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California gave her a lifeline; now she fights for others

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Friday, April 5, 2024

Joy Perrin, center, testifies against cutting CalWORKS programs March 20, 2024. Photo by José Luis Villegas for CalMatters Good morning, Inequality Insights readers. I’m CalMatters reporter Wendy Fry.  This week we have two essential stories from our California Divide team that you won’t want to miss.  Reporter Justo Robles reported that the state is considering zeroing out funds for the CalWORKS family stabilization and job subsidy programs to help balance the budget.  He quoted Joy Perrin, a single mother who lived in a van with her two children after fleeing an abusive relationship. A social worker helped her access the CalWORKS program that provides cash assistance, transitional housing and counseling to families in crisis. Now, amid a statewide budget shortfall, Perrin was fighting to save the program that helped save her. She testified at a recent budget hearing. “This program gave me the opportunity to show my children that poverty doesn’t have to be our name,” said Perrin, who now has a safe home and an associate’s degree in biology. “Not only am I a testament of the power of this program, but my children will be able to share their stories and how it can change their path to their future.”  Sometimes government programs fall short. California Divide Reporter Alejandra Reyes-Velarde recently wrote about a faltering deal between the Los Angeles Black Worker Center and the LA Public Works Department that was supposed to produce city jobs for 200 Black workers trained by the center. Instead the city has hired only 49 of 83 people trained; most took sanitation jobs. “We are nowhere near that (200) number for different reasons, some that are not clear or satisfactory to us,” said Yodit Semu, program specialist at the center’s Ready to Work program.  Want to meet people who care about — and have the power to do something about — California’s pressing challenges? CalMatters is hosting its first Ideas Festival June 5-6 in Sacramento. Find out more and sign up here. DON’T MISS Some stories may require a subscription to read. Creative chances. A proposal from the Newsom administration aims to help foster kids catch up on sports and music studies, CalMatters’ Ana Ibarra reports. The program would steer more money to foster children with the greatest needs and set aside funds for them to pursue their passions. Fixed-fee fight. After months of debate, the California Public Utilities Commission proposed the top three utilities charge flat fees of $24.15 a month for their fixed costs (but low-income customers would pay $6 – $12). That’s in addition to charges based on how much electricity people use; those rates would fall by 5 to 7 cents per kilowatt hour. Dozens of elected officials just signed a letter urging repeal of the “utility tax,” and an advocacy group warned “$24 today could turn into $80 tomorrow.”  Digital divide. About 6% of Black, Latino, low-income and non-college-degreed households in California have no internet at all, says the Public Policy Institute, noting that digital access is at an all-time high and the digital divide has narrowed.  Tijuana sewage crisis. The U.S. has stepped into a watchdog role over the Tijuana sewage system, which continually fouls San Diego beaches, says Voice of San Diego. Meanwhile some California border schools, concerned about  students’ health, are asking President Joe Biden and California Gov. Gavin Newsom to declare a sewage state of emergency, the Border Report says.  Sticker shock. Affordable housing often comes with a hefty price tag. Voice of San Diego reports five affordable housing complexes are costing $619,000 to nearly $911,000 per unit to build.  Hair equity. The Assembly’s judiciary committee this week passed a bill that would expand the reach of California’s 2019 CROWN Act —  which bars hair discrimination at schools and workplaces — to also include competitive sports and other situations. Proponents say hairstyle restrictions are sometimes used to discriminate against Black children, especially athletes.  Children in the desert.  A federal judge disagreed with the Biden administration’s position that it bears no responsibility for housing and feeding migrant children who are waiting in makeshift open-air camps along the U.S-Mexico border. The judge said the Department of Homeland Security must process the children and quickly place them somewhere “safe and sanitary.” Many have waited between two border fences in San Diego or in a mountainous area east of the city. Pesticide problem. Assemblymember Laura Friedman, a Democrat from Burbank, announced Wednesday a bill to ban all uses of paraquat, a highly toxic, widely-used weedkiller that has been linked to Parkinson’s disease. The Environmental Protection Agency forbids its use on golf courses, but not on farms. According to the Environmental Working Group, 70% of the places in California where the chemical was sprayed are in census tracts with high numbers of Latino residents.  Neighborhood changes. What happens to schools when neighborhoods gentrify? The Brookings Institution studied Los Angeles, Oakland and San Diego neighborhoods where influxes of middle-income, white residents changed the dynamic. From 2000 to 2019, nearly half the “low-socioeconomic status” neighborhoods experienced gentrification. In LA and Oakland, students’  “exposure” to low-income students declined, but in San Diego it increased. Also gentrifying areas had more charter schools nearby than did non-gentrifying areas. Thanks for following our work on the California Divide team. While you’re here, please tell us what kinds of stories you’d love to read. Email us at inequalityinsights@calmatters.org. Thanks for reading,The California Divide Team

Good morning, Inequality Insights readers. I’m CalMatters reporter Wendy Fry.  This week we have two essential stories from our California Divide team that you won’t want to miss.  Reporter Justo Robles reported that the state is considering zeroing out funds for the CalWORKS family stabilization and job subsidy programs to help balance the budget.  He […]

Joy Perrin, center, sits with Maria Rodriguez-Lopez, right, director of the Fresno County Social Services, while testifying at the Budget Subcommittee No. 2 Human Services hearing at the state Capitol in Sacramento on March 20, 2024. Gov. Gavin Newsom recently proposed cuts to the CalWORKs program. Photo by José Luis Villegas for CalMatters
Joy Perrin, center, sits with Maria Rodriguez-Lopez, right, director of the Fresno County Social Services, while testifying at the Budget Subcommittee No. 2 Human Services hearing at the state Capitol in Sacramento on March 20, 2024. Gov. Gavin Newsom recently proposed cuts to the CalWORKs program. Photo by José Luis Villegas for CalMatters
Joy Perrin, center, testifies against cutting CalWORKS programs March 20, 2024. Photo by José Luis Villegas for CalMatters

Good morning, Inequality Insights readers. I’m CalMatters reporter Wendy Fry. 

This week we have two essential stories from our California Divide team that you won’t want to miss. 

Reporter Justo Robles reported that the state is considering zeroing out funds for the CalWORKS family stabilization and job subsidy programs to help balance the budget. 

He quoted Joy Perrin, a single mother who lived in a van with her two children after fleeing an abusive relationship. A social worker helped her access the CalWORKS program that provides cash assistance, transitional housing and counseling to families in crisis.

Now, amid a statewide budget shortfall, Perrin was fighting to save the program that helped save her. She testified at a recent budget hearing.

“This program gave me the opportunity to show my children that poverty doesn’t have to be our name,” said Perrin, who now has a safe home and an associate’s degree in biology. “Not only am I a testament of the power of this program, but my children will be able to share their stories and how it can change their path to their future.” 

Sometimes government programs fall short. California Divide Reporter Alejandra Reyes-Velarde recently wrote about a faltering deal between the Los Angeles Black Worker Center and the LA Public Works Department that was supposed to produce city jobs for 200 Black workers trained by the center. Instead the city has hired only 49 of 83 people trained; most took sanitation jobs.

“We are nowhere near that (200) number for different reasons, some that are not clear or satisfactory to us,” said Yodit Semu, program specialist at the center’s Ready to Work program. 

Want to meet people who care about — and have the power to do something about — California’s pressing challenges? CalMatters is hosting its first Ideas Festival June 5-6 in Sacramento. Find out more and sign up here.

DON’T MISS

Some stories may require a subscription to read.

