Lawmakers Take Manufacturing Companies to Task Over Toxic PFAS Chemicals in Drinking Water
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Tensions between lawmakers and several large manufacturing companies came to a head on Capitol Hill this week during a hearing on toxic fluorochemicals in U.S. drinking water.
Representatives from the 3M Company, the Chemours Company and DuPont appeared before the House Oversight and Reform Committee on Sept. 10 as Congress explores several bills to regulate dangerous "forever chemicals" called PFAS, which do not break down in the environment and have been linked to a number of diseases.
Democrats on the committee suggested the companies had long known about the health hazards of dangerous "forever chemicals" called PFAS in their products and should shoulder some of the responsibility for addressing their spread.
"You have played a part in this national emergency. You have sickened our first responders and members of the military, and I don't know how you sleep at night," said Rep. Debbie Wasserman-Schultz of Florida, The Hill reported.
California Rep. Harley Rouda, who chairs the Oversight and Reform Committee's Subcommittee on Environment, said the companies' misrepresentation of the science around PFAS "shakes the foundation of democratic capitalism" by "violating the trust of the American people," The Guardian reported.
According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, PFAS are synthetic chemicals used since the 1940's in food packaging, non-stick pans, cosmetics, firefighting foam and water- and grease-repellent products. PFAS contamination is often found in water sources near industrial sites, military bases and airports in nearly every U.S. state.
In addition to persisting in the environment, they have been shown to accumulate in the human body, and PFAS exposure has been linked with infertility, cancer, thyroid disease, developmental problems in children, liver damage and a host of other health issues, according to the U.S. Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry.
"Exposure to PFAS at even the lowest concentrations has been shown to harm human health and puts people in communities with contaminated drinking water at risk," the Environmental Working Group found.
The company executives, defended by the committee's Republican members, downplayed the health risks of PFAS and corporate liability for cleanup and medical costs.
3M's Senior Vice President of Corporate Affairs Denise Rutherford testified that the company had voluntarily phased out use of certain types of PFAS in the 90's and that "there is still no cause and effect relationship for any adverse human affect" of PFAS at current levels, The Hill reported.
This contradicts a large body of scientific research and 3M's own records — revealed during a lawsuit in Minnesota — which show that the company has been aware of the toxicity of fluorochemicals and potential health risk since 1950, according to the Star Tribune.
Michigan Rep. Dan Kildee said the denials were "ridiculous," and that the companies knew of the health risks or they "wouldn't have taken them off the market in the first place."
Chief operating and engineering officer at DuPont, Daryl Roberts, said that his company supports regulation of two of the 5,000 types of PFAS but will only clean up the chemicals at its current locations. DuPont made and used one of these types of PFAS called PFOA in its non-stick cookware until 2015, when that part of the business was spun off into its own company, Chemours. Chemours has since taken DuPont to court over responsibility for addressing contamination, The Guardian reported.
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A child stands in what is left of his house in Utuado, Puerto Rico, which was almost completely destroyed by Hurricane Maria, on Oct. 12, 2017. U.S. Coast Guard Petty Officer 1st Class Jon-Paul Rios. Flickr, CC by 2.0
By Mark Hertsgaard and Kyle Pope
To hear many journalists tell it, the spring of 2020 has brought a series of extraordinary revelations. Look at what the nation has learned: That our health-care system was not remotely up to the challenge of a deadly pandemic. That our economic safety net was largely nonexistent. That our vulnerability to disease and death was directly tied to our race and where we live. That our political leadership sowed misinformation that left people dead. That systemic racism and the killing of Black people by police is undiminished, despite decades of protest and so many Black lives lost.
To hear many journalists tell it, the spring of 2020 has brought a series of extraordinary revelations. Look at what the nation has learned: That our health-care system was not remotely up to the challenge of a deadly pandemic. That our economic safety net was largely nonexistent. That our vulnerability to disease and death was directly tied to our race and where we live. That our political leadership sowed misinformation that left people dead. That systemic racism and the killing of Black people by police is undiminished, despite decades of protest and so many Black lives lost.
