Mothers Facing Pollution Risks Find Allies in the Religious Right

Tuli Hughes's first three pregnancies ended in miscarriage. During her fourth pregnancy, she gave birth prematurely to a baby with a fatal birth defect who died a few minutes after being born. On her fifth try, Tuli again gave birth prematurely; the baby weighed about one pound and also died within minutes.

An explanation may be found in the environmental conditions in Tuli's neighborhood of Bayview-Hunters Point, which is home to San Francisco's main power and sewage treatment plants and the now-closed Hunters Point Naval Shipyard, a Superfund toxic waste site.

Bayview-Hunters Point, a low-income, predominantly African-American community in southeast San Francisco, has one of the highest infant mortality rates in California, comparable to rates in the developing world. Between 1992 and 2001, the area's infant mortality rate averaged 11.8 per 1,000 births, well above the national average of 6.8 per 1,000 and the average for San Francisco, which has the nation's lowest infant mortality rate among large cities. Recent studies also show that women in the community suffer from high rates of miscarriages and premature births, as well as breast and cervical cancer.

Low-income women of color like Tuli not only reside disproportionately around chemical dumps, power plants and other polluting facilities; they are also plagued by other socioeconomic handicaps such as lack of quality health care that exacerbate their reproductive health problems. These other handicaps undoubtedly contribute to the elevated reproductive health risks in areas like Bayview-Hunters Point, but they do not fully explain them. Research points to environmental contamination as a major part of the story.

Exposure to even small amounts of toxic chemicals during the early stages of pregnancy can lead to miscarriages and premature births, while prolonged exposure can cause infertility, endometriosis (a condition in which tissue that normally lines the uterus grows in other areas of the body), cervical cancer, and other reproductive complications. Children born to mothers exposed to toxic chemicals are also at greater risk of birth defects, learning disabilities, and other developmental illnesses. The Center for American Progress recently released a paper titled "More Than a Choice" that urges a broader conversation about reproductive health and rights -- one that goes beyond the narrow but dominant issue of abortion. As the paper indicates, a key part of this conversation must be providing a safe environment for healthy pregnancies and babies. The debate over abortion, while important, has tended to distract from this and other pressing issues of reproductive justice like access to quality health care and child care to the detriment of women and families across the country. Issues like these have the potential to create common ground even among those who have butted heads in the past. Indeed, a shared concern for healthy babies and families and a healthy environment has helped forge one of the unlikeliest partnerships Washington has seen in years: the religious right and the environmental community.

Conservative evangelical Christians have begun to press for stronger environmental protections to ensure the health of vulnerable communities. Much attention has been given to recent efforts by prominent evangelicals pressing for action on global warming. But some are also taking on mercury pollution as a threat to the "sanctity of life."

Mercury emissions from power plants contaminate coastlines, rivers, and lakes, and "bioaccumulate" in fish. Nearly all fish contain traces of mercury, but fish at or near the top of the food chain contain higher levels of mercury that may harm a fetus or young child's developing nervous system. Children born to women who eat mercury-contaminated fish are at a higher risk for a number of neurological disorders including mental retardation and learning disabilities.