  • Creative chances. A proposal from the Newsom administration aims to help foster kids catch up on sports and music studies, CalMatters’ Ana Ibarra reports. The program would steer more money to foster children with the greatest needs and set aside funds for them to pursue their passions.
  • Fixed-fee fight. After months of debate, the California Public Utilities Commission proposed the top three utilities charge flat fees of $24.15 a month for their fixed costs (but low-income customers would pay $6 – $12). That’s in addition to charges based on how much electricity people use; those rates would fall by 5 to 7 cents per kilowatt hour. Dozens of elected officials just signed a letter urging repeal of the “utility tax,” and an advocacy group warned “$24 today could turn into $80 tomorrow.” 
  • Digital divide. About 6% of Black, Latino, low-income and non-college-degreed households in California have no internet at all, says the Public Policy Institute, noting that digital access is at an all-time high and the digital divide has narrowed. 
  • Tijuana sewage crisis. The U.S. has stepped into a watchdog role over the Tijuana sewage system, which continually fouls San Diego beaches, says Voice of San Diego. Meanwhile some California border schools, concerned about  students’ health, are asking President Joe Biden and California Gov. Gavin Newsom to declare a sewage state of emergency, the Border Report says. 
  • Sticker shock. Affordable housing often comes with a hefty price tag. Voice of San Diego reports five affordable housing complexes are costing $619,000 to nearly $911,000 per unit to build. 
  • Hair equity. The Assembly’s judiciary committee this week passed a bill that would expand the reach of California’s 2019 CROWN Act —  which bars hair discrimination at schools and workplaces — to also include competitive sports and other situations. Proponents say hairstyle restrictions are sometimes used to discriminate against Black children, especially athletes. 
  • Children in the desert.  A federal judge disagreed with the Biden administration’s position that it bears no responsibility for housing and feeding migrant children who are waiting in makeshift open-air camps along the U.S-Mexico border. The judge said the Department of Homeland Security must process the children and quickly place them somewhere “safe and sanitary.” Many have waited between two border fences in San Diego or in a mountainous area east of the city.
  • Pesticide problem. Assemblymember Laura Friedman, a Democrat from Burbank, announced Wednesday a bill to ban all uses of paraquat, a highly toxic, widely-used weedkiller that has been linked to Parkinson’s disease. The Environmental Protection Agency forbids its use on golf courses, but not on farms. According to the Environmental Working Group, 70% of the places in California where the chemical was sprayed are in census tracts with high numbers of Latino residents. 
  • Neighborhood changes. What happens to schools when neighborhoods gentrify? The Brookings Institution studied Los Angeles, Oakland and San Diego neighborhoods where influxes of middle-income, white residents changed the dynamic. From 2000 to 2019, nearly half the “low-socioeconomic status” neighborhoods experienced gentrification. In LA and Oakland, students’  “exposure” to low-income students declined, but in San Diego it increased. Also gentrifying areas had more charter schools nearby than did non-gentrifying areas.

Thanks for following our work on the California Divide team. While you’re here, please tell us what kinds of stories you’d love to read. Email us at inequalityinsights@calmatters.org.

Thanks for reading,
The California Divide Team

Read the full story here.
Photos courtesy of

Related News

Companies Legally Use Poison to Make Your Decaf Coffee

Do you drink decaffeinated coffee? Are you aware that it’s often made by applying a chemical so dangerous it was banned for use in paint stripper five years ago? And are you aware that companies think banning this chemical is really, really unfair?This week the Environmental Protection Agency finalized a rule prohibiting all but “critical” uses of methylene chloride, a highly toxic liquid that is believed to have killed at least 88 people since 1980—mostly workers refinishing bathtubs or doing other home renovations. Methylene chloride can cause liver damage and is linked to multiple cancers, among other health effects. Amazingly, while the EPA banned its sale for paint stripping in 2019 for this reason, it continues to be used for a lot of other purposes. And one of those is decaffeinating coffee, because the Food and Drug Administration decided in the 1980s that the risk to coffee drinkers was low given how the coffee was processed.The EPA’s ban on noncritical use of methylene chloride is one of many rules the Biden administration has announced or finalized ahead of the Congressional Review Act deadline. (The CRA, essentially, makes it easier for an unfriendly Congress to nix any administrative regulations finalized in the last 60 days of a legislative session.) A lot of the recently announced rules ban or curtail toxic substances that have made their way into everyday life and are poisoning people. The EPA has limited long-lasting chemicals called PFAS in drinking water, requiring water utilities within five years to build treatment systems that remove it. The agency has categorized two types of PFAS as hazardous substances under the Superfund law, requiring manufacturers to monitor whether they’ve been released into the environment and, if so, clean them up. It has also—finally—fully banned asbestos. It’s finalized a rule to further restrict fine particulate pollution in the air, which has been linked to heart disease, heart attacks, asthma, low birth weight, Alzheimer’s, and other forms of dementia. It’s in the process of finalizing a rule reducing lead in drinking water, which would require the replacement of lead pipes throughout the nation.Banning poison is good politics. As mentioned in last week’s newsletter, while only 47 percent of respondents in a recent CBS News poll supported reentering the Paris climate agreement, 70 percent said they supported reducing toxic chemicals in drinking water. That’s consistent with other polls showing that a majority of people think the federal government is doing too little to protect “lakes, rivers and streams,” and that an overwhelming majority of people—even 68 percent of Republicans—believe the federal government should play some role in “addressing differences across communities in their health risks from pollution and other environmental problems.”But every single time one of these rules is announced, companies and industry groups respond with the most ridiculous statements. Let’s look at just a few recent examples.“A group of coffee makers against banning methylene chloride,” Boston radio station WBUR reported in early April, “recently wrote the FDA saying, ‘True coffee aficionados in blind tastings’ prefer coffee decaffeinated with the chemical.” Who knows how this study was done—“True coffee aficionados” are not known for preferring decaf, period, hence a recent P.R. push to improve decaf’s image. Nick Florko, a reporter for health news website Stat, told WBUR that the coffee makers’ letter to the FDA was a “pretty funny claim if you consider the fact that we’re talking about coffee here that’s essentially rinsed in paint thinner.” And this says nothing at all about what happens to workers involved in the decaffeination process. (Methylene chloride has previously been shown to poison even trained workers wearing protective gear.)National Coffee Association president William Murray said something even weirder, telling CNN via email that banning methylene chloride “would defy science and harm American[s’] health.” His logic appeared to be that since all coffee consumption, including decaf, shows signs of reducing cancer risk overall, it’s not really a problem to decaffeinate coffee using a known carcinogen. That’s loopy even for industry pushback. For one thing, it’s easy to imagine that coffee could be good in general, and less good if you add poison to it. For another, coffee can also be decaffeinated without methylene chloride, using only water. Now let’s look at PFAS pushback. Knowing the EPA rules were in progress, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce in March launched the “Essential Chemistry for America” initiative, with the goal of “protecting ‘forever chemicals’ it deems ‘critical,’” according to E&E News. “We’re increasingly concerned that overly broad regulatory approaches threaten access to modern fluorochemistries, so we’re taking action to ensure their availability,” chamber vice president Marty Durbin said. Given that “access” language is typically used in a social and environmental justice context, restyling the regulation of poisons as threatening “access to modern fluorochemistries” is gutsy, to say the least. The private water industry is meanwhile throwing a fit about being asked to filter out PFAS. The rule will “throw public confidence in drinking water into chaos,” Mike McGill, president of water industry communications firm WaterPIO, told the AP. (You’d think the existence of PFAS in the water is what would tank public confidence, not the requirement that it be removed.) Then there’s the common threat from private water utilities—which, remember, turn a profit off providing a substance people can’t live without—that removing PFAS will increase people’s water bills. Robert Powelson, the head of the National Association of Water Companies, said that the costs of the federal regulation “will disproportionately fall on water and wastewater customers,” according to The Washington Post. “Water utilities do not create or produce PFAS chemicals,” Powelson added. “Yet water systems and their customers are on the front lines of paying for the cleanup of this contamination.”It’s true enough that water utilities are not the ones creating PFAS chemicals. On the other hand, there are lots of water contaminants that water utilities are responsible for filtering out if they want to keep making money from providing people with drinking water. Is there really any reason PFAS shouldn’t be among them? Saying that the cost of this regulation “will disproportionately fall on water and wastewater customers” shouldn’t be read as an expression of sympathy for disadvantaged households. The burden will fall on customers because the utilities will make sure of it. It’s a threat, and one that doesn’t mention the federal money from the Inflation Reduction Act that is being made available to help shoulder that burden. Those funds may well fall short, but that doesn’t change the fact that they’re paying for-profit entities to transition to removing something they ought to have been filtering out long ago. And even if this federal rule hadn’t been made, companies would probably have to start removing PFAS anyway, because they are facing increasingly expensive lawsuits over not doing so. (The water utilities, in turn, are suing polluters to cover remediation costs—another source of funding.)It’s worth emphasizing what PFAS chemicals actually do to people, particularly in light of the American Water Works Association’s assertion to the AP that the cost of removing the chemicals “can’t be justified for communities with low levels of PFAS.” Researchers are now pretty sure that PFAS exposure increases the risk of dying from cardiovascular disease. Studying people in northern Italy who drank PFAS-contaminated water, researchers also saw increased rates of kidney and testicular cancer. The Guardian report on this contained this disturbing finding too: Women with multiple children had lower levels of PFAS only because pregnancy transferred PFAS into their children’s bodies instead.Don’t let that get in the way of a good comms statement from industry groups, though. Remember: Forcing companies even to report their PFAS pollution, or remove PFAS from the water, is unfair.Good News/Bad NewsTwenty-nine-year-old Andrea Vidaurre has won the Goldman Environmental Prize for her work in environmental justice, pushing California to adopt new standards for truck and rail emissions that will curtail the air pollution harming working-class Latino communities in California’s Inland Empire. The United States has sided with petrostates in opposing production controls on plastic at the negotiations in Ottawa for a U.N. treaty to reduce plastic pollution. (Two weeks ago, I wrote about these negotiations, noting that the number of plastics industry lobbyists attending this session was not yet known. Now it is: 196 lobbyists from the fossil fuel and chemical industries registered for this round, according to the Center for International Environmental Law—a 37 percent increase from the number at the last session.)Stat of the Week9.6%That’s the percentage of the 250 most popular fictional films released between 2013 and 2022 in which climate change exists and a character depicted on screen knows it, according to a new “Climate Reality Check” analysis from Colby University and Good Energy. Read Sammy Roth’s newsletter about why climate change in movies is so important here.What I’m ReadingBig Oil privately acknowledged efforts to downplay climate crisis, joint committee investigation findsCongressional Democrats this week released a report confirming what news outlets have previously reported: Companies like Exxon knew about climate change very early on and covered it up. They also found in subpoenaed emails that Exxon tried to discredit reporting of its duplicity, while privately acknowledging that it was true:The new revelations build on 2015 reporting from Inside Climate News and the Los Angeles Times, which found that Exxon was for decades aware of the dangers of the climate crisis, yet hid that from the public.At the time, Exxon publicly rejected the journalists’ findings outright, calling them “inaccurate and deliberately misleading.” … But in internal communications, Exxon confirmed the validity of the reporting. In a December 2015 email about a potential public response to the investigative reporting, Exxon communications advisor Pamela Kevelson admitted the company did not “dispute much of what these stories report.” … “It’s true that Inside Climate News originally accused us of working against science but ultimately modified their accusation to working against policies meant to stop climate change,” Alan Jeffers, then a spokesperson for Exxon, wrote in a 2016 email to Kevelson. “I’m OK either way, since they were both true at one time or another.”Read Dharna Noor’s report in The Guardian.This article first appeared in Life in a Warming World, a weekly TNR newsletter authored by deputy editor Heather Souvaine Horn. Sign up here.