<h2></h2>
<p>Journalism is now engaged in explaining and contextualizing this moment, a frenzy of feature writing prompted by the filling of morgues and the throngs of people in the streets. Some of these pieces will be impressive; a few will win our most prestigious journalism prizes. We'll look back at the spring of 2020 and congratulate ourselves on the central role played by professional reporters, who helped the nation navigate these crises.</p><p>But let's save the self-congratulations. While it is true that the virus and the uprising in the streets have exposed deep injustices and inequities in our nation, none of them are new.</p><p>This summer and fall, all of these stories will crash together as Americans vote in an election that is also a decisive turning point in the overarching story of our time—the onrushing climate emergency. This summer, scientists say, will bring heat waves, wildfires, <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/environment/coronavirus-hurricanes/" target="_blank">and "one of the most active" hurricane seasons on records</a>. Protests against racial injustice may well rise along with temperatures, no doubt fueled by more videos of pain and death. In the fall, our health crisis may well increase, as the COVID-19 pandemic collides with the seasonal flu, all while the US economy continues to experience Great Depression levels of unemployment. It is to the shame of journalism if we don't get to the root of why all of this is happening so that voters can make informed choices in November.</p>
<p>It's worth remembering the media hand-wringing that followed the election of Donald Trump in 2016. Mainstream news outlets, out of touch and understaffed, reported largely from inside their own establishment bubbles, and few in those confined spaces believed Trump had a shot at winning the presidency. So the press missed the story. It didn't understand the stirring of disaffection in the country; it underestimated the racism and economic fear that would drive white people to support Trump; it misread polling and cherry-picked data to convince itself that a Trump loss was inevitable.</p><p>In a presidential election, the media's job is to understand the electorate, not predict the outcome before voters have cast ballots. Four years ago, reporters and editors became too obsessed with political gamesmanship, personality, and trivia to do the media's primary job. The result was a humiliating defeat for journalism and an acceleration of the mistrust of the press that already existed.</p><p>At the start of the 2020 election year, despite pledges by newsroom leaders to do better, the same tendencies showed. Trump was defining the narrative. Structural chasms in the country were ignored. The Democratic field was reduced to caricature.</p><p>Then came the coronavirus and the police killings of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, and Ahmaud Arbery, among too many others. Exactly none of what we as journalists learned about our nation in the past three months should have come as a surprise. We have known, or should have known, that the public health system in the US is overpriced and unequal. We have known, or should have known, that Americans are not equipped to withstand an economic downturn. We have known, or should have known, that racial injustice is pervasive in our country (and in our media) and that Black people continue to die, be incarcerated, and suffer economically at tragically disproportionate rates.</p>
<p>The fact that it took a pandemic, police killings, and mass protests to focus mainstream journalistic attention on these issues is damning, and must prompt a reappraisal of how we work. Why weren't newsrooms obsessing about these issues before the world imploded this spring? Why must we always be reactive to injustice, instead of proactively highlighting it? Isn't it the job of journalism to ferret out wrongdoing even if people in power want it to remain hidden? Why aren't we advocating for our audiences and their lives?</p><p>Which brings us to the climate crisis. This summer, wildfires will ravage the American west. Deadly heat will pound the global south. Hurricanes will march up the Atlantic coast. Homes, and perhaps whole communities, will be lost. Crops and people will die.</p><p>If the journalistic status quo holds, news organizations will respond by going into disaster-coverage mode, mobilizing their dwindling staffs to cover the crisis as it unfolds. They'll take astonishing pictures of the destruction and hear heroic stories from survivors and rescue workers. They'll tally up the economic costs and run heartbreaking profiles of families who died in their swimming pools while trying to escape the fire or children who were washed out to sea. And then, only after the work of covering the disaster is done, will they perhaps take a moment to examine why all this is happening—why these disasters are occurring, again and again, all over the world, with increased frequency and ferocity.</p><p>There's a pattern here. The news business waits for news to happen when, in fact, we shouldn't need another Black person to be shot to start reporting on racism in the police force. Nor should we need yet another Category Five hurricane to flatten yet another community before we sound the alarm that the planet is on the brink of climate collapse.</p><p><span></span>These are deep, structural stories that are all linked. Novel viruses like COVID-19 often begin in wild animals, many of which are coming into closer contact with humans because their habitats are being destroyed by deforestation, mining, and <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/environment/coronavirus-habitat-loss/" target="_blank">other extractive activities</a>. The first line of infection is often among disadvantaged communities. The heat waves, droughts, storms, and other effects of rising temperatures almost always punish the poor and people of color first and worst.</p>
<p>Where we are in covering the climate-emergency story? Not remotely close to where we should be. The <em>Columbia Journalism Review</em> and <em>The Nation</em>, in partnership with the <em>Guardian</em>, co-founded Covering Climate Now a year ago because we were convinced that most newsrooms were not doing enough to tell the climate story. Over the past year, we have made impressive progress. <a href="https://www.coveringclimatenow.org/partners/" target="_blank">Our partners</a> now include more than 400 news outlets representing more than 50 countries, with a combined audience of roughly 2 billion people. Our collaboration has done weeks of joint coverage that yielded thousands of additional climate stories. During our first week of joint coverage, last September, Google searches for the term "climate change" <a href="https://grist.org/article/google-searches-for-climate-change-finally-beat-out-game-of-thrones/" target="_blank">were the highest in history</a>. And some news outlets that are not Covering Climate Now partners also have upped their game, hiring dedicated climate editors, adding and deepening climate coverage, and including climate among the key issues in the 2020 elections.</p><p>And yet. And yet. And yet.</p><p>While we have been heartened (and grateful) to see so many of our colleagues join this effort, we still don't sense the urgency that the climate emergency demands, especially as the 2020 election approaches. Our window to prevent catastrophe is closing fast. In some respects, it has already shut: at least three feet of sea level rise is inevitable by 2100, and possibly much sooner, scientists say, compelling the relocation of millions of people and trillions of dollars worth of coastal infrastructure <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/may/08/sea-levels-could-rise-more-than-a-metre-by-2100-experts-say" target="_blank">around the world</a>.</p>
<p>The public sees the urgency and actually wants more climate news. Even during the peak of coronavirus coverage in April, some of the world's biggest news organizations told us that their audiences had little appetite for stories that weren't about the virus, with one exception: climate change, which continued to generate significant traffic.</p><p>Journalism now has a window of opportunity to get these interconnected stories right. Editorially, we are urging our partners—and journalists everywhere—to play the climate story bigger. It's not enough to do one story on one candidate's position on climate change and be done with it. Climate change should be a continuing part of the narrative about any candidate's campaign, just as the candidate's positions on COVID-19, the economy, and health care are. The word "climate" should be included in headlines and broadcast scripts often enough that the public can't miss it.</p><p>Above all, we hope newsrooms will remember the big picture and cover the real horserace. It's easy for campaign coverage to get mired in minutia. The contest between Republicans and Democrats is of great interest, of course, and the outcome couldn't matter more. But the horserace that matters most is humanity's collective race to defuse the climate emergency, which means strong action must begin now, not four years from now. What's ultimately being decided in these elections is nothing less than whether all of us are going to have a livable planet 20 years from now and beyond. If the press is most comfortable chasing fires and sending reporters into disaster zones, so be it. But newsrooms should know: the disaster is here. It is raging now. Our job is to cover it with the urgency it deserves.</p>
<p class=""><em>This story originally appeared in </em><a href="https://www.cjr.org/" target="_blank">Columbia Journalism Review</a><a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/r/entryeditor/2646313949#/" target="_self"></a> <em>and is republished here as part of Covering Climate Now, a global journalism collaboration strengthening coverage of the climate story.</em></p>From Your Site Articles
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President Trump's claim last September that Hurricane Dorian was headed for Alabama's gulf coast was quickly refuted by employees at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). An independent investigation found that NOAA's chief violated the agency's ethics when he backed Trump's warning and doctored map that used a Sharpie to alter the storm's path, as EcoWatch reported.
