Air Pollution Harm To Unborn Babies May Be Global Health Catastrophe, Warn Doctors (theguardian.com)

Air pollution significantly increases the risk of low birth weight in babies, leading to lifelong damage to health, according to a large new study. From a report: The research was conducted in London, UK, but its implications for many millions of women in cities around the world with far worse air pollution are "something approaching a public health catastrophe," the doctors involved said. Globally, two billion children -- 90% of all children -- are exposed to air pollution above World Health Organization guidelines. A Unicef study also published on Wednesday found that 17 million babies suffer air six times more toxic than the guidelines. The team said that there are no reliable ways for women in cities to avoid chronic exposure to air pollution during pregnancy and called for urgent action from governments to cut pollution from vehicles and other sources.

Comments

I'm committed to clean air and water

[bluefoxlucid]

As part of my plan for my Congressional office, I remain committed to our need for clean air and water. I will research and develop a policy to transition our Conservational Reserve Program farm subsidies to a land-preserving utility: rather than keeping reserve agricultural land empty, we will encourage farmers to retain this land and build non-permanent solar generation installations.

Solar generation farms require cabling, conduit, racks, and photovoltaic panels. They don't require poured concrete or other land-destroying development, and we can remove them by taking up the cabling and conduit, unbolting and storing the panels, and pulling the racking from the ground. No disposal of dug-out concrete foundation is necessary; at most, we may require reusable concrete piers as footer.

As farmland generally requires sunlight, it makes for ideal solar generation real estate. Subsidizing the initial deployment and operation of solar installations would displace our coal, oil, and natural gas electrical generation capacity with clean energy. The American taxpayer currently pays billions of dollars every year for the Conservational Reserve Program; this money returns nothing except the promise of land in reserve. The transition to solar operation will similarly preserve the land while producing clean energy at discount subsidy rates, allowing the American people to recover some of that tax cost.

We must pursue new solutions to bring progress to our great nation. Our Congressmen have failed to do this for us, so now I will replace one of our content and well-established so that I can do the job we as public servants owe the American people.