Do you drink decaffeinated coffee? Are you aware that it’s often made by applying a chemical so dangerous it was banned for use in paint stripper five years ago? And are you aware that companies think banning this chemical is really, really unfair?This week the Environmental Protection Agency finalized a rule prohibiting all but “critical” uses of methylene chloride, a highly toxic liquid that is believed to have killed at least 88 people since 1980—mostly workers refinishing bathtubs or doing other home renovations. Methylene chloride can cause liver damage and is linked to multiple cancers, among other health effects. Amazingly, while the EPA banned its sale for paint stripping in 2019 for this reason, it continues to be used for a lot of other purposes. And one of those is decaffeinating coffee, because the Food and Drug Administration decided in the 1980s that the risk to coffee drinkers was low given how the coffee was processed.The EPA’s ban on noncritical use of methylene chloride is one of many rules the Biden administration has announced or finalized ahead of the Congressional Review Act deadline. (The CRA, essentially, makes it easier for an unfriendly Congress to nix any administrative regulations finalized in the last 60 days of a legislative session.) A lot of the recently announced rules ban or curtail toxic substances that have made their way into everyday life and are poisoning people. The EPA has limited long-lasting chemicals called PFAS in drinking water, requiring water utilities within five years to build treatment systems that remove it. The agency has categorized two types of PFAS as hazardous substances under the Superfund law, requiring manufacturers to monitor whether they’ve been released into the environment and, if so, clean them up. It has also—finally—fully banned asbestos. It’s finalized a rule to further restrict fine particulate pollution in the air, which has been linked to heart disease, heart attacks, asthma, low birth weight, Alzheimer’s, and other forms of dementia. It’s in the process of finalizing a rule reducing lead in drinking water, which would require the replacement of lead pipes throughout the nation.Banning poison is good politics. As mentioned in last week’s newsletter, while only 47 percent of respondents in a recent CBS News poll supported reentering the Paris climate agreement, 70 percent said they supported reducing toxic chemicals in drinking water. That’s consistent with other polls showing that a majority of people think the federal government is doing too little to protect “lakes, rivers and streams,” and that an overwhelming majority of people—even 68 percent of Republicans—believe the federal government should play some role in “addressing differences across communities in their health risks from pollution and other environmental problems.”But every single time one of these rules is announced, companies and industry groups respond with the most ridiculous statements. Let’s look at just a few recent examples.“A group of coffee makers against banning methylene chloride,” Boston radio station WBUR reported in early April, “recently wrote the FDA saying, ‘True coffee aficionados in blind tastings’ prefer coffee decaffeinated with the chemical.” Who knows how this study was done—“True coffee aficionados” are not known for preferring decaf, period, hence a recent P.R. push to improve decaf’s image. Nick Florko, a reporter for health news website Stat, told WBUR that the coffee makers’ letter to the FDA was a “pretty funny claim if you consider the fact that we’re talking about coffee here that’s essentially rinsed in paint thinner.” And this says nothing at all about what happens to workers involved in the decaffeination process. (Methylene chloride has previously been shown to poison even trained workers wearing protective gear.)National Coffee Association president William Murray said something even weirder, telling CNN via email that banning methylene chloride “would defy science and harm American[s’] health.” His logic appeared to be that since all coffee consumption, including decaf, shows signs of reducing cancer risk overall, it’s not really a problem to decaffeinate coffee using a known carcinogen. That’s loopy even for industry pushback. For one thing, it’s easy to imagine that coffee could be good in general, and less good if you add poison to it. For another, coffee can also be decaffeinated without methylene chloride, using only water. Now let’s look at PFAS pushback. Knowing the EPA rules were in progress, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce in March launched the “Essential Chemistry for America” initiative, with the goal of “protecting ‘forever chemicals’ it deems ‘critical,’” according to E&E News. “We’re increasingly concerned that overly broad regulatory approaches threaten access to modern fluorochemistries, so we’re taking action to ensure their availability,” chamber vice president Marty Durbin said. Given that “access” language is typically used in a social and environmental justice context, restyling the regulation of poisons as threatening “access to modern fluorochemistries” is gutsy, to say the least. The private water industry is meanwhile throwing a fit about being asked to filter out PFAS. The rule will “throw public confidence in drinking water into chaos,” Mike McGill, president of water industry communications firm WaterPIO, told the AP. (You’d think the existence of PFAS in the water is what would tank public confidence, not the requirement that it be removed.) Then there’s the common threat from private water utilities—which, remember, turn a profit off providing a substance people can’t live without—that removing PFAS will increase people’s water bills. Robert Powelson, the head of the National Association of Water Companies, said that the costs of the federal regulation “will disproportionately fall on water and wastewater customers,” according to The Washington Post. “Water utilities do not create or produce PFAS chemicals,” Powelson added. “Yet water systems and their customers are on the front lines of paying for the cleanup of this contamination.”It’s true enough that water utilities are not the ones creating PFAS chemicals. On the other hand, there are lots of water contaminants that water utilities are responsible for filtering out if they want to keep making money from providing people with drinking water. Is there really any reason PFAS shouldn’t be among them? Saying that the cost of this regulation “will disproportionately fall on water and wastewater customers” shouldn’t be read as an expression of sympathy for disadvantaged households. The burden will fall on customers because the utilities will make sure of it. It’s a threat, and one that doesn’t mention the federal money from the Inflation Reduction Act that is being made available to help shoulder that burden. Those funds may well fall short, but that doesn’t change the fact that they’re paying for-profit entities to transition to removing something they ought to have been filtering out long ago. And even if this federal rule hadn’t been made, companies would probably have to start removing PFAS anyway, because they are facing increasingly expensive lawsuits over not doing so. (The water utilities, in turn, are suing polluters to cover remediation costs—another source of funding.)It’s worth emphasizing what PFAS chemicals actually do to people, particularly in light of the American Water Works Association’s assertion to the AP that the cost of removing the chemicals “can’t be justified for communities with low levels of PFAS.” Researchers are now pretty sure that PFAS exposure increases the risk of dying from cardiovascular disease. Studying people in northern Italy who drank PFAS-contaminated water, researchers also saw increased rates of kidney and testicular cancer. The Guardian report on this contained this disturbing finding too: Women with multiple children had lower levels of PFAS only because pregnancy transferred PFAS into their children’s bodies instead.Don’t let that get in the way of a good comms statement from industry groups, though. Remember: Forcing companies even to report their PFAS pollution, or remove PFAS from the water, is unfair.Good News/Bad NewsTwenty-nine-year-old Andrea Vidaurre has won the Goldman Environmental Prize for her work in environmental justice, pushing California to adopt new standards for truck and rail emissions that will curtail the air pollution harming working-class Latino communities in California’s Inland Empire. The United States has sided with petrostates in opposing production controls on plastic at the negotiations in Ottawa for a U.N. treaty to reduce plastic pollution. (Two weeks ago, I wrote about these negotiations, noting that the number of plastics industry lobbyists attending this session was not yet known. Now it is: 196 lobbyists from the fossil fuel and chemical industries registered for this round, according to the Center for International Environmental Law—a 37 percent increase from the number at the last session.)Stat of the Week9.6%That’s the percentage of the 250 most popular fictional films released between 2013 and 2022 in which climate change exists and a character depicted on screen knows it, according to a new “Climate Reality Check” analysis from Colby University and Good Energy. Read Sammy Roth’s newsletter about why climate change in movies is so important here.What I’m ReadingBig Oil privately acknowledged efforts to downplay climate crisis, joint committee investigation findsCongressional Democrats this week released a report confirming what news outlets have previously reported: Companies like Exxon knew about climate change very early on and covered it up. They also found in subpoenaed emails that Exxon tried to discredit reporting of its duplicity, while privately acknowledging that it was true:The new revelations build on 2015 reporting from Inside Climate News and the Los Angeles Times, which found that Exxon was for decades aware of the dangers of the climate crisis, yet hid that from the public.At the time, Exxon publicly rejected the journalists’ findings outright, calling them “inaccurate and deliberately misleading.” … But in internal communications, Exxon confirmed the validity of the reporting. In a December 2015 email about a potential public response to the investigative reporting, Exxon communications advisor Pamela Kevelson admitted the company did not “dispute much of what these stories report.” … “It’s true that Inside Climate News originally accused us of working against science but ultimately modified their accusation to working against policies meant to stop climate change,” Alan Jeffers, then a spokesperson for Exxon, wrote in a 2016 email to Kevelson. “I’m OK either way, since they were both true at one time or another.”Read Dharna Noor’s report in The Guardian.This article first appeared in Life in a Warming World, a weekly TNR newsletter authored by deputy editor Heather Souvaine Horn. Sign up here.