<p><br/></p>
<p>Questions linger as to why NOAA officials decided to support Trump's inaccurate warnings. Apparently, the U.S. Department of Commerce, which oversees NOAA, does not want the public to know. The Commerce Department has impeded an inspector general's investigation into whether or not the administration coerced officials into supporting a false narrative and is blocking a release of the report, according to <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/01/climate/trump-dorian-noaa-investigation.html" target="_blank">The New York Times</a>.</p>
<p>In a <a href="https://www.oig.doc.gov/OIGPublications/2020-07-01_IG_Memorandum_to_Secretary_Ross_re_OIG-20-031-I_%28SECURED%29.pdf" target="_blank">memo </a>from Inspector General Peggy Gustafson to Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, she takes the rare step of publicly airing a dispute between an agency inspector general and a cabinet secretary, according to <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/weather/2020/07/02/commerce-ig-sharpiegate-dispute/" target="_blank">The Washington Post</a>. In the memo, she claims that Ross' office "thwarted" the publication of her report. She claims that the Commerce Department has claimed that portions of the report cannot be made public, but they have not specified which portions, according to <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/01/climate/trump-dorian-noaa-investigation.html" target="_blank">The New York Times</a>.</p><p>The department's refusal to cooperate with the release of the investigation "appears to be directly linked to the content of our report and the findings of responsibility of the high-level individuals involved," Gustafson wrote, according to <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/01/climate/trump-dorian-noaa-investigation.html" target="_blank">The New York Times</a>.</p>
<p>The full report has not been released, but on Monday, a <a href="https://www.oig.doc.gov/OIGPublications/OIG-20-032-I.pdf" target="_blank">summary</a> was posted that said that the department led a "flawed process that discounted NOAA participation," and also "required NOAA to issue a Statement that did not further NOAA's or [National Weather Service's (NWS)] interests," as <a href="https://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/505246-commerce-department-led-flawed-process-on-sharpiegate-watchdog" target="_blank">The Hill</a> reported.</p><p>That summary also said that NOAA "failed to account for the public safety intent of the NWS Birmingham tweet and the distinction between physical science and social science messaging."</p><p>That failure to account for public safety came from NOAA's officials walking back a tweet from the NWS Birmingham's office that said "Alabama will NOT see any impacts from Dorian. We repeat, no impacts from Hurricane Dorian will be felt across Alabama."</p>
<p>It turns out the unsigned statement that contradicted NWS Birmingham's tweet was the result of pressure from the White House on Secretary Ross, who oversees NOAA and who threatened to fire the political staff at NOAA unless the contradiction of Mr. Trump was addressed, as The New York Times reported.</p><p>The full report was supposed to be released on Tuesday, but it has yet to be released, which prompted the unusual memo from Gustafson. As The Washington Post reported, Senator Maria Cantwell, the ranking Democrat on the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee, said: "This situation has gone from bad to worse. Secretary Ross must immediately cease this campaign to keep the public in the dark. The Inspector General is doing their job and the public deserves to see the report. Release the report now, Mr. Secretary."</p>
<p>The Washington Post also noted that this year NOAA's credibility is particularly important as forecasters are predicting an active <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/hurricanes">hurricane</a> season amidst the coronavirus pandemic, which is seeing a surge in vulnerable states like Florida and Texas. The need to social distance will pose unprecedented challenges for storm preparation, evacuation and response. That means NOAA's forecasts and advice need to have ironclad credibility since they are integral to public safety.</p>
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In ‘Conservation Disaster,’ Hundreds of Botswana's Elephants Are Dying From Mysterious Cause
1h
Animals
African bush elephants in the Makgadikgadi Pans Game Reserve in Botswana on Nov. 22, 2016. Michael Jansen / Flickr
More than 350 elephants have died in Botswana since May, and no one knows why.
