1. Darryl Fears. (26 Sept 2013) Report: Polluted farm runoff
linked to toxic green algae slime in U.S. waters. The Washington Post.
2. Category: Environment
3. Level: National
4. About: Manure and pesticide runoff produces toxic algae
that is ruining marine life and has killed one human and 20 pets.
5. Who this concerns: Everyone should be concerned. Once the
algae gets into the ocean it can potentially go anywhere. The people in direct
contact with the Mississippi River should be the most concerned since its
contaminated the water supply and now the people are forced to pay to have
their water plant cleaned. New York, Iowa, Oregon, Ohio, Kentucky, Florida, and
California are states reporting the most pollution.
6. My thoughts: This
isn’t breaking news. We have known for a long time that the pesticides we spray
all over our crops run off the plants, into the soil, the rivers, and
eventually the ocean. They kill marine
life and create these “dead zones” and surprisingly we still allow it. We have
a look the other way policy when it comes to pesticides. The Big Ag lobbyists
have the control and the freaks are the people that actually care enough to buy
organic produce. One boy was killed by cyanobacteria so it’s not that big of a
deal yet. We can still blame the bacteria and not the source of the bacteria
which is the pesticide runoff. Without pesticides, we wouldn’t have this
problem. What we are still unaware of is the long term effect of what
pesticides do when consumed by humans. Lots of illnesses are on the rise like
autism and depression. People are worse off now than they were before we
started mono-culturing and mass producing only a few crops. That’s not the way
nature intended it to be. If nature doesn’t like the way something is being done,
she will find a way to destroy the problem and in this case, people are the
problem. The other day one of my professors said this, “The earth’s fine, it’s
the people that are screwed.”
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