FMHS APES Third Spring 2019

 Biju Manthuruthil The last time I went to the doctor’s office, I noticed something frightening. Right after the nurse or medical assistant used remotely anything, they would throw it away into the corresponding waste bin, either regular trash can or the different colored bio-hazard bins. Now training as a medical assistant, I know that of course the spread of bodily fluids is the biggest thing on the back of our minds when we go into a patient’s room besides the actual task we go in for so we throw away anything that remotely touched bodily fluids. But the thing that shocked me was that the nurse threw away a plunger into a regular trash can. That doesn’t seem like a big deal bio-hazard wise because there’s no bodily fluid taken from me, the issue was that imagine if someone not trained correctly throws away the whole thing along with many other items that shouldn’t even be touching the bare human hand.       This sparked the idea of looking into how...

  Caleb Lawless   Extreme weather events seem to be making the news more and more these days. Think about Hurricane Florence and the wildfires in California , not to mention the countless floods and droughts worldwide that did not make the news. Every time one of these events is being covered on TV, I always wonder if there is a way they could be prevented. It turns out that humans are not able to prevent these events, but we are able to contribute to the cause of them. While some people may resist the topic, environmental scientists have determined that climate change is fueling extreme weather. As you can see by the graphic above, natural disasters and their cost have been increasing since the 1980's. Since the 80's, extreme climate and weather events have cost the US over a trillion dollars in damages, and climate change is to blame. In the US, especially in 2018, our most damaging source of extreme weather comes...

Keerthi Koganti Nuclear Power is a resource of creating power and electricity without the discharge of greenhouse gases. However it has been the cause many disasters such as the Chernobyl disaster which occurred in the Soviet Union, and the Kyshtym. These disasters have caused genetic deformities, loss of habitats and diversity. Such dangerous substances possess a threat. Therefore the storage of them is a problem, as the increase of these substances there are higher risks of exposure to radioactive substances. Many who handle the radioactive substances face the effects of radiation. Flora and fauna are destroyed. Most low level radioactive wastes can be handled by humans without measurable biological effects but it is still recommended to be careful while handling. R ead more:   http://www.pollutionissues.com/Pl-Re/Radioactive-Waste.html#ixzz5g1z9oUCE One of the more recent problems that we have is Fukushima nuclear waste storage in Japan. After 7 years that plant was...

Anshul Kumar I don't remember too much from elementary school (excluding my multiplication tables), but I do remember one thing: projects. So many fun projects with powerpoints and labs. But I also remember what almost all of our projects used: construction paper. The vanilla paper was almost always my go-to in elementary school. But a lot of the time, students would just tear a small piece of paper and throw the rest away. They didn't even recycle it. It's not completely their fault (we were in elementary school and just learning about recycling), but it got me thinking how much can be saved. Paper is, of course, not the only thing that can be recycled. Cardboard, plastic bottles, cans, and glass can all be recycled. Many Americans currently rely heavily on the trash can. Anything they throw into it will just disappear and will never be seen again. But this is not true. The United States produces almost 30% of the world's garbage. It will come back to haunt us, a...

Jennifer Hanchette Overpopulation. When you truly think about it, this has to be one of the largest and most challenging environmental issues caused by man. Our obstacle is ourselves, ethics, research, and our overall advancement in society. Furthermore for us humans to continue researching how to better our planet, we need more time, effort, and resources which can include tearing other habitats apart for our metropolitan jungles. This brings us back to this very moment in time; we are depleting Earths resources - renewable and nonrenewable - and fast. We need 4 Earths to sustain the average US citizen. 4.8 For Australians. 5.1 for Kuwaitis. the further down  the list we go, the clearer the image becomes; Earth won't be able to sustain this aggressively massive, self-aware life form for much longer. Humans are in fact, dangerous to Earth. A lot of this is due to our invasive-like nature and overall greediness for resources, but our consumptive, wasteful nature tops ov...

Eric Haddad Plastic pollution is no stranger to society. However, one of the biggest culprits is also one of the least suspected: straws. Straws seem too small to cause any harm, but when you take into account how many are used every day, their effect greatly increases. Straws are one of the most found litter during beach and ocean cleanups. They cannot be recycled in most places, and they are not biodegradable (when a substance can be naturally broken down and digested by micro-organisms and then recycled into new organic molecules and life). The plastic used to make straws takes around 200 years to degrade (when a substance is just broken down into small pieces). The plastic may appear to go away, but the small, deconstructed pieces will forever remain on Earth. Even worse is that the degrading of plastic releases toxic chemicals that harm wildlife and the environment. Aside from the chemical dangers that straws pose to animals, the straw itself greatly harm them. It is belie...

Saumya Gunampalli We’ve all done it. Thrown away a rotten banana or the bag of spinach you forgot was in the back of the fridge. It’s just a couple of little things. No big deal, right? Well, it might have a bigger impact on the environment than you think. Each year, 60 million tons of produce get thrown away, just in America. This accounts for roughly 40 percent of all produce grown in the country. Basically, almost half of our produce grown goes straight into the trash. A lot of this comes from the fact that grocery stores only like to have the “pretty food” in stock. This means that any imperfections in produce can result in it being thrown away before it even hits the market. To do our part, we should buy only what we need and use what we have to reduce food waste. Another factor that contributes to all the food-related waste is food packaging. It may not seem like a lot, but this waste adds up quickly. One way to combat...