Living Downstream: Book Review

Now believe me, I probably would never have picked up this book if it wasn't for my Sociology of Health & Illness course I was taking. We needed to pick a book to read that had to do with health, so instead of doing the book Fast Food Nation, like every other person in the class [and because I had already read it before in high school], I decided to go with a book my professor mentioned in class, a book that made me look more deeply into cancer. Living Downstream: An Ecologist's Personal Investigation of Cancer and the Environment is not only filled with valuable information about the environment we live in today and how it affects our bodies, but it also has the personal story of the author, Sandra Steingraber. Hearing her story is what made me keep flipping the pages, that and I had to read it in order to get an A on the paper.

Synopsis from Barnes & Noble:

The first edition of Living Downstream—an exquisite blend of precise science and engaging narrative—set a new standard for scientific writing. Poet, biologist, and cancer survivor, Steingraber uses all three kinds of experience to investigate the links between cancer and environmental toxins.

The updated science in this exciting new edition strengthens the case for banning poisons now pervasive in our air, our food, and our bodies. Because synthetic chemicals linked to cancer come mostly from petroleum and coal, Steingraber shows that investing in green energy also helps prevent cancer. Saving the planet becomes a matter of saving ourselves and an issue of human rights. A documentary film based on the book will coincide with publication.

My Review:

“There was once a village along a river. The people who lived there were very kind. These residents, according to parable, began noticing increasing numbers of drowning people caught in the river’s swift current. And so they went to work devising ever more elaborate technologies to resuscitate them. So preoccupied were these heroic villagers with rescue and treatment that they never thought to look upstream to see who was pushing the victims in.”

– Steingraber, 1997

Instead of focusing on the prevention of the 80% of cancers due to environmental exposures, the society is too wrapped up in curing this disease to even bother what is causing the onset. These environmental toxins, such as herbicides, pesticides, petrochemicals, and radiation are linked to many types of cancer. It's a complex web of causation that causes cancer, including genes, life-style, and the environment. In 2009 alone, 1.48 million people in the U.S were told that had cancer - that's 4 thousand a day! As a future Child Life specialist, I will be working with children in hospitals helping to normalize their experience. Cancer happens to be the most common disease killer of American school children, as stated in Steingraber's book. Prenatal exposures to environmental carcinogens create the threat of cancer in children. The information about childhood cancer intrigued me, because I know cases such as these may come along, and I need to realize that cancer has many ways of appearing in a child's life.

I love that she included her personal voice in the book, because it really allowed me to connect with the author, as well as the causes behind cancer. On top of that, Steingraber has without a doubt done her research , and I don't think for a second that she held back any information. She even went as far as including the limitations and the relevance of the topic at hand.

I think that we can all read this book and begin to understand that the change starts with us, and in order to help others we must create a way to stop this web of causation from causing cancer.

My Rating: 5 Stars