proverbialwisdom
proverbialwisdom's JournalNear Exide plant, dangerous lead levels in some yards are 100 times above health limits
Source: By Tony Barboza and Ben Poston, Los Angeles Times
July 20, 2016, 3:00 a.m.
Homes, schools and at least one day-care center near a shuttered Vernon battery recycler are contaminated with higher levels of brain-damaging lead than previously disclosed, with soil samples at some properties found to be so hazardous they are as much as 100 times above California’s health standard, state and county records show.
The public remains largely in the dark about where and at what concentrations the poisonous metal has been detected in neighborhoods near the Exide Technologies plant because state regulators have failed to release pollution readings for the vast majority of properties.
The California Department of Toxic Substances Control says it has tested the soil of more than 2,400 homes. Despite repeated requests from The Times, the agency provided readings for just 269 properties.
A summary of results for 1,190 homes released Friday by the department was not broken down by property or location, but indicated thousands of soil samples were above state health standards and hundreds were at hazardous waste levels.
Read more: http://www.latimes.com/local/california/la-me-ln-dangerous-lead-levels-20160714-snap-story.html
Related: https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/2995582-Summary-of-soil-sampling-results-near-Exide.html
"The increase was especially sharp among kindergartners, where autism cases grew by 17% last year."
July 18, 2016 11:36 AM
Autism rates in California public schools jumped 7 percent in 2016
By Phillip Reese
More than 97,000 California public school students have been diagnosed as autistic, a number that has risen seven-fold since 2001, according to the latest special education data from the California Department of Education.
The figure represent a jump of about 6,500, or 7 percent, from 2014-15 to 2015-16.
The increase was especially sharp among kindergartners, where autism cases grew by 17 percent last year. More than one of every 65 kindergartners in California public schools is classified as autistic.
Since 2006, the number of autistic students statewide has risen by between 5,000 and 7,000 every year, state figures show.
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Yesterday, Reverend Jesse Jackson urged President Obama to veto the GMO labeling bill.
Today Reverend Jesse Jackson urged President Obama to veto the GMO labeling bill that is currently before the House, should it reach his desk. In a letter sent directly to the president the renowned civil rights activist called attention to the “serious inequities (in the) GMO labeling legislation.” In the letter Jackson points out the discriminatory nature of such a labeling system; “100,000,000 Americans, most of them poor, people of color and elderly either do not own a smart phone or an iPhone to scan the QR code or live in an area of poor internet connectivity.”
LETTER: http://www.centerforfoodsafety.org/files/jesse-jackson-letter-to-obama_12626.pdf
Info from Center for Food Safety email.
Russian Billionaires in U.S. Health Push With D.C. Insiders
Source: Irina Reznik and Alex Sazonov, Washington Post
Jul 15, 2016, 7:06 am ET
(Bloomberg) -- Mikhail Fridman cashed out of his Russian oil venture near the top of the market and moved to London to build an empire in calmer climes. Then Brexit struck, reinforcing his determination to keep heading west.
With Britain’s decision to leave the European Union and sanctions over Ukraine muddying the investment waters from Moscow to Glasgow, Fridman and his three fellow Alfa Group billionaires are looking across the Atlantic and see a clear stream of profit in ever-higher spending on health care. With two Washington insiders in tow to help navigate the terrain, the Russians are preparing to invest as much as $3 billion in the industry over three years, starting in the U.S., where it accounts for almost a fifth of the economy.
“There are signals of a major tectonic shift in economic development happening before our eyes,” Fridman said in an interview in London.
Flush with almost $14 billion from the sale in 2013 of TNK-BP to state-owned Rosneft PJSC, Fridman and his partners created Luxembourg-based LetterOne to acquire western projects to balance their holdings back home. After buying North Sea energy assets, U.K. student housing and a slice of Uber Technologies Inc., they have about half left to deploy.
The skills and tactics that allowed Fridman to flourish in post-Soviet Russia won’t necessarily translate into success in the U.S., particularly with relations at a post-Cold War low. So he and his partners, who are both decried and admired for their mastery of what is known as administrative resources -- the aggressive use of connections, courts and cops to achieve commercial aims -- have brought on board people with ties to both major candidates for president.
