drinking water

From Asthma to Cancer, ‘Blistering’ New Report Details Human Cost of Fracking

From Asthma to Cancer, ‘Blistering’ New Report Details Human Cost of Fracking

By Jessica Corbett A team of researchers on Tuesday released a “blistering” report on the serious public health threats—from headaches to asthma to cancer—posed by hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, a process of injecting a mix of water and chemicals into rocks to release oil and natural gas. The study—described as “the most authoritative” of its […]

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    Report: 64% of Bottled Water Is Tap Water, Costs 2000x More

    Report: 64% of Bottled Water Is Tap Water, Costs 2000x More

    By Julia Conley Bottled water companies have relied on predatory marketing practices and exorbitant lobbying efforts to sell Americans on the inaccurate belief that pre-packaged water is cleaner and safer than tap water—a notion that is costing U.S. households about $16 billion per year. In a new report entitled “Take Back the Tap,” Food & […]

    How Water Scarcity Shapes the World’s Refugee Crisis

    How Water Scarcity Shapes the World’s Refugee Crisis

    Behind barbed-wire fences at this camp in northern Jordan, about 33,000 Syrians—half of them children—exist uneasily, housed in rows of rudimentary shelters that barely protect them from the winter cold. Drinking water must be brought in daily by dozens of tanker trucks or pumped from desert boreholes that overexploit Jordan’s largest groundwater basin. As in […]

    Update on Nestlé: Michiganders Mobilize to Take Back Public Water

    Update on Nestlé: Michiganders Mobilize to Take Back Public Water

    By Miranda Fox The Swiss multinational Nestlé has been facing increasing scrutiny in Michigan. Outside of the small town of Evart, a mere 128 miles from Flint, Nestlé is attempting to increase how much spring water it is taking for water bottling. Nestlé submitted an application with Michigan’s Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) late last […]

    More Action Needed to Ensure Safe Water for First Nations

    More Action Needed to Ensure Safe Water for First Nations

    All nine community water systems on Lytton First Nation land in BC have been under boil water advisories at one time or another. Now the First Nation is taking an innovative approach to resolving its drinking water problems. It’s working with public and private organizations and universities in a “circle of trust” to identify challenges […]

    Non-Stick Chemicals Used in Pans, Food Wrappers Linked to Weight Gain

    Non-Stick Chemicals Used in Pans, Food Wrappers Linked to Weight Gain

    Perfluorinated chemicals, also known as PFASs or PFCs, are used to make everyday items—such as food wrappers, textiles, pots and pans—repel water and grease. But these chemicals have been linked to a host of health problems, including high cholesterol, hormone disruption and even kidney and testicular cancer. Now, researchers at Harvard University found evidence that […]

    Trump’s Budget Is a Blueprint for Destruction

    Trump’s Budget Is a Blueprint for Destruction

    By Rhea Suh It may sound like green eyeshades stuff, but the massive budget proposal the White House sends up to Congress each February is a kind of road map to our future. It’s the president’s plan for spending taxpayer dollars to advance his priorities and goals. President Trump’s proposal landed with a thud Monday […]

    Trump Administration Sued for Suspension of Clean Water Rule

    Trump Administration Sued for Suspension of Clean Water Rule

    Multiple states and conservation groups are legally challenging the Trump administration’s decision to delay the Obama-era Clean Water Rule. Last week, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) put a two-year suspension on the rule, also known as Waters of the United States (WOTUS), which protects large water bodies like lakes and rivers but also listed […]

    How NAFTA Is Making Our Food and Water Much Less Healthy

    How NAFTA Is Making Our Food and Water Much Less Healthy

    By Shiney Varghese As the sixth round of the negotiations on North American Free Trade Agreement begin next week in Montreal, Canada, the controversy over exactly what a new agreement might involve—if there is one at all—continues to generate debate. As the NAFTA renegotiations were about to start, the Canadian government publicly stated its core […]