The Love Canal Story Is Not Finished

In this issue, Gensburg et al. (2009) summarize the mortality experience of > 6,100 former residents of Love Canal, New York, over the period 1979–1996. Love Canal became a household word 30 years ago when outraged residents, led by Lois Gibbs and the Love Canal Homeowners Association, demanded attention to the apparent adverse effects of hazardous waste exposures on their children’s health (Boston University School of Public Health 2004). Love Canal was evacuated between 1978 and 1980, and property owners were compensated in the first such widely publicized creation of environmental refugees in the United States. Several books and documentaries have described the process and the responses of the various parties involved, including the New York State Department of Health (Boston University School of Public Health 2004; Levine 1982).