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  • I Hate Pink - The Goods on Breast Cancer Awareness Month
    Feature, Sep-Oct-2012-Vol22-No4, Health & Toxics

    by Judy Brady

    It is estimated that over 22,000 women and men in Canada will be diagnosed with breast cancer this year and nearly ten times as many in the United States.
    Almost a quarter of these people will die.

    Ever since it dawned on me that having been swaddled in a pink blanket set me on a course of considerably more limited choices than those available to the baby wrapped in a blue blanket, I’ve been wary of anything that comes in pink. But in October it’s impossible to avoid pink. Breast Cancer Awareness Month (BCAM) is upon us and millions of little pink ribbons on millions of lapels exhort us to be “aware” of breast cancer.

  • The Chronic War on Cancer
    Feature, Sep-Oct-2012-Vol22-No4, Health & Toxics

    by Devra Davis

    By the turn of the 18th century, the path-breaking Italian physician Bernardino Ramazzini had documented more than three dozen different cancer-prone professions. At that point the disease was still uncommon and usually lethal.
    Ramazzini did not know which specific part of the job caused which maladies, but he knew that people in many different jobs were subject to risk, including miners of coal, lead, arsenic and iron, metal gilders, chemists, potters, tinsmiths, glassmakers, painters, tobacco workers, lime workers, tanners, weavers, coppersmiths, mirror makers, painters, sulphur workers,

  • PQ Bans Fracking, Closes Nuke - But Not a Whisper on English TV
    Fracking, Nuclear power, Quebec

    I had the misfortune to watch both the CBC and CTV television news from Ontario last night, so imagine my surprise when a news clipping service landed the following headline from the Montreal Gazette  on my laptop this morning: "A Beautiful Day for Environmentalists." Those days being few and far between,

  • WWF Comes Out Against Enbridge
    Enbridge, Pipelines

    The hundreds of thousands of British Columbians who oppose Enbridge’s Northern Gateway Pipeline, its dilbit, and the associated oil tanker traffic, from First Nations to fishermen to the NDP opposition to environmental organizations like the

  • Alexandra Morton - Tracking Salmon for Fish Farm Viruses
    Fish farms

    Photo Credit: Anissa ReedAlexandra Morton doesn’t take no for an answer. Although Justice Cohen ruled in May that he will not reopen his Inquiry to review findings that some BC farm salmon in the markets are infected with a contagious heart virus, Morton diligently continues with her work of tracking wild salmon.

    She spent her summer travelling throughout BC with a small group of volunteers sampling salmon and other fish to map where the European viruses are showing up. First Nation, sport and commercial fishermen shared their catch allowing Morton to be privy to some of the most exclusive fishing spots in BC.

    Her most recent blog, Reading the Fish,  is a graphic science

  • Forward-Thinking Forestry - Clayoquot Sound’s War in the Woods
    BC, BC Forests, First Nations, ForestEthics, Forests, Land use, Vancouver Island, Summer-2012-Vol22-No3

    by Julia Prinselaar

    Nearly two decades after the last of 10,000 protesters packed their bags and left Clayoquot Sound in the final days of a summer-long logging blockade in 1993, the fight to protect the region’s ancient temperate rainforest continues. 

    In some ways the demonstrations were a success.

    When the province announced a Land Use Decision

  • Bill C-38 - Its Deadly Affects on the Environment
    Feature, Bill C-38, Sep-Oct-2012-Vol22-No4, Society

    Bill C-38 Affects on Environmentby Darryl Luscombe

    Bill C-38, The Jobs, Growth and Long-term Prosperity Act, received Royal Assent and became law in Canada on June 29th, 2012. The Omnibus Budget bill is the most targeted  attack on democracy, the environment and environmental advocates by any Canadian government in history.

  • CETA Trade Deal and Jumbo Resort Proposal
    Feature, Mining, Sep-Oct-2012-Vol22-No4, Parks

    Photo by Lucas Jmieffby Joyce Nelson

    Ever since the BC Liberal government surprised residents of BC’s Kootenays with its March 20, 2012 approval for the controversial Jumbo Glacier Resort, people have been asking: Why now? After all, the Jumbo Resort proposal has been around since 1989 and has been successfully opposed by local people for

  • Protecting Children from Pesticides - the Neglected Legacy of Rachel Carson
    Feature, Children, Pesticides, Sep-Oct-2012-Vol22-No4

    Creative Commonsby Bruce Lanphear

    At the turn of the 20th century, the greatest threat to the health of children was infectious diseases, like cholera, tuberculosis and typhoid.
    The development of vaccines and antibiotics played an important role in reducing deaths from infections, but the single greatest factor in reducing death rates and improving life expectancy was altering the environment to make it inhospitable to infectious agents: providing

  • Pesticide Residues in Our Food - What Does It Really Mean?
    Feature, Food, Pesticides, Sep-Oct-2012-Vol22-No4

    Photo by Paula Rodriguezby Miranda Holmes

    For the past eight years, the Environmental Working Group (EWG) has been analysing the pesticide testing done by the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA).
    EWG’s annual Shopper’s Guide to Pesticides in Produce ranks pesticide contamination for 45 popular fruits and vegetables, measuring the contamination in six

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"This is it. It's done!" was the message in Alaska in 2008, 19 years after the Exxon Valdes oil spill.  Dave Janka, who runs Auklet Charters in Prince William Sound, ran his boat over to Smith Island to snap this photo.  Dave says, "It's far from done!"

W.L.M. (Bill) Wilson writes: 'Attached is my rewrite of Anne Feeney’s “Have You Been To Jail for Justice”. Anne granted permission to do non-profit performances of this Enbridge version.' Video by Ester Strijbos.