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What A Week It Was: Apocadocuments from
View By Scenario:
Species Collapse:(8)
Plague/Virus:(1)
Climate Chaos:(6)
Resource Depletion: (4)
Biology Breach:(5)
Recovery:(8)
This Week's Top Ten Very Scary Tags:
ecosystem interrelationships  ~ toxic water  ~ global warming  ~ low-energy future  ~ anthropogenic change  ~ plastic problems  ~ pesticide runoff  ~ technological innovation  ~ rights of nature  ~ toxic buildup  ~ bad policy  



ApocaDocuments (4) matching "toxic water" from this week
[see full week] ~ [see all stories tagged "toxic water"]
Fri, May 22, 2009
from Mongabay:
85 percent of oyster reefs gone
The first global report on the state of shellfish was released today at the International Marine Conservation Congress in Washington, DC. Painting a dire picture for shellfish worldwide, the report found that 85 percent of oyster reefs have vanished.... "We're seeing an unprecedented and alarming decline in the condition of oyster reefs, a critically important habitat in the world's bays and estuaries," said Mike Beck, senior marine scientist at The Nature Conservancy and lead author of the report. Oyster reefs in North America, Europe, and Australia are particularly hard-hit with many of the reef systems considered functionally extinct. Still the majority of wild oysters come from the east coast of North America, where even these productive reefs are in decline. ...


Thank goodness I don't even like oysters.

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Wed, May 20, 2009
from Marine Biological Laboratory, via:
Scientists link influenza A (H1N1) susceptibility to common levels of arsenic exposure
The ability to mount an immune response to influenza A (H1N1) infection is significantly compromised by a low level of arsenic exposure that commonly occurs through drinking contaminated well water, scientists at the Marine Biological Laboratory (MBL) and Dartmouth Medical School have found.... However, in mice that had ingested 100 ppb (parts per billion) arsenic in their drinking water for five weeks, the immune response to H1N1 infection was initially feeble, and when a response finally did kick in days later, it was "too robust and too late," Hamilton says. "There was a massive infiltration of immune cells to the lungs and a massive inflammatory response, which led to bleeding and damage in the lung." Morbidity over the course of the infection was significantly higher for the arsenic-exposed animals than the normal animals.... "One thing that did strike us, when we heard about the recent H1N1 outbreak, is Mexico has large areas of very high arsenic in their well water, including the areas where the flu first cropped up. We don't know that the Mexicans who got the flu were drinking high levels of arsenic, but it's an intriguing notion that this may have contributed," Hamilton says. ...


Next they'll discover that "old lace" is a catalyst for the black plague.

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Wed, May 20, 2009
from Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, via EurekAlert:
Contaminants in marine mammals' brains
The most extensive study of pollutants in marine mammals' brains reveals that these animals are exposed to a hazardous cocktail of pesticides such as DDTs and PCBs, as well as emerging contaminants such as brominated flame retardants.... The chemicals studied include pesticides like DDT, which has been shown to cause cancer and reproductive toxicity, and PCBs, which are neurotoxicants known to disrupt the thyroid hormone system. The study also quantifies concentrations of polybrominated diphenyl ethers or PBDEs (a particular class of flame retardants), which are neurotoxicants that impair the development of motor activity and cognition. This work is the first to quantify concentrations of PBDEs in the brains of marine mammals. The results revealed that concentration of one contaminant was surprisingly high. According to Montie, "The biggest wakeup was that we found parts per million concentrations of hydroxylated PCBs in the cerebrospinal fluid of a gray seal. That is so worrisome for me. You rarely find parts per million levels of anything in the brain." ...


Now, why would marine mammals need flame retardants?

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Mon, May 18, 2009
from Osservatorio Balcani:
Erin Brockovich in Greece
Erin Brockovich arrived in Greece to save the Asopus river, contaminated with high levels of hexavalent chrome, the same heavy metal that the American legal assistant had fought against in California.... Now, the hexavalent chrome and other heavy metals such as nickel have been detected in quantities as 100 times higher than the legal limit in the Asopus river in Boeotia, in central Greece. The river, once suitable for swimming and fishing, springs up on the slopes of Kitheronas Mountains, believed by the ancient Greeks to be the motherland of the Muses. The river provides drinking water to tens of thousands of people in its high stream areas, but its groundwater also reaches millions of residents of Athens.... The pollution of the clear waters of Asopus began back in 1969, when the colonels' dictatorship declared the area an "industrial park" and permitted many companies to discharge unfiltered waste in the river. The results are visible today. In September 2007, the first big alarm came from the agricultural faculty at the University Athens after an analysis of the groundwater that arrives from Boeotia to Attica, an area of Athens. A recent inspection by the parliamentary environmental commission shamefully found the Asopus river to be "completely pure": clearly the factories were given time to do their "spring cleaning". ...


Let's greenlight it: "Erin Brockovich" meets "Z."

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