leaders to

“the numerous dangers, hazards and injustices created by hydraulic fracturing for natural gas and urge(s) them to take immediate action to address” the “severe environmental, public health, and human and civil rights abuses that the deregulated Natural Gas Industry has wrought on the citizens of the United States as a result of the massive gas drilling campaign that has been ravaging the country over the past decade.”

It all began with the Halliburton Loophole, inserted into the 2005 Energy bill by former vice-president Dick Cheney. That exempted the novel practice of horizontal hydraulic fracturing, which first introduced the use of over five hundred proprietary toxic chemicals from compliance with the Safe Drinking Water Act, the Clean Water Act, the Clean Air Act, and the Superfund Act.

Fox calls for an immediate end to these exemptions.

Five years ago, no one could have foreseen that the Gas Rush, with its ever-growing track record of hazards, spills, leaks, explosions, water and air contamination, and health dangers, would have strained the monitoring capacities of state governments, and over-ridden the rights of ordinary citizens to the extent now seen.

Calling for bi-partisan support, Fox calls for an end to federal subsidies, reporting that “fossil fuel industries receive three times the level of federal subsidies as compared to renewable energy sources,” creating an “unfair advantage in the marketplace for fossil fuel drilling technologies,” like fracking.

Based on the “dire crisis occurring across America,” Fox recommends:

1. Expanding the planned EPA study to extend beyond 2011, to address issues of hazardous and cumulative emissions from gas drilling, and to be conducted by scientists without conflict of interest.

2. Conducting a five-year parallel health impact assessment in all of the most areas by an independent third party working alongside the EPA, either from an unbiased charitable foundation or an esteemed University.

3. Requiring EPA, and state and local departments of environmental protection/planning to oversee and issue permits for fracking

4. Managing immediate health and ecological crises in drilling areas to include:

• The use of vapor recovery units to control emissions at existing well-sites, separators, refineries, compressor stations and condensate tanks
• The provision of replacement water via municipal pipelines in areas where aquifers have been contaminated
• The restoration of areas that have been industrialized with compressor stations, refineries and other gas drilling and refining machinery to a state appropriate for residential use.
• The compensation for loss of property and physical injury to communities experiencing irreparable damage.

Fox further asks that the burden of proof for safety be shifted to the gas companies, requiring them and their associated industries to:

• Publicly disclose chemical ingredients in all products used to drill and frack on well-by-well basis.
• Tag each chemical product with a non-radioactive isotope to help track its possible migration into drinking water supplies.
• Cover costs for independent baseline water testing for all chemicals used in drilling, prior to drilling.

Fox asserts that

“if a chemical listed by the product manufacturers is found in a citizens private well or in a municipal water source, and is not found to be naturally occurring in the geology before drilling, both the product manufacturer and the drilling and extraction companies should have the burden to prove that contamination was not caused by the drilling company.”

In addition, due to widespread reports of “illegal dumping and improper disposal/treatment” of vast amounts of toxic drilling waste, generated by fracking, Fox recommends that “Every drop of drilling waste, drilling fluids, produced water or drill cuttings should be identified by its contents, tracked and reported in trucks that carry hazardous waste placards and must have a detailed and outlined waste management program for disposal and/or treatment.” To read the complete letter with all of Fox’s recommendations, please go here.

Fox hopes that on their visit to Washington, they will persuade the President and legislators to “swiftly act in the public’s interest to address this crisis.”

To comment on this blog on the Huffington Post, go here.

Sign up for health and environmental news, and radio programs here.