From my research on lead, I found the following observation from the Center for Disease Control, saying they classified the causes of disease and death as follows:
50 % due to unhealthy life styles
25 % due to environment
25% due to innate biology and
25% due to inadequate health care.
I've never thought about health so clearly, but it is a lifestyle altering realization. Live healthy, in a healthy place, or die worse than necessary as either a victim (if you can't escape bad environment) or a fool. So, in NEO do people have healthy lifestyles? Do we have a healthy environment? Do we - the media - the government - education - peers - focus on these issues, or on how we have so many great hospitals and medical researchers and that all that is the key to our future. What do you think?
Regarding lead... there's a bit of related background below, and there is much more found here. [1]
Lead poisoning is an environmental disease, but it is also a disease of life style. Lead is one of the best-studied toxic substances, and as a result we know more about the adverse health effects of lead than virtually any other chemical. The health problems caused by lead have been well documented over a wide range of exposures on every continent. The advancements in technology have made it possible to research lead exposure down to very low levels approaching the limits of detection. We clearly know how it gets into the body and the harm it causes once it is ingested, and most importantly, how to prevent it! Using advanced technology, we can trace the evolution of lead into our environment and discover the health damage resulting from its exposure.
Links:
[1] http://www.leadpoison.net/general/history.htm
[2] http://smtp.realneo.us/forum/of-the-day-is-it-safe-to-drink-water-from-a-hose
[3] http://smtp.realneo.us/Letting-the-Monster-loose
[4] http://smtp.realneo.us/blog/susan-miller/bioremediation-and-biofuels
[5] http://smtp.realneo.us/gclac-eradicating-lead-poisoning-in-greater-cleveland