Chemicals
Climate
Crisis

Op-ed: When it comes to food chemicals, Europe’s food safety agency and the FDA are oceans apart

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) are two major global agencies in charge of food chemical safety. It is common to hear that food chemical regulations in the EU are more protective of human health than in the U.S. The latest example is the recent ban of four food additives in California. The state’s Governor, Gavin Newsom, noted that the chemicals were already banned in the EU, implying that the lack of action by the FDA was putting the health of Californians at risk. We examined the FDA and EFSA’s responsibilities on food chemical safety to better understand why EFSA decisions are in general more protective of health. We specifically looked at the agencies’ approach to the safety of bisphenol-A (BPA) as an example of disparate decision-making.We found that in the EU the risk assessment and risk management of food chemicals are made by different entities: EFSA focuses on science and the European Commission decides on how the risk is managed. EFSA is independent to follow the science on BPA, for example, which resulted in three risk assessments with the last one showing greater harm to human health. In contrast, the FDA conducts both risk assessment and management and it is unclear how decisions are made. Over the years, the FDA has reviewed BPA studies but continued to maintain that its uses are safe.As the FDA undergoes a reorganization, the agency has a prime opportunity to increase transparency, collaborations and update its approach to evaluating food chemical safety. Separation of risk assessment and management Both in the EU and the U.S., the safety of chemicals allowed in food is based on the chemical’s inherent hazard and the level of exposure. If the risk is such that public health must be protected, a risk management decision is made, often via regulation. These decisions could range from banning chemicals to establishing a consumption level that would not increase health risks. "EFSA focuses on science and the European Commission decides on how the risk is managed ... In contrast, the FDA conducts both risk assessment and management and it is unclear how decisions are made."In the EU, the risk assessment and the risk management decisions are made by different entities. EFSA conducts risk assessments and the European Commission then makes the risk management decision based on EFSA’s findings. This separation allows the risk assessment to be grounded in science and the risk management to consider not only the science but also social, political, technological and economic factors, as well as the precautionary principle.In the U.S., the FDA conducts both risk assessment and management.Striking differences in assessing and managing riskThe EFSA relies on scientific panels composed of independent experts with high standards to limit conflicts of interest and bias. There are ten permanent panels and a scientific committee that supports their work. The scientific opinions are often unanimous, but when they’re not, minority reports are published in the EFSA Journal and also inform the European Commission’s risk management decisions.Unlike the EFSA, FDA staff review safety assessment and information provided by manufacturers. In a safety assessment there usually are four sections: toxicology, chemistry, environmental impact and policy; but it is unclear whether there is an epidemiologist among the reviewers. One FDA staff member from each section writes a memo with a summary of information and the conclusions. These memos inform the risk management decision about the use of a substance. The scientific evaluation is not always publicly available. It is also unclear how and by whom risk management decisions are made and whether the risk assessors are also involved in risk management. Prioritization of chemicals for reassessmentThe EFSA is mandated by law to re-evaluate all food additives authorized for use before 2009. The EFSA also identifies emerging risks and collects data about things like consumption, exposure and biological risk and responds to similar requests from member states.In the U.S., there is no legal mandate for the FDA to re-evaluate the use of the approximately 10,000 chemicals allowed in food, many of them authorized decades ago with little or no safety data. It is unclear if there is a process to identify emerging risks. The first reevaluation of chemicals was in response to President Nixon’s 1969 directive to reassess hundreds of substances the FDA determined to be generally recognized as safe. Only recently, the FDA took the initiative to re-evaluate the safety of partially-hydrogenated oil, Irgafos 168 and brominated vegetable oil. Other reevaluations have been in response to petitions from public interest organizations. BPA: A tale of two agenciesThe risk assessment of BPA — which has been linked to myriad health problems including cancer, diabetes, obesity, reproductive, immune system and nervous and behavioral problems — in food-contact materials is a good example of how two science-based agencies have made very different risk management decisions.EFSA conducted risk assessments of BPA in 2006, 2015 and 2023, each time at the request of the European Commission in response to new science. The second and third re-evaluations resulted in reductions in the daily allowed exposure of BPA due to new evidence showing greater harm to human health. To complete the process, the Commission recently published its proposed regulation of BPA, which includes a ban of most common uses in polycarbonate plastic and metal can coating.The FDA assessment of BPA has been riddled with missteps and lack of transparency. The FDA approved BPA for use in food contact applications in the early 1960s. It didn’t a draft safety assessment until 2008, at the request of its commissioner in light of findings by the National Toxicology Program and ongoing evaluations in Europe. FDA then asked its Science Board to review the draft and establish a subcommittee; there was also a public meeting and a report. The subcommittee, which included some members of the board and external experts, had several concerns about FDA’s assessment. In 2014, the FDA published a memo summarizing an updated safety assessment of BPA. The five-page memo cites the toxicology evaluation conducted in previous years and exposure assessment using an unpublished model. The agency concluded that the estimated consumption amount of BPA was safe to protect children and adults. This was the FDA's last safety assessment. Unlike the EFSA, the FDA process is less structured and open. At the FDA "it is also unclear how and by whom risk management decisions are made and whether the risk assessors are also involved in risk management."The FDA has conducted its own studies on BPA at different life stages and in different species. The agency was a member of the Consortium Linking Academic and Regulatory Insights on BPA Toxicity (CLARITY-BPA). Launched in 2012 by the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, the National Toxicology Program and the FDA, the aim of CLARITY was to combine a traditional regulatory toxicology study from the government and investigational studies from academics who wield more modern techniques. As part of CLARITY, the FDA also conducted a two-year guideline compliant study on BPA toxicity. In 2018, FDA concluded that “currently authorized uses of BPA continue to be safe for consumers.” This statement was based on the results of only the first year of the CLARITY two-year study conducted by FDA according to its toxicity guideline and did not include analysis of data produced by the multiple academic laboratories involved in the project. Furthermore, it was not based on an assessment of risk which also necessitates exposure data. Meanwhile, the results of CLARITY, including the academic studies largely ignored by the FDA, played an important role in EFSA’s latest BPA risk assessment. Unlike EFSA, the FDA has not made public the criteria applied to select the data, to evaluate and appraise the studies included in the hazard assessment, or the weight of evidence methodology used in its current reassessment of BPA. The lack of transparency was a concern previously expressed by FDA’s Science Board subcommittee in 2008.A “deep misunderstanding” of the risk assessment and management distinctionEFSA’s independence from risk management decisions and recruitment of independent experts to conduct risk assessments gives the agency the freedom to follow the science. By comparison, the FDA has stagnated.One explanation for such a difference would be FDA’s strong adherence to its historical decisions, rather than considering more recent science. This bias toward their own work is not conducive to change. Another explanation would be FDA scientists conflating risk assessment and risk management. In 2013, the FDA conducted a review of its chemical safety program and an external consultant noted that there appeared to be a “deep misunderstanding of the risk assessment – risk management distinction” among the staff. This observation is apparent in a commentary in Nature in 2010, where FDA toxicologists said that dismissing “out of hand” risk management factors such as economics, benefits of existing technologies, cost of replacing banned technologies and the toxic risk of any replacement “is, to say the least, insular, and surely imprudent in a regulatory setting.” The consultant added that FDA staff suggested that the agency “should not be too quick to adopt new scientific approaches.” Such an approach has likely deterred its scientists from acting on new evidence.FDA is undergoing a reorganization, including the creation of a new Human Food Program. Almost a year ago, the agency announced it was “embarking on a more modernized, systematic reassessment of chemicals with a focus on post-market review.” For this to be successful, the FDA should adopt updated processes and methods, include outside experts when it encounters challenging scientific or technical issues, increase collaboration with other agencies, and engage with stakeholders including consumers, academic institutions, public interest organizations and industry. But above all, the FDA must restore the public’s trust in the agency with a strong commitment to transparency in decision-making and clear separation between risk assessment and risk management.For more information check these summary tables.