<p><a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/poaching" target="_self">Poaching</a> has been ruled out, because no tusks have been removed from the elephants' bodies, but it is possible the animals are dying of a disease that could spread to the human population.</p><p>"Yes, it is a <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/conservation" target="_self">conservation</a> disaster — but it also has the potential to be a <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/public-health" target="_self">public health</a> crisis," <a href="https://t.co/FOYIlddwzZ?amp=1" target="_blank">National Park Rescue</a> Director of Conservation Dr. Niall McCann told <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/amp/world-africa-53257512" target="_blank">BBC News</a>.</p>
<div id="9deed" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="101a9cd3a64051511e2bb793a9782a58"><blockquote class="twitter-tweet twitter-custom-tweet" data-twitter-tweet-id="1278329244767137792" data-partner="rebelmouse"><div style="margin:1em 0">A catastrophic die-off of elephants is happing in northern Botswana, and no one knows why. It’s vital that a team o… https://t.co/G4VlI5hZJA</div> — Niall McCann (@Niall McCann)<a href="https://twitter.com/NiallPMcCann/statuses/1278329244767137792">1593612416.0</a></blockquote></div>
<p>Botswana's tourism ministry first said that it was investigating the deaths in mid-May, when 12 dead elephants were found over two weekends in the country's Okavango Delta, <a href="https://phys.org/news/2020-05-botswana-probes-mysterious-death-elephants.html" target="_blank">Phys.org reported</a> at the time.</p><p>By the end of May, 169 elephants had died, and that number had more than doubled by mid-June, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/jul/01/more-than-350-elephants-dead-in-mysterious-mass-die-off-botswana-aoe" target="_blank">The Guardian reported</a>.</p><p>"This is totally unprecedented in terms of numbers of elephants dying in a single event unrelated to drought," McCann told BBC News.</p><p>But despite the scale of the deaths, the government has not yet completed testing of the animals to determine the cause, earning the criticism of conservation groups.</p>
<p>"There is real concern regarding the delay in getting the samples to an accredited laboratory for testing in order to identify the problem — and then take measures to mitigate it," <a href="https://eia-international.org/" target="_blank">Environmental Investigation Agency</a> Executive Director Mary Rice told The Guardian. "The lack of urgency is of real concern and does not reflect the actions of a responsible custodian. There have been repeated offers of help from private stakeholders to facilitate urgent testing which appear to have fallen on deaf ears … and the increasing numbers are, frankly, shocking."</p>
<p>The government, meanwhile, attributed the delay to the <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/coronavirus" target="_self">coronavirus</a> pandemic.</p><p>"We have sent [samples] off for testing and we are expecting the results over the next couple of weeks or so," Dr. Cyril Taolo, acting director for Botswana's department of wildlife and national parks, told The Guardian. "The Covid-19 restrictions have not helped in the transportation of samples in the region and around the world. We're now beginning to emerge from that and that is why we are now in a position to send the samples to other laboratories."</p><p>Taolo said the government had confirmed 280 out of 350 reported deaths and is working to confirm the rest.</p>
<p>Local reports indicate that animals of all ages and sexes are dying, with some spotted wandering in circles, a sign of neurological damage. The cause is likely a poison or disease, but experts are not sure which.</p><p>More than 100 elephants died in October 2019 in a suspected anthrax outbreak, Phys.org reported, but McCann told BBC News he had tentatively ruled out anthrax as the cause of the most recent deaths. Cyanide poisoning used by poachers is another possibility, but scavengers are not dying after eating the carcasses, The Guardian pointed out.</p><p>"It is only elephants that are dying and nothing else," McCann told BBC News. "If it was cyanide used by poachers, you would expect to see other deaths."</p>
<p>Botswana hosts the world's largest elephant population at more than 135,000 animals, about a third of all the elephants in Africa, Phys.org pointed out. The Okavango Delta, meanwhile, is home to 10 percent of Botswana's total population, or around 15,000 animals. African elephants are considered vulnerable by the <a href="https://www.iucnredlist.org/species/12392/3339343" target="_blank">International Union for Conservation of Nature Red List</a>. Botswana was considered one of the safest countries for elephants until recently, <a href="https://www.sciencealert.com/hundreds-of-elephants-have-died-in-botswana-for-months-and-we-still-don-t-know-why" target="_blank">Science Alert pointed out</a>. But the government made a controversial decision to <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/botswana-lifts-elephant-ban-2637907016.html" target="_self">lift</a> its elephant hunting ban in May of 2019, and poaching is on the rise. An <a href="http://elephantswithoutborders.org/" target="_blank">Elephants Without Borders</a> study <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S096098221930675X" target="_blank">published in Current Biology last year</a> found that new elephant carcasses in northern Botswana had increased by 593 percent between 2014 and 2018 and that at least 385 elephants had been poached between 2017 and 2018.</p>
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People relax in Victoria Gardens with the Houses of Parliament in the background in central London, as a heatwave hit the continent with temperatures touching 40 degrees Celsius on June 25, 2020. NIKLAS HALLE'N / AFP via Getty Images
The chance that UK summer days could hit the 40 degree Celsius mark on the thermometer is on the rise, a new study from the country's Met Office Hadley Centre has found.
