CHE Cafe call: A Conversation with Dan Fagin, Author of "Toms River: A Story of Science and Salvation"
1:00 pm US Eastern Time
Slides & Resources
Additional resources of interest:
NPR: For Toms River, An Imperfect Salvation
Huffington Post: Cracking Open a Cancer Cluster
The Diane Rehm Show: An Interview with Dan Fagin
The Pump Handle: Trying to make the unacceptable acceptable: New books by Dan Fagin and Sarah Vogel illuminate our flawed history of controlling chemical hazards
In Toms River, a story of a small town ravaged by industrial pollution, Dan Fagin weaves together the history of toxicology, the origins of the chemical industry, the subtleties of cancer etiology and treatment, the politics of state and federal agencies as they interact with big corporations, the trauma and courage of the children with cancer and their families, the strains on the Toms River community, the intricacies of the legal mediation, and the pitfalls of "cluster" investigations—all in one extraordinary book.
Reviewers have described Toms River as “a gripping environmental thriller” (Kirkus Reviews, starred review), “a crisp, hard-nosed probe into corporate arrogance and the power of public resistance” (Publishers Weekly), “an epic tale of our chemical age” (Carl Zimmer), and “essential reading for our times” (Siddhartha Mukherjee).
CHE's Director Elise Miller, MEd, spoke on this call with Dan Fagin about Toms River, the Toms River community, environmental health and cancer.
Featured Speaker
A science journalism professor at New York University, Dan Fagin is a nationally prominent journalist on environmental health topics. He has twice been a principal member of reporting teams that were finalists for the Pulitzer Prize, and he has won both of the best-known science journalism prizes in the United States, from the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the National Association of Science Writers. His recent publications include Nature, The New York Times, Scientific American and New Scientist. At NYU, Mr Fagin is an associate professor of journalism and the director of the masters-level Science, Health and Environmental Reporting Program (SHERP).