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) are two major global agencies in charge of food chemical safety. It is common to hear that food chemical regulations in the EU are more protective of human health than in the U.S. The latest example is the recent ban of four food additives in California. The state’s Governor, Gavin Newsom, noted that the chemicals were already banned in the EU, implying that the lack of action by the FDA was putting the health of Californians at risk. We examined the FDA and EFSA’s responsibilities on food chemical safety to better understand why EFSA decisions are in general more protective of health. We specifically looked at the agencies’ approach to the safety of bisphenol-A (BPA) as an example of disparate decision-making.We found that in the EU the risk assessment and risk management of food chemicals are made by different entities: EFSA focuses on science and the European Commission decides on how the risk is managed. EFSA is independent to follow the science on BPA, for example, which resulted in three risk assessments with the last one showing greater harm to human health. In contrast, the FDA conducts both risk assessment and management and it is unclear how decisions are made. Over the years, the FDA has reviewed BPA studies but continued to maintain that its uses are safe.As the FDA undergoes a reorganization, the agency has a prime opportunity to increase transparency, collaborations and update its approach to evaluating food chemical safety. Separation of risk assessment and management Both in the EU and the U.S., the safety of chemicals allowed in food is based on the chemical’s inherent hazard and the level of exposure. If the risk is such that public health must be protected, a risk management decision is made, often via regulation. These decisions could range from banning chemicals to establishing a consumption level that would not increase health risks. "EFSA focuses on science and the European Commission decides on how the risk is managed ... In contrast, the FDA conducts both risk assessment and management and it is unclear how decisions are made."In the EU, the risk assessment and the risk management decisions are made by different entities. EFSA conducts risk assessments and the European Commission then makes the risk management decision based on EFSA’s findings. This separation allows the risk assessment to be grounded in science and the risk management to consider not only the science but also social, political, technological and economic factors, as well as the precautionary principle.In the U.S., the FDA conducts both risk assessment and management.Striking differences in assessing and managing riskThe EFSA relies on scientific panels composed of independent experts with high standards to limit conflicts of interest and bias. There are ten permanent panels and a scientific committee that supports their work. The scientific opinions are often unanimous, but when they’re not, minority reports are published in the EFSA Journal and also inform the European Commission’s risk management decisions.Unlike the EFSA, FDA staff review safety assessment and information provided by manufacturers. In a safety assessment there usually are four sections: toxicology, chemistry, environmental impact and policy; but it is unclear whether there is an epidemiologist among the reviewers. One FDA staff member from each section writes a memo with a summary of information and the conclusions. These memos inform the risk management decision about the use of a substance. The scientific evaluation is not always publicly available. It is also unclear how and by whom risk management decisions are made and whether the risk assessors are also involved in risk management. Prioritization of chemicals for reassessmentThe EFSA is mandated by law to re-evaluate all food additives authorized for use before 2009. The EFSA also identifies emerging risks and collects data about things like consumption, exposure and biological risk and responds to similar requests from member states.In the U.S., there is no legal mandate for the FDA to re-evaluate the use of the approximately 10,000 chemicals allowed in food, many of them authorized decades ago with little or no safety data. It is unclear if there is a process to identify emerging risks. The first reevaluation of chemicals was in response to President Nixon’s 1969 directive to reassess hundreds of substances the FDA determined to be generally recognized as safe. Only recently, the FDA took the initiative to re-evaluate the safety of partially-hydrogenated oil, Irgafos 168 and brominated vegetable oil. Other reevaluations have been in response to petitions from public interest organizations. BPA: A tale of two agenciesThe risk assessment of BPA — which has been linked to myriad health problems including cancer, diabetes, obesity, reproductive, immune system and nervous and behavioral problems — in food-contact materials is a good example of how two science-based agencies have made very different risk management decisions.EFSA conducted risk assessments of BPA in 2006, 2015 and 2023, each time at the request of the European Commission in response to new science. The second and third re-evaluations resulted in reductions in the daily allowed exposure of BPA due to new evidence showing greater harm to human health. To complete the process, the Commission recently published its proposed regulation of BPA, which includes a ban of most common uses in polycarbonate plastic and metal can coating.The FDA assessment of BPA has been riddled with missteps and lack of transparency. The FDA approved BPA for use in food contact applications in the early 1960s. It didn’t a draft safety assessment until 2008, at the request of its commissioner in light of findings by the National Toxicology Program and ongoing evaluations in Europe. FDA then asked its Science Board to review the draft and establish a subcommittee; there was also a public meeting and a report. The subcommittee, which included some members of the board and external experts, had several concerns about FDA’s assessment. In 2014, the FDA published a memo summarizing an updated safety assessment of BPA. The five-page memo cites the toxicology evaluation conducted in previous years and exposure assessment using an unpublished model. The agency concluded that the estimated consumption amount of BPA was safe to protect children and adults. This was the FDA's last safety assessment. Unlike the EFSA, the FDA process is less structured and open. At the FDA "it is also unclear how and by whom risk management decisions are made and whether the risk assessors are also involved in risk management."The FDA has conducted its own studies on BPA at different life stages and in different species. The agency was a member of the Consortium Linking Academic and Regulatory Insights on BPA Toxicity (CLARITY-BPA). Launched in 2012 by the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, the National Toxicology Program and the FDA, the aim of CLARITY was to combine a traditional regulatory toxicology study from the government and investigational studies from academics who wield more modern techniques. As part of CLARITY, the FDA also conducted a two-year guideline compliant study on BPA toxicity. In 2018, FDA concluded that “currently authorized uses of BPA continue to be safe for consumers.” This statement was based on the results of only the first year of the CLARITY two-year study conducted by FDA according to its toxicity guideline and did not include analysis of data produced by the multiple academic laboratories involved in the project. Furthermore, it was not based on an assessment of risk which also necessitates exposure data. Meanwhile, the results of CLARITY, including the academic studies largely ignored by the FDA, played an important role in EFSA’s latest BPA risk assessment. Unlike EFSA, the FDA has not made public the criteria applied to select the data, to evaluate and appraise the studies included in the hazard assessment, or the weight of evidence methodology used in its current reassessment of BPA. The lack of transparency was a concern previously expressed by FDA’s Science Board subcommittee in 2008.A “deep misunderstanding” of the risk assessment and management distinctionEFSA’s independence from risk management decisions and recruitment of independent experts to conduct risk assessments gives the agency the freedom to follow the science. By comparison, the FDA has stagnated.One explanation for such a difference would be FDA’s strong adherence to its historical decisions, rather than considering more recent science. This bias toward their own work is not conducive to change. Another explanation would be FDA scientists conflating risk assessment and risk management. In 2013, the FDA conducted a review of its chemical safety program and an external consultant noted that there appeared to be a “deep misunderstanding of the risk assessment – risk management distinction” among the staff. This observation is apparent in a commentary in Nature in 2010, where FDA toxicologists said that dismissing “out of hand” risk management factors such as economics, benefits of existing technologies, cost of replacing banned technologies and the toxic risk of any replacement “is, to say the least, insular, and surely imprudent in a regulatory setting.” The consultant added that FDA staff suggested that the agency “should not be too quick to adopt new scientific approaches.” Such an approach has likely deterred its scientists from acting on new evidence.FDA is undergoing a reorganization, including the creation of a new Human Food Program. Almost a year ago, the agency announced it was “embarking on a more modernized, systematic reassessment of chemicals with a focus on post-market review.” For this to be successful, the FDA should adopt updated processes and methods, include outside experts when it encounters challenging scientific or technical issues, increase collaboration with other agencies, and engage with stakeholders including consumers, academic institutions, public interest organizations and industry. But above all, the FDA must restore the public’s trust in the agency with a strong commitment to transparency in decision-making and clear separation between risk assessment and risk management.For more information check these summary tables.