<p>British summers currently only reach 40 degrees every 100 to 300 years. But the study, published in <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-020-16834-0" target="_blank"><em>Nature Communications</em></a> Tuesday, found that such temperatures could occur every 3.5 years if nothing is done to reduce <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/greenhouse-gases" target="_self">greenhouse gas</a> emissions and curb the <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/climate-change/" target="_self">climate crisis</a>.</p><p>"Climate change has already influenced the likelihood of temperature extremes in the UK. The chances of seeing 40°C days in the UK could be as much as 10 times more likely in the current climate than under a natural climate unaffected by human influence," lead author Dr. Nikolaos Christidis said in a <a href="https://www.metoffice.gov.uk/about-us/press-office/news/weather-and-climate/2020/chances-of-40c-days-in-the-uk-increasing-due-to-human-influence" target="_blank">Met Office press release</a>. "The likelihood of exceeding 40°C anywhere in the UK in a given year has also been rapidly increasing, and, without curbing of greenhouse gas emissions, such extremes could be taking place every few years in the climate of 2100."</p>
<div id="f49f9" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="548418422f9dfc779c1082b8d99bfcca"><blockquote class="twitter-tweet twitter-custom-tweet" data-twitter-tweet-id="1277980676583600134" data-partner="rebelmouse"><div style="margin:1em 0">New research published today shows the chances of 40°C days in the UK are increasing rapidly due to #GlobalWarming… https://t.co/gNwrqnYPMA</div> — Met Office (@Met Office)<a href="https://twitter.com/metoffice/statuses/1277980676583600134">1593529311.0</a></blockquote></div>
<p>To reach their conclusions, the researchers combined temperature measurements across the country with 16 different climate models, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/jun/30/likelihood-of-40c-temperatures-in-uk-is-rapidly-accelerating" target="_blank">The Guardian explained</a>. They found that reducing emissions made a big difference in lowering future temperatures. Under a medium-emissions scenario, in which emissions are reduced but not enough to honor the <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/paris-agreement" target="_self">Paris agreement</a> goal of limiting global warming to below two degrees, 40 degree days would occur every 15 years.</p><p>"This research shows human-caused climate change has set us on a course to see temperature extremes in the UK that would be highly unlikely under a 'natural' climate, although urgent action to reduce emissions now can significantly reduce the occurrence of extreme high temperatures in the UK in the future," coauthor and head of the Met Office National Climate Information Centre Dr. Mark McCarthy said in the press release.</p>
<p>The study also looked at the likelihood of other temperature extremes. Days 35 degrees or higher currently occur every five years on average but could happen nearly every other year by 2100 under a high-emissions scenario. The 40 and 35 degree days would be most common in the Southeast, but the North could see 30 degree days once per decade by 2100. They are now extremely rare in that region.</p><p>UK summers are already feeling the impacts of the climate crisis. The summer of 2018 was the joint hottest on record, and the country saw its highest recorded temperature of 38.7 in Cambridge during July 2019, The Guardian reported. The climate crisis has made <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/heat-wave" target="_self">heat waves</a> in the country 30 more likely, and temperature extremes caused 3,400 early deaths between 2016 and 2019. These impacts will only worsen as temperatures rise, which is a big reason why the Met Office conducted the study, Christidis told <a href="https://www.france24.com/en/20200630-uk-increasingly-likely-to-see-40c-temperatures" target="_blank">AFP</a>. He said he wanted to help the country plan better for extremes.</p>
<p>"Exceeding extreme temperature thresholds like the 40C in the UK would be accompanied by severe impacts — on <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/public-health" target="_self">public health</a>, transport infrastructure," he told AFP.</p><p>However, on a global scale, the UK won't be feeling the heat as intensely as other places.</p><p>"Heatwaves are a real risk to life in the UK, especially if we do not begin modifying our homes, workplaces and hospitals to manage their expected overheating," University of Leeds professor Piers Forster, who was not involved in the study, told The Guardian. "However, we should note that in terms of heatwaves, the UK will get off lightly compared with most other nations. Heatwaves in the major crop-growing regions of the world could have more profound effects, both globally and for the UK."</p>
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A crowd of people congregate along Ocean Drive in Miami Beach, Florida on June 26, 2020, amid a surge in coronavirus cases. CHANDAN KHANNA / AFP / Getty Images
By Melissa Hawkins
After sustained declines in the number of COVID-19 cases over recent months, restrictions are starting to ease across the United States. Numbers of new cases are falling or stable at low numbers in some states, but they are surging in many others. Overall, the U.S. is experiencing a sharp increase in the number of new cases a day, and by late June, had surpassed the peak rate of spread in early April.
<p>When seeing these increasing case numbers, it is reasonable to wonder if this is the <a href="https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(20)30845-X/fulltext" target="_blank">dreaded second wave of the coronavirus</a> – a resurgence of rising infections after a reduction in cases.</p><p>The U.S. as a whole is not in a second wave because the first wave never really stopped. The virus is simply spreading into new populations or resurging in places that let down their guard too soon.</p>
<img lazy-loadable="true" src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yMzQyOTc3NC9vcmlnaW4ucG5nIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTYwMDgyNTQ5Nn0.pIiEitkLeMiGNtre8D4VqLrBTuBwisNJUEliEEswUbI/img.png?width=980" id="ca408" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="bd189e44e055fdff3f5d0c96e879b40b" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" />
Seven day rolling average of number of people confirmed to have COVID-19, per day (not including today). This chart gets updated once per day with data by Johns Hopkins. Johns Hopkins university doesn't provide reliable data for March 12 and March 13. Johns Hopkins CSSE Get the data
To Have a Second Wave, the First Wave Needs to End.