Read more: http://washpost.bloomberg.com/Story?docId=1376-OA8XN66JIJUT01-4TSPURT7UORR6BQ31V7I6NQG0J
via Bloomberg TV side screen headlne: "With Britain's decision to leave the European Union and sanctions over Ukraine muddying the investment waters from Moscow to Glasgow, Fridman and his three fellow Alfa Group billionaires are looking across the Atlantic and see a clear stream of profit in ever-higher spending on health care."
More.
http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/watch-lebron-james-carmelo-anthony-espys-black-lives-matter-910852https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/early-lead/wp/2016/07/13/nba-superstars-issue-call-to-action-for-fellow-athletes-in-appearance-at-espys/
“Human Genome Project-Write” Unveiled
“Human Genome Project-Write” Unveiled
A proposal to synthesize entire genomes—the subject of a controversial, invitation-only meeting at Harvard last month—is formally presented in Science.
By Jef Akst | June 2, 2016
A team led by New York University’s Jef Boeke, Harvard’s George Church, and Andrew Hessel of the California-based commercial design studio Autodesk Research has published its proposal to synthesize entire genomes from scratch, including those of humans. Called the “Human Genome Project-Write” (the authors refer to the original HGP as Human Genome Project-Read), the initiative could take 10 years and a minimum of $100 million just to get started, the researchers wrote today (June 2) in Science.
“It’s essentially a call to action,” Hessel told BuzzFeed News. “We are suggesting it’s time to consider a new genome project standing on the foundations of the Human Genome Project.”
An underlying goal of the proposed project is to develop technologies to more efficiently and more cheaply write DNA. “Tangible products may be slow to follow at first, but writing DNA more cheaply and at large scale will make researchers more efficient and comprehensive in their work, leading to practically unlimited potential for indirect products,” Danielle Tullman-Ercek, a biochemical engineer at the University of California, Berkeley, told Nature.
But the proposal was not universally praised. “My first thought was ‘so what,’” Martin Fussenegger, a synthetic biologist at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich, told Nature. “I personally think this will happen naturally. It’s just a matter of price at the end.”
Others are still upset about the discussion that took place at a closed-door meeting last month at Harvard. Synthetic biologist Drew Endy of Stanford University and religious scholar Laurie Zoloth of Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois, question the scientific value of the plan. “Boeke et al.’s current proposal should be broadly rejected and not now pursued,” Endy told BuzzFeed News in an email.
MOONSHOT SEGMENT (Andrew Hessel, distinguished research scientist at Autodesk, and Ethan Kurzweil, a Bessemer Venture Partners partner): http://www.bloomberg.com/news/videos/2016-07-14/full-show-bloomberg-west-07-13
Emily Chang
@emilychangtv
Our new Series A segment live now! Today's topic: Moonshots with @ethankurz @andrewhessel bloomberg.com/live
3:28 PM - 13 Jul 2016
Carl Sagan? Check out Jennifer Margulis.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carl_SaganSAGAN'S 1ST SPOUSE: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lynn_MargulisThroughout her career, Margulis’ work could arouse intense objection (one grant application elicited the response, "Your research is crap, do not bother to apply again{4}), and her formative paper, "On the Origin of Mitosing Cells," appeared in 1967 after being rejected by about fifteen journals.
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In 1995, English evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins had this to say about Lynn Margulis and her work:"I greatly admire Lynn Margulis's sheer courage and stamina in sticking by the endosymbiosis theory, and carrying it through from being an unorthodoxy to an orthodoxy. I'm referring to the theory that the eukaryotic cell is a symbiotic union of primitive prokaryotic cells. This is one of the great achievements of twentieth-century evolutionary biology, and I greatly admire her for it."{24}
4. Sagan, Dorion, ed. (2012). Lynn Margulis: The Life and Legacy of a Scientific Rebel. White River Junction: Chelsea Green. ISBN 978-1-603-58446-3.
24. Margulis, Lynn, Gaia Is a Tough Bitch. Chapter 7 in The Third Culture: Beyond the Scientific Revolution by John Brockman (Simon & Schuster, 1995)
DAUGHTER: http://jennifermargulis.net/http://jennifermargulis.net/about/
https://www.amazon.com/Vaccine-Friendly-Plan-Effective-Health-Pregnancy/dp/1101884231/178-0574487-0383232
Here's the NIH.GOV press release, also in post #4, but I did not see that first.