Chemicals
Food
Health

Fiery 5,000 MPH Winds: Webb Maps Weather on Extreme Exoplanet WASP-43 b

WASP-43 b is cloudy on the nightside and clear on the dayside, with equatorial winds howling around the planet at 5,000 miles per hour. Sometimes...

This artist’s concept shows what the hot gas-giant exoplanet WASP-43 b could look like. WASP-43 b is a Jupiter-sized planet circling a star roughly 280 light-years away, in the constellation Sextans. The planet orbits at a distance of about 1.3 million miles (0.014 astronomical units, or AU), completing one circuit in about 19.5 hours. Because it is so close to its star, WASP-43 b is probably tidally locked: its rotation rate and orbital period are the same, such that one side faces the star at all times. Credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, Ralf Crawford (STScI)WASP-43 b is cloudy on the nightside and clear on the dayside, with equatorial winds howling around the planet at 5,000 miles per hour.Sometimes not finding something is just as exciting and useful as finding it. Take hot Jupiter WASP-43 b, for example. This tidally locked world has a searing-hot, permanent dayside and a somewhat cooler nightside. Astronomers using Webb to map the temperature and analyze the atmosphere around the planet expected to detect methane, a common carbon molecule, on the nightside. But there is clearly no sign of it. Why? The result suggests that supersonic winds of hot gas are blowing around from the dayside, thoroughly churning up the atmosphere, and preventing the chemical reactions that would otherwise produce methane on the nightside.This light curve shows the change in brightness of the WASP-43 system over time as the planet orbits the star. This type of light curve is known as a phase curve because it includes the entire orbit, or all phases of the planet.Because it is tidally locked, different sides of WASP-43 b rotate into view as it orbits. The system appears brightest when the hot dayside is facing the telescope, just before and after the secondary eclipse when the planet passes behind the star. The system grows dimmer as the planet continues its orbits and the nightside rotates into view. After the transit when the planet passes in front of the star, blocking some of the starlight, the system brightens again as the dayside rotates back into view.Credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, Ralf Crawford (STScI), Taylor Bell (BAERI), Joanna Barstow (The Open University), Michael Roman (University of Leicester)Webb Space Telescope Maps Weather on Planet 280 Light-Years AwayAn international team of researchers has successfully used NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope to map the weather on the hot gas-giant exoplanet WASP-43 b.Precise brightness measurements over a broad spectrum of mid-infrared light, combined with 3D climate models and previous observations from other telescopes, suggest the presence of thick, high clouds covering the nightside, clear skies on the dayside, and equatorial winds upwards of 5,000 miles per hour mixing atmospheric gases around the planet. The investigation is just the latest demonstration of the exoplanet science now possible with Webb’s extraordinary ability to measure temperature variations and detect atmospheric gases trillions of miles away.Tidally Locked “Hot Jupiter”WASP-43 b is a “hot Jupiter” type of exoplanet: similar in size to Jupiter, made primarily of hydrogen and helium, and much hotter than any of the giant planets in our own solar system. Although its star is smaller and cooler than the Sun, WASP-43 b orbits at a distance of just 1.3 million miles – less than 1/25th the distance between Mercury and the Sun.With such a tight orbit, the planet is tidally locked, with one side continuously illuminated and the other in permanent darkness. Although the nightside never receives any direct radiation from the star, strong eastward winds transport heat around from the dayside.Since its discovery in 2011, WASP-43 b has been observed with numerous telescopes, including NASA’s Hubble and now-retired Spitzer space telescopes.“With Hubble, we could clearly see that there is water vapor on the dayside. Both Hubble and Spitzer suggested there might be clouds on the nightside,” explained Taylor Bell, researcher from the Bay Area Environmental Research Institute and lead author of a study published on April 30 in Nature Astronomy. “But we needed more precise measurements from Webb to really begin mapping the temperature, cloud cover, winds, and more detailed atmospheric composition all the way around the planet.”This simplified diagram of an exoplanet phase curve shows the change in total brightness of a star–planet system as the planet orbits the star. The system looks brighter when more of the lit side of the planet is facing the telescope (full phase). It looks dimmer when more of the dark side is facing the telescope (new phase), when the planet is blocking some of the starlight (transit), and when light from the planet is blocked by the star (secondary eclipse).(Top) Diagram showing the change in a planet’s phase (the amount of the lit side facing the telescope) as it orbits its star.(Bottom) Three-dimensional graph showing the change in the total brightness of the star–planet system as the planet orbits its star. In this graph, known as a light curve, the horizontal plane is orbital location and the vertical axis is brightness.(Right) Scale bar. In both the orbital diagram and the light curve, color indicates the observed brightness of the star + planet: from dark purple (less amount of light detected) to white (more light detected).Researchers use phase curves to study variations in reflectivity and temperature of a planet with longitude (from one side to another), which can provide insight into the surface composition and atmospheric conditions of the planet.Credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, Dani Player (STScI), Andi James (STScI), Greg Bacon (STScI)Mapping Temperature and Inferring WeatherAlthough WASP-43 b is too small, dim, and close to its star for a telescope to see directly, its short orbital period of just 19.5 hours makes it ideal for phase curve spectroscopy, a technique that involves measuring tiny changes in brightness of the star-planet system as the planet orbits the star.Since the amount of mid-infrared light given off by an object depends largely on how hot it is, the brightness data captured by Webb can then be used to calculate the planet’s temperature.The team used Webb’s MIRI (Mid-Infrared Instrument) to measure light from the WASP-43 system every 10 seconds for more than 24 hours. “By observing over an entire orbit, we were able to calculate the temperature of different sides of the planet as they rotate into view,” explained Bell. “From that, we could construct a rough map of temperature across the planet.”The measurements show that the dayside has an average temperature of nearly 2,300 degrees Fahrenheit (1,250 degrees Celsius) – hot enough to forge iron. Meanwhile, the nightside is significantly cooler at 1,100 degrees Fahrenheit (600 degrees Celsius). The data also helps locate the hottest spot on the planet (the “hotspot”), which is shifted slightly eastward from the point that receives the most stellar radiation, where the star is highest in the planet’s sky. This shift occurs because of supersonic winds, which move heated air eastward.“The fact that we can map temperature in this way is a real testament to Webb’s sensitivity and stability,” said Michael Roman, a co-author from the University of Leicester in the U.K.To interpret the map, the team used complex 3D atmospheric models like those used to understand weather and climate on Earth. The analysis shows that the nightside is probably covered in a thick, high layer of clouds that prevent some of the infrared light from escaping to space. As a result, the nightside – while very hot – looks dimmer and cooler than it would if there were no clouds.This set of maps shows the temperature of the visible side of the hot gas-giant exoplanet WASP-43 b, as the planet orbits its star. The temperatures were calculated based on more than 8,000 brightness measurements of 5- to 12-micron mid-infrared light detected from the star-planet system by MIRI (the Mid-Infrared Instrument) on NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope. In general, the hotter an object is, the more mid-infrared light it gives off. Credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, Ralf Crawford (STScI), Taylor Bell (BAERI), Joanna Barstow (The Open University), Michael Roman (University of Leicester)Missing Methane and High WindsThe broad spectrum of mid-infrared light captured by Webb also made it possible to measure the amount of water vapor (H2O) and methane (CH4) around the planet. “Webb has given us an opportunity to figure out exactly which molecules we’re seeing and put some limits on the abundances,” said Joanna Barstow, a co-author from the Open University in the U.K.The spectra show clear signs of water vapor on the nightside as well as the dayside of the planet, providing additional information about how thick the clouds are and how high they extend in the atmosphere.Surprisingly, the data also shows a distinct lack of methane anywhere in the atmosphere. Although the dayside is too hot for methane to exist (most of the carbon should be in the form of carbon monoxide), methane should be stable and detectable on the cooler nightside.“The fact that we don’t see methane tells us that WASP-43 b must have wind speeds reaching something like 5,000 miles per hour,” explained Barstow. “If winds move gas around from the dayside to the nightside and back again fast enough, there isn’t enough time for the expected chemical reactions to produce detectable amounts of methane on the nightside.”The team thinks that because of this wind-driven mixing, the atmospheric chemistry is the same all the way around the planet, which wasn’t apparent from past work with Hubble and Spitzer.Reference: “Nightside clouds and disequilibrium chemistry on the hot Jupiter WASP-43b” by Taylor J. Bell, Nicolas Crouzet, Patricio E. Cubillos, Laura Kreidberg, Anjali A. A. Piette, Michael T. Roman, Joanna K. Barstow, Jasmina Blecic, Ludmila Carone, Louis-Philippe Coulombe, Elsa Ducrot, Mark Hammond, João M. Mendonça, Julianne I. Moses, Vivien Parmentier, Kevin B. Stevenson, Lucas Teinturier, Michael Zhang, Natalie M. Batalha, Jacob L. Bean, Björn Benneke, Benjamin Charnay, Katy L. Chubb, Brice-Olivier Demory, Peter Gao, Elspeth K. H. Lee, Mercedes López-Morales, Giuseppe Morello, Emily Rauscher, David K. Sing, Xianyu Tan, Olivia Venot, Hannah R. Wakeford, Keshav Aggarwal, Eva-Maria Ahrer, Munazza K. Alam, Robin Baeyens, David Barrado, Claudio Caceres, Aarynn L. Carter, Sarah L. Casewell, Ryan C. Challener, Ian J. M. Crossfield, Leen Decin, Jean-Michel Désert, Ian Dobbs-Dixon, Achrène Dyrek, Néstor Espinoza, Adina D. Feinstein, Neale P. Gibson, Joseph Harrington, Christiane Helling, Renyu Hu, Nicolas Iro, Eliza M.-R. Kempton, Sarah Kendrew, Thaddeus D. Komacek, Jessica Krick, Pierre-Olivier Lagage, Jérémy Leconte, Monika Lendl, Neil T. Lewis, Joshua D. Lothringer, Isaac Malsky, Luigi Mancini, Megan Mansfield, Nathan J. Mayne, Thomas M. Evans-Soma, Karan Molaverdikhani, Nikolay K. Nikolov, Matthew C. Nixon, Enric Palle, Dominique J. M. Petit dit de la Roche, Caroline Piaulet, Diana Powell, Benjamin V. Rackham, Aaron D. Schneider, Maria E. Steinrueck, Jake Taylor, Luis Welbanks, Sergei N. Yurchenko, Xi Zhang and Sebastian Zieba, 30 April 2024, Nature Astronomy.DOI: 10.1038/s41550-024-02230-xThe MIRI observation of WASP-43 b was conducted as part of the Webb Early Release Science programs, which are providing researchers with a vast set of robust, open-access data for studying a wide array of cosmic phenomena.The James Webb Space Telescope is the world’s premier space science observatory. Webb is solving mysteries in our solar system, looking beyond to distant worlds around other stars, and probing the mysterious structures and origins of our universe and our place in it. Webb is an international program led by NASA with its partners, ESA (European Space Agency) and the Canadian Space Agency.

