Consumer

"The abrupt cancellation of a beloved farm-to-school grant program threatens food access, school gardens, and small farms nationwide."

"For years a textile mill gave farmers its sewage sludge as free fertilizer. Today the land is full of “forever chemicals.”"

"Up to 17 percent of the planet’s agricultural land may be contaminated by toxic heavy metals, a new study has found. As many as 1.4 billion people reside in areas with soil dangerously polluted with compounds like arsenic, cadmium, cobalt, chromium, copper, nickel and lead, according to the study, published in Science."

"A federal program that helps low-income households pay for heating and cooling costs is in limbo."

"When President Donald Trump named Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as his choice to lead the US Department of Health and Human Services, one group of health researchers was cautiously optimistic that their cause would finally have a champion at the highest levels of government: those focused on food and nutrition."

"The US Department of Health and Human Services has launched a “massive testing and research effort” involving hundreds of scientists worldwide that will determine “what has caused the autism epidemic” by September, Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said Thursday. But experts expressed doubt that the research would be done in good faith, given Kennedy’s history of linking autism and vaccines despite strong evidence that the two are not connected."

"The 12206 ZIP code, which encompasses West Hill, Beverwyck and Upper Washington Avenue, has one of the state's highest concentrations of childhood lead poisoning."

"The Trump administration announced Friday that it was terminating a historic settlement aimed at improving wastewater treatment services for Alabamians in majority-Black communities harmed by raw sewage, calling the agreement an “illegal DEI and environmental justice policy.”

"The U.S. counties with the most egregious water quality violations are concentrated in four states: West Virginia, Pennsylvania, North Carolina and Oklahoma, a new study has found."