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Free Press Letter: One minute with a legendary female scientist

I only met her and talked to her once. I saw her speak only once.

What I saw, heard and understood was the power of this woman’s commitment to her fellow human beings, their health and the living environment. In the face of a lackadaisical attitude by the public and elected officials that ranked public health of the public secondary to jobs and profit, she stood on the facts of her research, using those facts as a podium of truth.

As a registered nurse, I found a kindred spirit in the first article I read, authored by Dr. Theo Colburn. Her research opened my mind to the possibilities of chemical alterations at the genetic level. Her research findings are scary and were and still are dismissed by too many people that should know better, preferring instead to dismiss scientific evidence, that chemical pollutants have a profound and lasting effect on all living tissue.



After the Rifle meeting of the Governor’s Task Force, I realized that representatives from the extractive industry and the effected public are not on the same page. The extractive industry is “business as usual” with a new pithy slogan: “The Western Slope Way.” The effected public is still “Please, Please, do it safely;” begging, as usual, for attention from, now, the task force and the Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation Commission.

I write this to demand the Task Force make recommendations that honor their families, neighbors and fellow citizens based on the “Precautionary Principle” and known research by Dr. Theo Colborn, as she lived amongst us and knew what these transient fracking companies will leave for us to pay for multi-generational health issues.



Until the continuance of health for all things becomes the overriding priority of our culture, we put the very existence of humanity at risk. New York State decided the public had sacrificed enough. Since 9/11 they know what it is like to lose catastrophically those held dear. New York State has “banned” fracking.

Benita Phillips RN, BSN

Palisade, Colo.


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