Dr. Sandra Steingraber, biologist, ecologist, author "Living Downstream"

Air Dates: February 20-22, 2021

THIS WEEK: DR. SANDRA STEINGRABER,Biologist, Poet & Cancer Survivor CancerTopic: The Growing Body Of Evidence Linking CancerTo Environmental Contaminations

- "The new Rachel Carson" – The Sierra Club- “From the right to know and the duty to inquire, flows the obligation to act.” -- Steingraber

Feb. 18, 2021 – This week’s guest on REPORT FROM SANTA FE is Dr. Sandra Steingraber, biologist, poet, and survivor of cancer in her twenties. She brings all three perspectives to bear on the most important health and human rights issue of our time: the growing body of evidence linking cancer to environmental contaminations.

Dr. Steingraber is the author of many books, scientific papers, and detailed compendia of research on environmental links to cancer. Steingraber writes, testifies as an expert witness, and lectures on the environmental factors that contribute to reproductive health problems and environmental links to cancer.

Her scrupulously researched scientific analysis ranges from the alarming worldwide patterns of cancer incidence to the sabotage wrought by cancer-promoting substances on the intricate workings of human cells. She is a Distinguished Scholar at Ithaca College.

Steingraber is heralded by the Sierra Club and others as "the new Rachel Carson," and was awarded the Biennial Rachel Carson Leadership Award from Chatham College, Rachel Carson's alma mater. Her book "Living Downstream: An Ecologist's Personal Investigation of Cancer and the Environment," has also been made into a documentary. "Living Downstream" is for all Americans who care about the health of their families and future generations. Sandra Steingraber's brave, clear, and careful voice is certain to break the paralyzing silence on this subject that persists more than three decades after Rachel Carson's great early warning.

Steingraber is a co-founder of New Yorkers Against Fracking and was instrumental in the State of New York's decision to ban fracking statewide, the first state with significant shale gas to do so. Dr. Steingraber recently testified in the New Mexico legislature offering evidence in support of Senate Bill 149, cosponsored by Senator Antoinette Sedillo Lopez and Representative Patricia Roybal Caballero, calling for a moratorium, a pause, on the issuance of new fracking permits while studies are conducted to see how fracking affects the health of New Mexico's land, water, air, and people.

Among Steingraber's many honors: Ms. Magazine named her “Woman of the Year” in 1997. She received the Hero Award from the Breast Cancer Fund and Utne Reader named her one of the “25 Visionaries Who Are Changing the World.” She has been given the Heinz Award, the Altman Award for “the inspiring and poetic use of science to elucidate the causes of cancer,” and the Breast Cancer Fund's "Hero Award" to honor those who have significantly helped advance our mission to identify and eliminate the environmental—and preventable—causes of breast cancer.

Quote:“I can say that it is time now to play ‘the save the world’ symphony. I don’t know what instrument you hold, but you need to play it as best as you can, & find your place in the score. You don’t have to play a solo here. But this is our task now.”