<p>A wave of an infection describes a large rise and fall in the number of cases. There isn't a precise epidemiological definition of when a wave begins or ends.</p><p>But with talk of a <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/jun/27/new-covid-19-clusters-across-world-spark-fear-of-second-wave" target="_blank">second wave in the news</a>, as an <a href="https://www.american.edu/cas/faculty/mhawkins.cfm" target="_blank">epidemiologist and public health researcher</a>, I think there are two necessary factors that must be met before we can colloquially declare a second wave.</p><p>First, the virus would have to be controlled and transmission brought down to a very low level. That would be the end of the first wave. Then, the virus would need to reappear and result in a large increase in cases and hospitalizations.</p><p>Many countries in <a href="https://doi.org/10.1038/s41562-020-0908-8" target="_blank">Europe and Asia have successfully ended the first wave</a>. <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/jun/08/new-zealand-abandons-covid-19-restrictions-after-nation-declared-no-cases" target="_blank">New Zealand</a> and <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2020/06/08/how-iceland-beat-the-coronavirus" target="_blank">Iceland</a> have also made it through their first waves and are now essentially coronavirus-free, with very low levels of community transmission and only a handful of active cases currently.</p><p>In the U.S., cases spiked in March and April and then trended downward due to social distancing guidance and implementation. However, the U.S. never reduced spread to low numbers that were sustained over time. Through May and early June, numbers plateaued at <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/us/coronavirus-us-cases.html" target="_blank">approximately 25,000 new cases daily</a>.</p><p>We have left that plateau. Since mid-June, cases have been surging upwards. Additionally, the percentage of COVID-19 tests that are returning positive <a href="https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/testing/individual-states/arizona" target="_blank">is climbing steeply</a>, indicating that the increase in new cases is not simply a result of more testing, but the result of an increase in spread.</p><p>As of writing this, new deaths per day <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-news/coronavirus-deaths-united-states-each-day-2020-n1177936" target="_blank">have not begun to climb</a>, but some hospitals' intensive care units have <a href="https://www.newsweek.com/texass-largest-hospital-reaches-100-percent-icu-capacity-1513481" target="_blank">recently reached full capacity</a>. In the beginning of the outbreak, deaths often lagged behind confirmed infections. It is likely, as Anthony Fauci, the nation's top infectious-disease specialist said on June 22, that <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/coronavirus-deaths-lag-behind-surging-infections-but-may-catch-up-soon/2020/06/24/22263b50-b620-11ea-a510-55bf26485c93_story.html" target="_blank">deaths will soon follow the surge in new cases</a>.</p>
Different States, Different Trends
<p>Looking at U.S. numbers as a whole hides what is really going on. Different states are in <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/us/coronavirus-us-cases.html" target="_blank">vastly different situations right now</a> and when you look at states individually, four major categories emerge.</p><ol><li>Places where the first wave is ending: States in the Northeast and a few scattered elsewhere experienced large initial spikes but were able to mostly contain the virus and substantially brought down new infections. <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/us/new-york-coronavirus-cases.html" target="_blank">New York</a> is a good example of this.</li><li>Places still in the first wave: Several states in the South and West – see <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/us/texas-coronavirus-cases.html" target="_blank">Texas</a> and <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/us/california-coronavirus-cases.html" target="_blank">California</a> – had some cases early on, but are now seeing massive surges with no sign of slowing down.</li><li>Places in between: Many states were hit early in the first wave, managed to slow it down, but are either at a plateau – like <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/us/north-dakota-coronavirus-cases.html" target="_blank">North Dakota</a> – or are now seeing steep increases – like <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/us/oklahoma-coronavirus-cases.html" target="_blank">Oklahoma</a>.</li><li>Places experiencing local second waves: Looking only at a state level, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/us/hawaii-coronavirus-cases.html" target="_blank">Hawaii</a>, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/us/montana-coronavirus-cases.html" target="_blank">Montana</a> and <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/us/alaska-coronavirus-cases.html" target="_blank">Alaska</a> could be said to be experiencing second waves. Each state experienced relatively small initial outbreaks and was able to reduce spread to single digits of daily new confirmed cases, but are now all seeing spikes again.</li></ol><p>The trends aren't surprising based on how states have been dealing with reopening. The virus will go wherever there are susceptible people and until the U.S. stops community spread across the entire country, the first wave isn't over.</p>What Could a Second Wave Look Like?
<p>It is possible – though at this point it seems unlikely – that the U.S. could control the virus before a vaccine is developed. If that happens, it would be time to start thinking about a second wave. The question of what it might look like depends in large part on everyone's actions.</p><p>The <a href="https://dx.doi.org/10.1086%2F592454" target="_blank">1918 flu pandemic</a> was characterized by a mild first wave in the winter of 1917-1918 that went away in summer. After restrictions were lifted, people very quickly went back to pre-pandemic life. But a second, deadlier strain came back in fall of 1918 and third in spring of 1919. In total, <a href="https://www.cdc.gov/flu/pandemic-resources/1918-commemoration/1918-pandemic-history.htm" target="_blank">more than 500 million people were infected</a> worldwide and upwards of <a href="https://theconversation.com/compare-the-flu-pandemic-of-1918-and-covid-19-with-caution-the-past-is-not-a-prediction-138895" target="_blank">50 million died</a> over the course of three waves.</p><p>It was the combination of a quick return to normal life and a mutation in the flu's genome that made it more deadly that led to the horrific second and third waves.</p><p>Thankfully, the coronavirus appears to be much more <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.meegid.2020.104351" target="_blank">genetically stable</a> than the influenza virus, and thus less likely to mutate into a more deadly variant. That leaves human behavior as the main risk factor.</p><p>Until a <a href="https://theconversation.com/what-needs-to-go-right-to-get-a-coronavirus-vaccine-in-12-18-months-136816" target="_blank">vaccine or effective treatment is developed</a>, the tried-and-true public health measures of the last months – <a href="https://theconversation.com/this-simple-model-shows-the-importance-of-wearing-masks-and-social-distancing-140423" target="_blank">social distancing,</a> <a href="https://theconversation.com/masks-help-stop-the-spread-of-coronavirus-the-science-is-simple-and-im-one-of-100-experts-urging-governors-to-require-public-mask-wearing-138507" target="_blank">universal mask wearing</a>, frequent hand-washing and avoiding crowded indoor spaces – are the ways to stop the first wave and thwart a second one. And when there are surges like what is happening now in the U.S., further reopening plans need to be put on hold.</p>From Your Site Articles
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A Chesapeake Energy drilling rig is located on farmland near Wyalusing, Pennsylvania, on March 20, 2012. Melanie Stetson Freeman / The Christian Science Monitor / Getty Images
By Eoin Higgins
Climate advocates pointed to news Sunday that fracking giant Chesapeake Energy was filing for bankruptcy as further evidence that the fossil fuel industry's collapse is being hastened by the coronavirus pandemic and called for the government to stop propping up businesses in the field.
