Khadija Ahmed: The Movement to Ban Plastic Production
Frontline communities continue to pay for plastics—from production to pollution. Now advocates are trying to reach consensus on a global plastics treaty before it’s too late.
Vegan Kitchen: Holy Guacamole!
The best sandwich I’ve ever eaten I bought at a food stand in the Austin airport years ago. A thin layer of guacamole on one thick slice of seed bread, a thin layer of humus on the other slice, and bean sprouts, chopped tomato and pepper relish in between. Since then, I’ve made variations on that sandwich many times.
Michelle D. Holmes, MD: What accounts for the racial disparity in breast cancer survival?
Studies show that the lack of Black doctors may contribute to the disparity.
Derrick Z. Jackson: After Decades of Disinformation, the US Finally Begins Regulating PFAS Chemicals
The Environmental Protection Agency announced it would regulate two forms of PFAS contamination under Superfund laws reserved for “the nation’s worst hazardous waste sites.”
Derrick Z. Jackson: The Very Slow Road to Banning Asbestos
Like almost all things chemical in the United States, the recent announcement by the Biden administration that it is banning a major form of asbestos is both a triumph and a disgrace.
Aidan Smith: Despite Meat Industry Lies, Plant-Based Diets Are Healthy
Plant-based diets have been connected to a decrease in mortality.
Derrick Z. Jackson: Ethylene Oxide Adds to Toxic Burden for Memphis Residents
Children are particularly sensitive to ethylene oxide exposure as it can damage their DNA.
Jeffrey Harrison: Disconcerting
The word became the mantra of
her last few years, which were, in fact,
often disconcerting: her descent
into dementia, her cancer diagnosis,
her fall, her fractured hip.
Patricia Jabbeh Wesley: This Worn-Out Hospital Gown
like all the other women survivors,
me, walking free from the monster.
T. R. Hummer: My Wife in Chemo
The house of healing is crystalline, clean
as the diagram of a carbon molecule drawn
With a laser beam on one facet of a diamond.
Sydney Lea: Heterodox
A knows of B
That after grim chemo his hair came back
The doctors reckoned they’d licked his disease
Thomas A. Thomas: In a Time
It is the month of our first walk along the salt
shore together, and of my beloved’s first illness,
harbinger of worse to come, month of our lost
mortgage, of bankruptcy, August of learning
Leslie Anne Mcilroy: Call Back
The pink half-gown is tied wrong.
I can’t figure out the strings.
My nipples are hard in the
fluorescent waiting room.
Tayve Neese: Inside her muscle, a blossom,
This is what the tumor had done,
reduced the whole world to nothing
but metaphor