BRIEF COMMUNICATION
VOLUME 124|ISSUE 7|JULY 2016
Project TENDR: Targeting Environmental Neuro-Developmental Risks. The TENDR Consensus Statement
BAM: http://www.democraticunderground.com/10141506618#post4
Welcome news!
https://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2016/06/30/fact-sheet-new-steps-toward-ensuring-openness-and-transparency2011: EPA praised use of Toxics Release Inventory data by prominent autism reseacher, meanwhile...
EPA: THE ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY
[CENTER]The Toxics Release Inventory (TRI) in Action: Media, Government, Business, Community and Academic Uses of TRI Data[/CENTER]p.8
Zimmerman, J.P., Bakian A., et al. "Maternal Residential Proximity to Toxic Release Inventory Sites In Children with ASD and Other Developmental Disabilities." International Meeting for Autism Research. INSAR: International Society for Autism Research. Manchester Grand Hyatt, San Diego, CA. 12 May 2011. Lecture
http://archive.sltrib.com/story.php?ref=/sltrib/news/51759624-78/autism-utah-disorder-education.html.csp
http://archive.sltrib.com/story.php?ref=/sltrib/news/51759624-78/autism-utah-disorder-education.html.csp
Mark Blaxill
July 5, 2016
...a Federal District Court Judge for the District of Utah issued a ruling Friday that effectively guarantees a Utah autism whistleblower her day in court. Judge Jill N. Parrish denied a majority of motions by Dr. William McMahon of the University of Utah to dismiss allegations by Dr. Judith Pinborough Zimmerman that McMahon and his colleagues acted improperly in retaliating against her for raising concerns over their research misconduct, violated university policies by terminating her contract without proper review, and impugned her reputation in the process.
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Dr. Zimmerman filed her lawsuit against Dr. McMahon nearly two years ago, in a complaint that describes a heated dispute between the two scientists over the proper handling of confidential health and education records as well as the accuracy of the data records used in measuring Utah’s autism prevalence as part of the Center for Disease Control’s (CDC) autism surveillance project, the Autism and Development Disabilities (ADDM) Network. Since 2002, Zimmerman had been the Director of Utah’s ADDM Network site, the Utah Registry of Autism and Developmental Disabilities (URADD). She joined the University of Utah in 2005, bringing the URADD grant with her. She was removed from her URADD and university positions in 2013.
Zimmerman’s lawsuit alleges that McMahon and colleagues violated federal records privacy restrictions in efforts to carry out lucrative additional research projects; these were privacy restrictions that she had carefully negotiated with the Utah Departments of Health and Education in order to bring URADD into compliance with federal law and protect autism families from unwanted use of their personal and family information. When Zimmerman expressed her concerns over privacy and data quality issues to University authorities, McMahon summarily fired her, locked her out of her office and placed himself in charge of URADD. Since Zimmerman’s dismissal, McMahon has become the PI of the URADD and watches over Utah’s contributions to the CDC’s ADDM reports.
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Zimmerman’s conflict with McMahon may have deeper roots than the privacy and data integrity claims cited in Zimmerman’s lawsuit. McMahon has been an active contributor to genetic studies of autism causation and participated as a co-author in dozens of such publications. Zimmerman, by contrast, led a study investigating “Maternal Residential Proximity to Toxic Release Inventory Sites” in children with autism. After speaking to a reporter at the Salt Lake Tribune about the study, she was reprimanded by McMahon. CDC has long been reluctant to investigate environmental causes of autism and McMahon’s interest in genetic research may well have made it easier for him to replace Zimmerman as the CDC’s Utah PI.
With a date as of yet undetermined, Zimmerman will have a chance to defend her career and reputation in front of a jury. Judge Parrish’s decision directly denied McMahon and the University’s request to dismiss Zimmerman’s allegations in 7 out of 12 causes of action in her complaint. McMahon and the University succeeded in dismissing 3 of the 12 causes; the remaining two were certified to the Utah Supreme Court, with Parrish asking for guidance in the absence of “controlling Utah law.’
No MSM coverage I can find yet.
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