Calculated Risks: Understanding the Toxicity of Chemicals in our Environment - Softcover

Rodricks, Joseph V.

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0521423317 ISBN 13: 9780521423311

Publisher: Cambridge University Press, 1994

Synopsis

Public concern regarding environmental pollution and chemicals present in foods, consumer products, and the work place are at an all time high. While there is widespread awareness, confusion still reigns, aggravated by conflicting reports concerning carcinogens in food and drinking water, or about chemicals present in medicines and household products that may cause birth defects. The central purpose of this book is to describe how scientists come to understand the toxic properties of such chemicals and the health risks they may pose. Rather than attempting to expose governmental and corporate ignorance, negligence or corruption, this book explores the underlying scientific issues.

About this title

Book Description

Public concern regarding environmental pollution and chemicals present in foods, consumer products, and the work place is at an all time high. The central purpose of this book is to describe how scientists learn to understand the toxic properties of such chemicals and the health risks they may pose.

Review

"...needs to be read by every medical scientist with any concern for public health issues as well as by environmental and food safety campaigners. It will sharpen debating skills enormously, broaden understanding of risk through chemicals and reveal not a few idiocies. Rodricks tells the scientists, the campaigners and the concerned citizens what they need to know. And they won't even need a dictionary. Dose-response curves, thresholds, environmental epidemiology and drug metabolism are all covered in simple and, at times, humorous terms. Toxicology is delightful--an art as well as science. Rodricks covers both." Simon Wolff, New Scientist

"Rodricks has written a book with a wealth of technical material that is so easy to read and follow, and which will be a gift to the students and fellow professionals he hopes will use it." Alastair Hey, Nature

"...presents a practical and balanced clarification of the scientific basis for our concerns and uncertainties. It should serve to refocus the debate." Biology Digest

"Rather than attempting to expose governmental and corporate ignorance, negligence or corruption, this book explores the underlying scientific issues. It presents a clarification of the scientific basis for our concerns and uncertainties." The Bulletin of Sci., Tech and Soc.

"...the best book we have yet seen on the theory of risk assessment--lucidly written, and evenhanded...If you want to understand the theory of risk assessment from the viewpoint of a successful risk assessor, this is the book for you." Rachel's Hazardous Waste News

"... a well-organized and readable text...The book should be recommended reading for those interested in obtaining an understanding of risk assessment." M.P. Schellenberg, Canadian Field Naturalist

"...provides access to the science and uncertainty behind the oft-quoted risks of toxic chemicals....The reader who completes the book is likely to know much more about the limitations of all assessments of risk." Resha M. Putzrath, BioScience

"It is difficult to praise this book enough. An evenhanded text that emphasizes complexity and reveals the gaps in our knowledge rather than oversimplifying the science of toxicology, Calculated Risks: The Toxicity and Human Health Hazards of Chemicals in Our Environment belongs on the shelves of every environmental organization. Writing in a manner that neither condescends nor baffles his readers, Joseph V. Rodricks has produced a text that if used as a point of departure in discussing siting, pollution, and similar disputes could save time and effort....This book is the basic text we all should read." C. Ian Jackson, Environment

Edition details

• Publisher: Cambridge University Press
• Publication date: 1994
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0521423317
• ISBN 13: 9780521423311
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 282