obvious riposte

Post #250,497 by rcareaga 4/1/06 12:59:06 AM Reply	obvious riposte to I hope I'm not the only one who thinks that spending $10M or more to bring about that improvement may not be the best use of the money is, if you're so fucking worried about your money, stop squandering two cents of it every time you post. Less obvious riposte is: suppose you somehow knew that you were destined to be terminal cancer victim #200,001 in your hypothetical city* of one million. Would you say, "no, fellas, really—I wouldn't dream of asking you to shell out ten dollars per capita to spare my miserable life. Truly, I appreciate it, but c'mon, ten dollars! I'm not worth it, et cetera, et cetera"...? cordially, *Of course, in your example you have 20% of the city population perishing of cancers of unspecified provenance. Given that statistic, I personally wouldn't stick around long enough to wait for the democratic process to settle the water quality issues... Die Welt ist alles, was der Fall ist.
Post #250,507 by Another Scott 4/1/06 7:58:06 AM Reply	Touche' :-) As I said, I don't know whether making the standard more stringent will help or not. If it were clear that all cancers were caused by environmental exposures of some sort, and if there were no other use for the hypothetical $10M that would be spent at that site, then the choice would be clear: The DoD, NASA, and DoE should quit their bellyaching and spend whatever it takes to clean all of it up. Unfortunately, it's not at all clear that that's the case. Too often in discussion of these issues, the risks and costs are taken in isolation. I don't think that makes much sense. Yes, "cost/benefit analysis" can be distorted by those with axes to grind, but it needs to be an important part of the process of deciding what we should do to improve health (and prosperity as well). [link\|http://www.meds.com/lung/seer.html#quest_19\|This] link gives the probabilities of dying of various common cancers: 19. What are the probabilities of dying of the most common causes of cancer death in men and women? (based on 1989-1991 mortality rates) Men . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Women Site . . .Probability (%) . . Site . . . . . Probability (%) All races All sites . .. . . 23.35 . . . . All sites . . . . 20.39 Lung and Bronchus . 7.09 . . .Lung and Bronchus . . 4.09 Prostate . . . . . .3.41 . . . . Breast . . . . . . 3.59 Colon and Rectum . .2.60 . . Colon and Rectum . . . 2.65 Pancreas . . . . . .1.08 . . . .Pancreas . . . . . .1.18 Stomach . . . . . . 0.86 . . . . Ovary . . . . . . .1.07 Just about everyone agrees that most lung cancers are caused by smoking, radon, or environmental exposures (dust). Surely DoD facilities have areas where people are exposed to lung hazards that could be better addressed by increased funding and attention. [link\|http://www.atsdr.cdc.gov/tfacts19.html\|TCE facts]: Some studies with mice and rats have suggested that high levels of trichloroethylene may cause liver, kidney, or lung cancer. Some studies of people exposed over long periods to high levels of trichloroethylene in drinking water or in workplace air have found evidence of increased cancer. Although, there are some concerns about the studies of people who were exposed to trichloroethylene, some of the effects found in people were similar to effects in animals. In its 9th Report on Carcinogens, the National Toxicology Program (NTP) determined that trichloroethylene is \ufffdreasonably anticipated to be a human carcinogen.\ufffd The International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) has determined that trichloroethylene is \ufffdprobably carcinogenic to humans.\ufffd Emphasis added. TCE is bad and needs to be cleaned up to reasonable levels. Reasonable is the operative word, IMO, and people of good faith can argue about what that reasonable level is. Despite the Guardian's take, it's not at all clear, IMO, that taking the MCL to 1 ppb or less will make a difference in people's health, while there's little doubt that decreasing people's workplace exposure to fine dust and radon will be beneficial. I hope it's a little clearer where I'm coming from. Cheers, Scott. (Who is reminded of [link\|http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Alar_and_apples\|Alar] - yes there's a risk. But how big is it?)
Post #250,519 by boxley 4/1/06 10:36:46 AM Reply	nit lung cancer appears to be caused by other people smoking smokers get it in reduced numbers compared to women that have never smoked. thanx, bill Any opinions expressed by me are mine alone, posted from my home computer, on my own time as a free american and do not reflect the opinions of any person or company that I have had professional relations with in the past 50 years. meep
Post #250,535 by Another Scott 4/1/06 2:17:44 PM Reply	Linky? TIA.
Post #250,616 by drewk 4/2/06 10:59:15 AM Reply	Arrogant stupidity Would you say, "no, fellas, really\ufffdI wouldn't dream of asking you to shell out ten dollars per capita to spare my miserable life. Truly, I appreciate it, but c'mon, ten dollars! I'm not worth it, et cetera, et cetera"...? If we've got $10M to spend on saving one life, let's spend it instead on saving several thousand lives. And keep in mind that the one life spared through not getting this cancer, may be a matter of some number of years at the end of life, vs. children dead of malnutrition. (Oh lord, he use "the children" argument!) So yes, I am saying that the possibility of five more years of your life isn't worth ten of my dollars. I am so fucking tired of the "if it saves one life" argument. </cranky> === Purveyor of Doc Hope's [link\|http://DocHope.com\|fresh-baked dog biscuits and pet treats]. [link\|http://DocHope.com\|http://DocHope.com]
Post #250,617 by broomberg 4/2/06 11:53:02 AM Reply	Screw you back I work at this location: [link\|http://www.atsdr.cdc.gov/HAC/PHA/warminster/naw_p1.html\|http://www.atsdr.cdc...nster/naw_p1.html] Did I have any idea of the issue until this hit the news? No. tick tick tick tick tick
Post #250,711 by drewk 4/3/06 12:48:31 AM Reply	Bah, completely different If you live/work right on top of the nasty, then yeah, you'll want someone to clean it up. But if we're talking dollars and sense, it'd probably be cheaper to just relocate you away from it until the cleanup is done. And I realized I was wrong in my previous post. It's not arrogance or stupidity. It's a juvenile, knee-jerk reaction against The Man. Any time we're talking about an environmental cleanup, we're talking about government or big business -- usually both. So as soon as someone involved starts saying it doesn't make sense to spend $X-million in this specific way, all the leftover hippies get up in arms about putting a price on people's heads. Only people who don't pay the bills talk like that. Which pretty much narrows it down to children, politicians and hippies. === Purveyor of Doc Hope's [link\|http://DocHope.com\|fresh-baked dog biscuits and pet treats]. [link\|http://DocHope.com\|http://DocHope.com]

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