Chemicals
Climate
Nature

We think we control our health – but corporations selling forever chemicals, fossil fuels and ultra-processed foods have a much greater role

Corporations have an incentive to make profits – even if their products hurt or even kill people. Here’s how to stop history repeating.

shutterstock Ahmet Misirligul/ShutterstockYou go to the gym, eat healthy and walk as much as possible. You wash your hands and get vaccinated. You control your health. This is a common story we tell ourselves. Unfortunately, it’s not quite true. Factors outside our control have huge influence – especially products which can sicken or kill us, made by companies and sold routinely. For instance, you and your family have been exposed for decades to dangerous forever chemicals, some of which are linked to kidney and testicular cancers. You’re almost certainly carrying these chemicals, known as PFAS or forever chemicals, in your body right now. And that’s just the start. We now know exposure to just four classes of product – tobacco, alcohol, ultra-processed foods and fossil fuels – are linked to one out of every three deaths worldwide. That is, they’re implicated in 19 of the world’s 56 million deaths each year (as of 2019). Pollution – largely from fossil fuels – is now the single largest environmental cause of premature death. Communities of colour and low-income communities experience disproportionate impacts; For example, over 90% of pollution related deaths occur in low middle income countries. This means the leading risk factor for disease and death worldwide is corporations who make, market and sell these unhealthy products. Worse, even when these corporations become aware of the harms their products cause, they have often systematically hidden these harms to boost profits at the expense of our health. Major tobacco, oil, food, pharmaceutical and chemical corporations have all applied similar techniques, privatising the profits and spreading the harms. Tobacco companies long questioned the link between smoking and cancer. Nopphon_1987/Shutterstock Profit and loss statements When companies act to conceal the harm their products do, they prevent us from protecting ourselves and our children. We now have many well-documented cases of corporate wrongdoing, such as asbestos, fossil fuels, pesticides, herbicides) sugar, silica, and of course tobacco. In these instances, corporations intentionally manufactured doubt or hid the harms of their products to delay or prevent regulation and maintain profits. Decades of empirical evidence shows these effective tactics have actually been shared and strategically passed from one industry or company to the next. For instance, when large tobacco companies Philip Morris and R.J. Reynolds bought food companies Kraft, General Foods and Nabisco in the 1980s, tobacco executives brought across marketing strategies, flavouring and colourings to expand product lines and engineered fatty, sweet and salty hyperpalatable foods such as cookies, cereals and frozen foods linked to obesity and diet-related diseases. These foods activate our reward circuits and encourage us to consume more. Or consider how ‘forever chemicals’ became so widespread. A team of scientists (including this article’s co-author) investigated previously secret internal industry documents from 3M and DuPont, the largest makers of forever chemicals PFOA and PFOS. The documents showed both 3M and DuPont used tactics from the tobacco industry’s playbook, such as suppressing unfavourable research and distorting public debate. Like Big Tobacco, 3M and DuPont had a financial interest in suppressing scientific evidence of the harms of their products, while publicly declaring in-demand products such as Teflon were safe. For decades, forever chemicals PFOA and PFOS have been used to make Teflon pans, Scotchgard, firefighting foam and other non-stick materials. By the early 2000s, one of these, PFOS, ended up in our blood at 20 times the level its manufacturer, 3M, considered safe. As early as 1961, the chief toxicologist at DuPont’s Teflon subsidiary reported the company’s wonder-material had “the ability to increase the size of the liver of rats at low doses”, and recommended the chemicals be handled “with extreme care”. According to a 1970 internal memo, the DuPont-funded Haskell Laboratory found the chemical class C8 (now known as PFOA/PFOS) was “highly toxic when inhaled and moderately toxic when ingested”. Teflon was hailed as a wonder material, making non-stick pans possible. But the original chemicals used to make Teflon were dangerous. Minko Dima/Shutterstock Both 3M and DuPont did extensive internal research on the risks their products posed to humans, but they shared little of it. The risks of PFOA including pregnancy-induced hypertension, kidney and testicular cancers, and ulcerative colitis was not publicly established until 2011. Now, 60 years after DuPont first learned of the harms these products could cause, many countries are facing the human and environmental consequences and a very expensive cleanup. Even though the production of PFOA and PFOS is being phased out, forever chemicals are easily stored in the body and take decades to break down. Worse, PFOA and PFOS are just two of over 15,000 different PFAS chemicals, most of which are still in use. How can we prevent corporate injury to our health? My co-author and I work in the field known as commercial determinants of health, which is to say, the damage corporations can do to us. Corporate wrongdoing can directly injure or even kill us. One of the key ways companies have been able to avoid regulation and lawsuits is by hiding the evidence. Internal studies showing harm can be easily hidden. External studies can be influenced, either by corporate funding, business-friendly scientists, legal action or lobbying policymakers to avoid regulation. Here are three ways to prevent this happening again: 1) Require corporations to adhere to the same standards of data sharing and open science as independent scientists do. If a corporation wants to bring a new product to market, they should have to register and publicly release every study they plan to conduct on its harms so the public can see the results of the study. 2) Sever the financial links between industry and researchers or policymakers. Many large corporations will spend money on public studies to try to get favourable outcomes for their own interests. To cut these financial ties means boosting public health research, either through government funding or alternatives such as a tax on corporate marketing. It would also mean capping corporate political donations and bringing lobbying under control by restricting corporate access and spending to policymakers and increasing transparency. And it would mean stopping the revolving door where government employees or policymakers work for the industry they used to regulate once they leave office. 3) Mandate public transparency of corporate funding to researchers and policymakers. In 2010, the United States introduced laws to enforce transparency on how much medical and pharmaceutical companies were spending to influence the products doctors chose to use. Research using the data unearthed by these laws has shown the problem is pervasive. We need this model for other industries so we can clearly see where corporate money is going. Registries should be detailed, permanent and easy to search. These steps would not be easy. But the status quo means corporations can keep selling dangerous or lethal products for much longer than they should. In doing so, they have become one of the largest influences on our health and will continue to harm generations to come – in ways hard to counter with yoga and willpower. And your health is more important than corporate profits. Read more: Chemicals, forever: how do you fix a problem like PFAS? Nicholas Chartres receives funding from The JPB Foundation, The World Health Organization and Health CanadaLisa Bero received or receives funding from Cochrane, NHMRC, Health Canada, the State of Colorado.

