Most of us who regularly read newspapers are aware that many years ago, the appointed city manager of Flint, Michigan, in partial response to a fiscal crisis, changed the feedwater of the Flint water treatment plant from someplace "good" to the Detroit river, which had a higher acidic content. This change resulted in a chemical reaction that caused the lead in water lines to leech into the water supply, and ended up increasing the amount of lead in Flint's drinking water. We all know that lead is poisonous and has all sorts of negative impacts on health, especially in children.
Bottom line: Flint's population, which is largely African American has been drinking water that is unsafe, because of this decision, which of course is characterized as "racist." The linked article outlines the problem and its aftermath.
www.dailymail.co.uk
The element of the article that I find most interesting is as follows:
"...the broader effects of the crisis, such as the major social upheaval and overall sense of crisis, beyond direct lead poisoning, had a larger impact on educational outcomes."
In other words, all the public fuss about the problem caused more harm than the problem itself. The article also states that people living in homes that got less of the lead-poisoning had the same detrimental effects as those that had more.
One suspects that if the whole thing had been kept a secret, everyone would have been better off.
And one can also notice that a lot of people got rich over this, and somewhere, somehow, about $600 Million will go to the victims, and presumably to their lawyers and "public advocates" who made this story what it was. Fortunately, the Democrats in Congress can just print that money and nobody will ever actually have to pay for it.
Bottom line: Flint's population, which is largely African American has been drinking water that is unsafe, because of this decision, which of course is characterized as "racist." The linked article outlines the problem and its aftermath.
Flint water crisis led to massive spike in children with special needs
The Flint water crisis, which exposed 12 thousand children to lead, has resulted in all-time high numbers of children with special needs [bottom right] and poor math scores [top right].
The element of the article that I find most interesting is as follows:
"...the broader effects of the crisis, such as the major social upheaval and overall sense of crisis, beyond direct lead poisoning, had a larger impact on educational outcomes."
In other words, all the public fuss about the problem caused more harm than the problem itself. The article also states that people living in homes that got less of the lead-poisoning had the same detrimental effects as those that had more.
One suspects that if the whole thing had been kept a secret, everyone would have been better off.
And one can also notice that a lot of people got rich over this, and somewhere, somehow, about $600 Million will go to the victims, and presumably to their lawyers and "public advocates" who made this story what it was. Fortunately, the Democrats in Congress can just print that money and nobody will ever actually have to pay for it.