<p>"Fracking giant Chesapeake Energy just declared bankruptcy thanks to its massive $9 billion debt," <a href="https://twitter.com/foe_us/status/1277644540866965505" target="_blank">tweeted</a> Friends of the Earth. "Meanwhile the Trump administration continues to try and bail out this garbage fire industry with our tax dollars—despite clear risks."</p>
<div id="e5f24" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="6e7171f8e2904f47ed8066a7a21bd48a"><blockquote class="twitter-tweet twitter-custom-tweet" data-twitter-tweet-id="1277573943340171264" data-partner="rebelmouse"><div style="margin:1em 0">The poster company for US fracking has fallen. https://t.co/n1MWs3sszT</div> — Andrew Thaler (@Andrew Thaler)<a href="https://twitter.com/DrAndrewThaler/statuses/1277573943340171264">1593432338.0</a></blockquote></div>
<p>The company, which at its peak in 2008 was <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2020/06/28/chesapeake-energy-once-power-gas-business-files-bankruptcy" target="_blank">valued</a> at $37 billion, had a market capitalization of just $115 million on Friday.</p><p>"The debt bubble made it unable for Chesapeake to maneuver when the pandemic ruined demand for energy," David Dayen <a href="https://prospect.org/coronavirus/unsanitized-medicare-for-coronavirus/" target="_blank">wrote</a> of the bankruptcy for <em>The American Prospect</em>.</p><p>News reports put most of the blame for the bankruptcy on former CEO Aubrey McClendon, who bought up leases and rights around the country as the fracking industry boomed. </p><p>As <em>Forbes</em> <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidblackmon/2020/06/29/chesapeake-energy-finally-succumbs-with-chapter-11-filing/#52549bb56b58" target="_blank">reported</a>, a number of bad business decisions and moves left Chesapeake in bad condition even before gas prices collapsed due to the slowed demand from the pandemic.</p>
<p>According to <em>Forbes</em>:</p><blockquote>As natural gas prices <a title="https://www.eia.gov/dnav/ng/hist/rngwhhdm.htm" href="https://www.eia.gov/dnav/ng/hist/rngwhhdm.htm" target="_blank">collapsed in the late 2000s</a>, McClendon next turned to sales of his own company's assets or portions of working interests in big play areas as a means of continuing to finance and pay down that debt. He sold shares of the company's working interests in the Barnett, the Eagle Ford, the Marcellus and the Haynesville to various other players, like <a title="https://bp.com" href="https://bp.com/" target="_blank">BP</a> and <a title="https://cnooc.com" href="https://cnooc.com/" target="_blank">CNOOC</a>, but every sale also meant less and less cash flow coming into the company itself. Many in the business during that time joked about it being a sort of a pyramid scheme in which the debts would ultimately end up outstripping the company's income and ability to pay.<br><br>McClendon also made the decision in 2010-11 to shift Chesapeake's gas-heavy asset mix to one more heavy in liquids. That strategic decision certainly helped during a time of $100 oil prices, but the bust of 2015-16 and the current COVID-19-related price collapse ultimately proved to heavy a burden for current CEO Doug Lawler—who was brought on board in 2013—and his management team to navigate. A company that once had a market cap of over $37 billion at one point in May saw its market cap drop as low as $200 million. A company that once employed over 8,000 individuals today employs around 2,300.</blockquote>
<p>John Thieroff, a senior analyst at Moody's Investors Service, <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/31f35631-7b7d-4fa1-8eef-6255bf18cf88?segmentId=b0d7e653-3467-12ab-c0f0-77e4424cdb4c" target="_blank">told</a> the <em>Financial Times</em> Sunday he expected other companies to follow suit.</p><p>"There will no doubt be others to file for bankruptcy in the near term as the sector looks to get out from under the copious amount of debt it took on during the boom," said Thieroff.</p><p>President Donald Trump has weighed bailing out the fossil fuel industry as part of a coronavirus pandemic recovery plan. The plans have been met with stiff resistance from environmental groups like Western Values Project, which <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/newswire/2020/05/19/trump-admin-punishes-renewables-while-bailing-out-oil-and-gas" target="_blank">said</a> in May that the move was an example of the White House "using a public health crisis as an excuse to bail out the president's corporate cronies while leaving everyone else to fend for themselves."</p>
<p class=""><em>Reposted with permission from <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/2020/06/29/poster-company-us-fracking-has-fallen-chesapeake-energy-files-bankruptcy" target="_blank">Common Dreams</a>.</em></p>From Your Site Articles
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Youth participate in the Global Climate Strike in Providence, Rhode Island on September 20, 2019. Gabriel Civita Ramirez / CC by 2.0
By Neil King and Gabriel Borrud
Human beings all over the world agreed to strict limitations to their rights when governments made the decision to enter lockdown during the COVID-19 crisis. Many have done it willingly on behalf of the collective. So why can't this same attitude be seen when tackling climate change?
