A Michigan pediatrician who played a key role in uncovering government missteps during the Flint water crisis is in Honolulu to speak at the University of Hawaiʻi.
Dr. Mona Hanna-Attisha discovered her patients were being poisoned by lead in their water pipes after Flint switched its water source in 2014. She is credited with bringing the contamination to the public’s attention even as state agencies dismissed her concerns.
Hanna-Attisha wrote a book about her activism and whistleblowing, "What the Eyes Don't See: A Story of Crisis, Resistance, and Hope in an American City." Ahead of her UH Mānoa event on Thursday, she spoke to The Conversation about water contamination in Flint, on Oʻahu, and around the country.
"We have continued to see water crises throughout our country that have so many parallels and the most important parallel is that they could have been prevented. And so when I hear about other water crises, like what's happened here in Hawaiʻi. I'm heartbroken. I'm sad, but I'm not surprised," she said.
"But it also translates very much into our ability to work to prevent the next crisis. And there's been so many, kind of, glimmers of hope in our investment in water infrastructure nationally, the amazing voice of activists being raised, the words 'environmental justice' are part of our national lexicon now," Hanna-Attisha said.
She said governments have an opportunity to strengthen environmental regulations, many of which have not caught up with the most recent science.
"We can have stronger protections. We can instead be governed not by innocent until proven guilty, but rather, let's assume something is not safe until we can prove it's safe. So this is what is known as the precautionary principle, which is how we should be governed in public health and environmental health and children's health," Hanna-Attisha said.
This interview aired on The Conversation on March 22, 2023. The Conversation airs weekdays at 11 a.m. on HPR-1.
