Clean, not healthy Today’s relatively antienvironmental mood contains the bothersome notion that our national wellbeing, in terms of productivity, and environmental quality are dichotomous. Plenty of evidence reinforces this mood: widespread economic uncertainty, current congressional efforts to scuttle environmental legislation, campaign rhetoric regarding downward trends in U.S. productivity, and suggestions in the popular press that declines in the U S . work ethic are somehow related to the shackling of our industry by federal regulation. Oddly, even the absence of proper scientific tools or reliable scientific data is cited as an additional reason for environmental retreat. Clearly, the notions of environmental regulation and industrial productivity are related, perhaps even antagonistic where useful by-product options do not exist or inflation/unemployment effects prevail. In reality, a continuum of options for decision making exists, and the tendency to dichotomize environment and production must be seen as a poor rationalization of generalized anxiety. The requirement for unassailable scientific proof of harm before regulation and the elimination or substantial weakening of present environmental legislation are acts of choice consistent with our traditional value system which prizes industrial output and discounts the rights of future generations (and the future generally). Unfortunately, this choice places present technology in the outrageous position of supporting increased contamination in order to afford the cost of cleaning up. That’s the point. We have chosen, so far, a clean environment, not necessarily a healthful one. There is some tyranny of words here, and the tendency to dichotomize these issues is encouraged by ambiguity in word pairs such as “clean/healthful” and “cost/ benefit .”
Actual implementation of water legislation has improved scenic/aesthetic features of waterways and probably has made them safer for fish. No serious progress has been made with regulation of human toxicants. In air quality legislation, we have focused on urban smog and ignored global threats from carbon dioxide. We have many more laws and regulations than we had 10 years ago and the estimated costs of these are not trivial. But we have bought clean, not healthy. Cost and benefit are essentially defined by this perception. The option for a healthful environment involves quite different choices and portends economic costs and adjustments to our lifestyle which we as a society are currently not willing to make on the basis of potential hazards. In this sense, the issues of environmental health and industrial productivity are, at least presently, dichotomous. We do not believe that the costs of stopping protective policies that are ultimately shown to be unnecessary are inherently less than the costs of potential suffering. This mood is reflected in most current efforts to soften present laws, many of which have differing definitions of “hazards,” “degree of protection,” or “burden of proof.” So our traditional decision-making system is working. It is reducing complex issues involving the public weal to traditional terms (cleanliness) with traditional results (don’t tread on me or my pocketbook). There is comfort in tradition, but unfortunately very little security, as we have not faced up to the ethical issues of public health protection.
Volume 14, Number 10, October 1980
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