<p>Stephen Reicher is a social psychologist at the University of St. Andrews in Scotland, where he researches collective behavior and social identity. DW spoke to him for <a href="https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/on-the-green-fence/id1474805073" target="_blank">the second season</a> of the environmental podcast <a href="https://www.dw.com/en/environment-podcast-on-the-green-fence/a-48670967" target="_blank">On The Green Fence</a>. </p><p><em>DW: We've watched the collective move very fast in response to this crisis. Were you amazed by that?</em></p><p>Stephen Reicher: At one level, I wasn't. If you look at the literature on what happens in emergencies, the traditional literature plays into this notion of the public as a problem — the idea that human beings are always psychologically frail and they always have difficulty in dealing with complex information. And under a crisis, they crack, they panic. You would never have a Hollywood disaster film without people running, screaming, waving their hands in the air and blocking the exits.</p><p>But actually, that isn't what happens in disasters. When people come together, when they have a sense that others will support them, especially in situations of difficulty, then it makes them better able to cope and more psychologically resilient. Collectivity is the resource that allows us to cope practically, but also psychologically, to get through these times.</p>
<p><em>Why was the response to the coronavirus seemingly so easy, particularly when compared to the far more existential threat of climate change? What is the difference between these two?</em></p><p>The temporality of the issue, the fact that it is immediate, the ways in which it is tangible and the way in which it is unarguable.</p><p>If you are talking about the events that are happening now due to climate change and that are killing people, it is probabilistic that climate change was critical to them. The probabilities are very, very high. But it is not immediately self-evident in the same way that it's evident that somebody is dying from coronavirus. These things become arguable.</p><p>And that's where the second factor comes in, which is the political factor. In some places it has been consensual, and it has been pretty positive. And that's because politicians have not tried to argue or mobilize against compliance with medically necessary measures. In other places, that's not true — in the United States, for instance, where Trump has been supporting those in various states who have been calling it a "lockdown tyranny." And in Brazil, and in India.</p><p>The other absolutely obvious point differentiating coronavirus from climate change are the political differences and the differences in terms of political leadership — in terms of a) how we understand what's going on, and b) how we should respond to what's going on.</p>
<p><em>If I understood you correctly, if there were general consensus and a general realization that we are facing an existential threat and everybody really believed the science, the collective would be moved to action. Is it really that simple or is something else holding us back?</em></p><p>At the moment we are acting collectively towards members of our community who are currently alive, and we can see whether they will live or die. It is much more abstract in the sense of climate change because we are acting for many of those who are not yet born — they might be our children or grandchildren.</p><p>It's the articulation of the psychological and lived experience with the ideological way in which we make sense of it and explain it and are told how to behave. The reason why the political, in many ways, is more powerful in undermining action on climate change is because it is much more abstract. It is a much less direct experience.</p>
<p><em>Do we need role models to catalyze change? And if so, what kind of role models? If Greta Thunberg, for instance, can't pull it off, then who could?</em></p><p>We need leadership. I don't think it's entirely coincidental that some of the countries where coronavirus is raging most dangerously are those with toxic leadership, as in the United States, as in Brazil. Whereas in some of those countries which are doing well — like New Zealand — the leadership takes a very different form indeed.</p><p>Leadership can take many forms. It doesn't have to be traditional. It doesn't have to be hierarchical. It doesn't have to be a single individual. It can be distributed. But you need voices which, firstly, serve to create a sense of community and communal responsibility. Secondly, they need to form a relationship with the public. A leader needs to be seen in many ways as one of us, as acting for us, and as achieving for us, in order to be effective.</p><p><span></span>Leadership is effective to the extent that we believe that a leader is representative of us, understands who we are and what we value. More than ever, we do need good, inclusive leadership that engages with the public rather than imposes on the public.</p>
<p><em>On a personal level, Steve, if you as a social psychologist could mold the change that we'd need to achieve for a sustainable world, how would you go about putting the collective on the right track?</em></p><p>The group is always going to be part of the solution. Groups can do awful things and groups can do magnificent things. The problem doesn't lie in group psychology, per se. It depends on the specific ideologies and cultures that define the groups we belong to. How inclusive or exclusive are they? What are the norms and values that define the nature of our community? Are they values of compassion or are they values of strength and domination? Not all groups are good, but that depends upon the group culture.</p><p>The thing that is absolutely clear, however, is that if you get rid of groups, then you get rid of the one vehicle of change that we've actually got. If you get rid of groups, you freeze the status quo. The power of the powerless lies in their combination. I think we can wield that power for good rather than for ill.</p>
<p><em>Do you think we're going to pull this off? If the science is right, we are running out of time. When it comes to the changes that have to be made, are we going to be magnificent? Are we going to be horrible?</em></p><p>There is a problem with the debate that's going on at the moment. Some people are telling us that coronavirus is going to change the world for the good — we're going to realize that collectivity is terrible, we're going to realize that precarity is destructive and that inequalities kill. And other people are saying, no, no, no, it's going to be completely awful — we're all going to be divided, we're going have a recession which will pit us against each other.</p><p>The danger of making predictions in those forms is that it gives rise to fatalism. Either you believe it's going be awful so there is nothing you can do about it, or you believe it's going to happen anyway and therefore you don't need to do anything about it. Those were the critiques, for instance, of mechanical forms of Marxism.</p><p>I don't think there is any inevitable outcome. I'm not a prophet. If we want to move forward progressively, we've got to harness the power of the collective. We've got to understand how it's within the collective that we become agents who can actually make and change our own world.</p><p>To predict is to be counterproductive. It pacifies people. It says "the future will be like this," rather than to say "we need to fight for the future."</p>
<p class=""><em>Reposted with permission from </em><em><a href="https://www.dw.com/en/coronavirus-and-climate-change-collective-action-is-the-only-way-forward/a-53595386" target="_blank">Deutsche Welle</a>.</em><a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/r/entryeditor/2646306339#/" target="_self"></a></p>From Your Site Articles
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