his paper discusses the shotgun wedding of science, law and public policy, with respect to chronic diseases, believed to have long latencies, special windows of vulnerability and multiple causes.Science works incrementally, solving puzzles that are posed within dominant object domains. While public interest in environmental causes of cancer and other chronic diseases remains high, limited funds have been expended to expand the object domain of basic research to include synergistic, environmental health issues. The dominant medical paradigm has limited basic research questions on chronic illnesses to efforts to improve treatment and detection, based on adaptions of the germ theory of disease which seek to identify solitary causes. Renewed interest in primary prevention is being fueled by the breast cancer activist community and some scientists seeking to exand the object domain of basic research. The regulatory paradigm has shifted from one which relied on precautionary principles in the enviromental heyday of the 1970s to one that seeks proof of human harm, before authorizing actions to be taken to reduce exposure.
Learning Objectives: To show that limited funds have been available despite growing public interest in environmental health, and how the breast cancer activist community and some scientists seeking to exand the object domain of basic research are now putting this issue more firmly on the agenda
Presenting author's disclosure statement:
Organization/institution whose products or services will be discussed: None
I do not have any significant financial interest/arrangement or affiliation with any organization/institution whose products or services are being discussed in this session.