President Donald Trump proposes deep cuts to the Environmental Protection Agency. He feels that environmental regulations place an undue burden on businesses and curtailing those rules will allow businesses to expand, thus creating more jobs.
Indeed, with fewer guidelines, more jobs will be created, unfortunately in areas that we don’t want them: the medical field and its ancillary services. Water will become more contaminated with, to name a few, nitrates, lead, arsenic, fluorides, petrochemicals and pesticides.
With increased air pollution, a spike in many diseases will occur. The primary illnesses to escalate will be chronic respiratory disease, lung cancer, heart disease, and damage to the nervous system, liver and kidneys. Air pollution aggravates or complicates conditions in the elderly. We shall require more specialists in a broad range of disciplines as well as therapists and counselors to provide care for the increased patient load.
On top of that, we have a health care crisis, and many sick people will not be able to get the attention they deserve. Allowing industry to foul water and air is a very shortsighted policy; the positive effect is far outweighed by the negative.
— Sam Solomon, Deerfield
