Environmental Health

Hurricane Tomas seems to be worsening conditions favorable to the spread of cholera in Haiti, where some streets have been turned into rivers.

A farm lobby coalition has received federal money to attack the Environmental Working Group's list of the most pesticide-laden fruits and vegetables.

Florida has ended its investigation of excess childhood brain cancer cases in the unincorporated Palm Beach County community known as The Acreage without finding any environmental cause.

"Bisphenol A readily passes through skin, French scientists report. Best known as an estrogen-mimicking constituent of some plastics and resins, BPA is also found in a large share of cash register receipt paper in the United States and Europe, a trio of studies recently indicated. One of the three also showed that the powdery coating easily rubs off onto the hands."

"High levels of manganese and copper pollution in urban areas are linked to increased risk of Parkinson's disease, according to an analysis of 35,000 Parkinson's patients by scientists at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis."

"For the first time, a study in humans suggests that a controversial, estrogen-like chemical in plastic may be related to conditions that reduce men's fertility."

"People living near a steel factory or another source of high manganese emissions are at higher risk of developing Parkinson's disease, suggests a new study."

"SAINT MARC, Haiti -- Officials warn that Haiti's cholera epidemic that has claimed almost 300 lives has yet to peak, and that authorities should prepare for the disease to spread to the capital and its squalid tent cities."

"Pregnant women living in Texas neighborhoods with higher air levels of benzene – a pollutant often released from oil refineries and traffic exhaust – are more likely to have babies with neural tube defects. Women living in the areas with the highest benzene levels had a two times greater risk for their children to be born with spina bifida."