Recently, residents in the mid-west, especially in Wisconsin, have been falling ill due to the contamination of well water. The ground water has become increasingly polluted due to many factors. However, the main factor is an excess amount of waste being spread across fields. After the fields have absorbed as much “fertilizer” as possible, the extra waste flows into streams, rivers, and groundwater. Lisa Barnard, who lives just 15 miles from the city of Green Bay said, “sometimes it smells like a barn coming out of the faucet.” Residents have had to deal with water contamination for a while now and it has been causing many illnesses.
The people who are affected by the contaminated well waters have experienced “chronic diarrhea, stomach illnesses, and severe ear infections.” One young boy had so many ear infections that he had to have an operation and his physician said that the infections were most likely caused by bathing in polluted water. Along with being sick, residents have also had to spend thousands of dollars re-digging/digging deeper wells. For instance, Joel Reetz spent $16,000 making his well deeper after he learned that his water was polluted. Thankfully, Reetz was able to afford to dig a deeper well, but this is not always the case and leaves many families with nothing except contaminated water.
Although there has been a large effort to greatly reduce the amount of pollution in water resources, by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), there are even more factors that refute their arguments. For example, the EPA has requested that larger farmers, those with 700 or more cows, be required to follow special laws. However, the George W. Bush administration passed regulations allowing many farms to “self-certify that they will not pollute.” In response, most farms never register and get away with contaminating states’ water sources. Also, even though the EPA is trying to increase the enforcement of the Clean Water Act, Congress has yet to create new rules on the topic.
5 comments:
It is amazing that even in a country as developed as the United States, many still have to deal with unsafe water.
This article did a great job of painting vivid images to explain some of the things that are happening in this small town. One, the women said the faucet smelt like a barn and this allowed the reader to realize how disgusting the water really is. The article also did a good job of explaining the sicknesses that the people in this town have to deal with due to the bad water. Finally, the article explained that, on top of all these other problems, many farmers have to pay to dig their wells deeper in search of better water. The review could have used more quotes and said where the article came from. I learned that not everyone in the US can people enjoy the benefits of clean water.
I found this article very interesting and surprising. Three aspects of the review that I thought were presented particularly well were how people who have been affected by this have experienced many illnesses as a result. Also, I thought it was surprising that the water within the United States has become so contaminated, which was presented well. Another aspect of this article that was presented well was how the Environmental Protection Agency has been doing many things to attempt to rid Wisconsin of this problem. One way to make this article even better could be by adding even more specific examples on how we all can prevent pollution. Another way to further improve this article could be by explaining more cases of people who have been affected by this pollution. Overall, I really liked this article and review.
Overall, I really liked this article and review.I found this article to be very interesting. Three aspects of the review that were well presented were the facts that the water in the United States has become so contaminated. Another was how the Environmental Protection Agency has been doing a lot of work to attempt to rid places like Wisconsin of this problem. the last was how people who have been affected by this have experienced many illnesses. a way to make this article better could be by explaining more cases of people who have been affected by this pollution by adding more specific examples on how to prevent pollution. Another way to further improve this article could be by adding more specific examples on how to prevent pollution. All is all, great review
i was really shocked that the water is becoming so polluted. two things that could of made this article better would be to explain more about what we can do to help. also one thing that they could have done to improve this article would be to give more examples, like more about who it is effecting and examples of it. three parts of this article that happened to be really well presented was that they showed how much money residents are spending, just to try and make the water cleaner. another good example was they told us some reasons that the water is becoming so polluted in the mid-west. the last thing that was presented well was they gave an example of the illness that the contaminated water is causing
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