Chemicals
Food
Health

The impacts of toxic 'forever chemicals' aren't the same for women, men

This story is part of a series, “Fighting ‘Forever Chemicals’: Women face pervasive PFAS risks.” While “forever chemicals” have been linked to numerous adverse health impacts from cancers to kidney disease, they also may have disparate impacts on male and female bodies. “Very often you see something in one sex and not the other sex,”...

This story is part of a series, “Fighting ‘Forever Chemicals’: Women face pervasive PFAS risks.” While “forever chemicals” have been linked to numerous adverse health impacts from cancers to kidney disease, they also may have disparate impacts on male and female bodies.   “Very often you see something in one sex and not the other sex,” said Linda Birnbaum, former head of the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences and the National Toxicology Program.  “Forever chemicals,” or PFAS, can be found in many common household products and certain kinds of firefighting foams. Their use in manufacturing has led their proliferation in the air, water and soil, and they are estimated to be in the blood of about 97 percent of Americans. The federal government recently set the first nationwide limits on a few types of these substances in drinking water. Some of the different ways the pervasive chemicals affect men and women are clearly tied to reproductive organs.  PFAS exposure is associated with an increased risk of testicular cancer, for example: A panel of scientists established in 2012 that there is a “probable link” between exposure to a type of PFAS called PFOA and testicular cancer. A January 2022 Toxicology review explored several issues related to the female reproductive system — such as birth defects, fertility and menstrual cycle changes — that could be connected to PFAS exposure. “The effects are many,” the authors found, though they said it’s not yet clear exactly how the substances target female endocrine and reproductive systems due to “a major research gap.” A study published in September sought to narrow that gap by zooming in on sex-specific relationships between three classes of probable endocrine disruptors — including PFAS — and previous diagnoses of hormone-related cancers. The scientists observed particularly striking indications of these differences with regard to melanoma: Higher blood levels of PFAS were linked to prior diagnoses in women, but not in men.  “Sex-specific associations between PFAS chemicals and previous melanoma diagnosis, suggest that sex-mediated mechanisms may be at play,” wrote the authors, from the University of Southern California and the University of Michigan. While the precise mechanism behind the melanoma connection is still uncertain, the scientists surmised that because these tumor cells have estrogen receptors, environmental contaminants that mimic estrogenic activity — such as PFAS, potentially — could be fueling the cancer’s growth in women. Similar to melanoma, other health impacts that aren’t so obviously tied to sex-specific characteristics may still affect men and women differently following exposure to environmental contaminants, such as PFAS. High blood pressure, for instance, appears to be more pronounced in women than in men, recent studies have revealed. Sometimes, this manifests in pregnancy-induced hypertension, which can lead to a potentially fatal condition called preeclampsia — a potential effect of PFAS exposure that Erin P. Hines, a researcher in the Environmental Protection Agency’s reproductive toxicology division, said she’s eager to see more research into. “Having preeclampsia or having pregnancy-induced hypertension during pregnancy can change a woman's health outcome for the rest of her life, putting her more at risk for adverse cardiovascular outcomes like stroke,” Hines said, noting that this risk is independent of PFAS exposure. “But if you have a pregnancy where you have preeclampsia or one of these hypertensive disorders of pregnancy, over your lifetime, there are increased risks of morbidity and mortality associated [with] cardiovascular events,” she added. Beyond the pregnancy-induced type, additional research has also identified hypertension in the PFAS-exposed female population broadly.  A 2022 study from the American Heart Association found that middle-aged women with higher blood levels of certain types of PFAS had a greater risk of hypertension. Analyzing the annual follow-up visits of 1,058 midlife women who were initially free of hypertension from 1999 to 2017, the scientists found that 470 individuals developed this condition. The authors determined that women ages 45-56 who had high concentrations of PFOS in their blood had a 42 percent higher chance of developing high blood pressure, while those with high concentrations of PFOA had a 47 percent higher chance. Women who had high concentrations of all seven types of PFAS examined by the study had a 71 percent increased risk of getting high blood pressure. Study author Ning Ding said PFAS exposure appears to put women at especially high risk in a broader way, as well. “Women seem to be particularly vulnerable when exposed to these chemicals,” Ding, a postdoctoral fellow in the University of Michigan’s epidemiology department, said in a statement. “Exposure may be an underappreciated risk factor for women’s cardiovascular disease risk.” Studies are also emerging that suggest links between PFAS and other health outcomes in girls or women, such as ADHD in girls or weight gain in women. Scientists have also linked PFAS exposure to an increased susceptibility of developing diabetes among middle-aged women. Some types of PFAS could disrupt the regulatory behavior of certain protein molecules and, in turn, raise the risk of diabetes within this cohort, according to the April 2022 study.  Although the researchers stressed that evidence of sex-dependent links between PFAS and diabetes in humans is lacking, they pointed to another recent study showing that the metabolic responses of female mice to PFOA exposure were greater than those of male mice. Meanwhile, another impact from PFAS has been shown to primarily affect boys. A 2022 study found that teen boys who are exposed to a mixture of the substances and another type of hormone-disrupting chemicals known as phthalates may have lower bone density — which makes bones weaker and more prone to fractures.  Some vulnerabilities associated with PFAS may take root in utero. Prenatal exposure to the substances has been linked to preterm births, changes in birth weight or congenital issues that manifest later in childhood  — including ADHD or IQ effects, according to Birnbaum. “We are seeing with PFAS — like a lot of chemicals which actually disturb hormone systems — that you do get a boy or girl difference,” she said, noting that some effects are appearing in only one sex. “If you look at, say, baby boys and baby girls together, you might not see an effect. But if you separate out the sexes, all of a sudden you can see an effect in one of them,” Birnbaum added. But she also acknowledged that not all researchers are open to that type of separation: “What's interesting to me is that there are some people who don't want to believe that. They think, well, if you don't see it in both, you know, males and females, it can't be happening.” The discovery of sex-dependent health impacts often hinges upon what, exactly, scientists are looking for in their research, according to Birnbaum. “It's kind of the old story: If you don't look, you don't see. But when you start to look, you start to find.”

Chemicals
Health
Science

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Chemicals
Crisis
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