Last week I listened to a blog radio chat between Renee Ross, the health editor of BlogHer; Dr. Sande Okelo from John Hopkins Children's Center; and Vernice Miller-Travis, the vice president of the Maryland State Commission on Environmental Justice and Sustainable Communities. Ross has a son with asthma, which has worsened in this year's heightened …

Turtles win! The best news I've heard all day: JFK airport traffic backed up while turtles take their time crossing runways to get to the other side–and lay eggs in the sand, of course. What else but motherhood would make a turtle ferocious enough to brave the hazards of large-winged, fire-breathing monsters? About 150 moms …

The foremost scientific experts on the ocean just released a disturbing study on how pollution, warming and acidification of our oceans is leading to mass extinctions of life. Unless we curve our crustacean appetites and polluting ways, all coral reefs, for example, are expected to be gone by 2050. Here is the report: "The ocean …

This piece by Donna Barnett was cross posted on Chasing Clean Air. Yellow! Orange! Where's the green! If we're to progress toward bluer skies, we've got to offer solutions for industry and individuals to take action! The other day Chasing Clean Air reader, Irene Kittrell, asked my impression about an EPA Greenversations blog post called …

This piece was cross-posted at Milspouse Mutterings. Occupational Lung Disease – for most of us that conjures up Black Lung in a coal miner; silicosis in a quarry worker;  and for an old paralegal ahem from the asbestos days, asbestosis or worse in a worker in a boiler factory.  It isn’t usually a condition that …

We moms often scratch our heads and wonder, don’t pro-polluters have children of their own? Don’t they care about their health? Of course they do. But children aren’t on pro-polluters minds. Maybe because the pro- polluters aren’t the ones sitting in hospital emergency rooms while children have asthma attacks. Pro-polluters aren’t the ones in the …

Much as I love raising my three children in urban Washington, DC, the suburbs do appeal. But it’s not for the grassy lawns or the ample parking. The number one reason I long to move to Maryland or Virginia is that if I did, I would be able to elect Senators and Representatives with voting …

Scientists are not political big shots, or the rock stars of the environmental movement. They are concerned citizens like you and I who set out to systematically discover and document answers to pressing scientific queries. Doctors, nurses, researchers and professors devote their lives to making the world a better place for our families. More than …

This piece was cross-posted on Non-Toxic Kids. Just in case you heard how the new proposed air toxics rules would "close " down several power plants, causing hundreds of workers to lose their jobs, read this opinion piece from the New York Times. Turns out AEP (American Electric Power) haven't been exactly forthright.  They've left …

This piece was cross-posted at Marcia G. Yerman. In New York, the tag line for the lotto ticket that folks line up to buy is, “You have to be in it to win it.”  It’s a fair assessment of most things in life…even clean air. Right now, our country is at a turning point on …