Interview with CHE Partner, Jackie Hunt Christensen

When I started working for Greenpeace right out of college, I intended to work only long enough to earn money to pursue a graduate degree in Peace Studies. But as I got involved in issues involving groundwater contamination from hazardous waste landfills and dioxin contamination from garbage and medical waste incinerators, I saw a much more immediate threat--often to poor people or people of color. At that time, I was participating as a matter of conscience. It wasn't until my diagnosis with Parkinson's disease in 1998 that my work in the environmental health movement became a matter of my own survival.


What is your primary mission in your work?

Obviously, as the CHE-PD work group, we want to explore environmental links to neurodegenerative diseases like PD. But I also hope that our work group can serve as a "safe space" where researchers, clinicians, patient-advocates, and others can share information and ideas as peers. I would love to see us develop some true community-based participatory research projects on Parkinson's disease.

I am also very active within the Parkinson's Action Network, the group that serves as the policy voice of the Parkinson's community. Together with the Parkinson's Institute, the Parkinson's Action Network and CHE are hosting a consensus conference on Parkinson's disease (PD) and the environment in late June 2007.


What successes have most encouraged you in your work recently?

Convening the work group, having a reception at the World Parkinson's Congress, and having about 80% of the people we invited to the consensus conference agree to attend are all major successes, as far as I'm concerned.


What have been some of the greatest recent challenges?

Significant obstacles include my having the disease itself, which often limits my own productivity and that of many of my colleagues; funding for research; and lack of interaction between patients and the research community.


What is the number one change you would like to see for the future of environmental health?

Implementation of the tenets of the Precautionary Principle in setting U.S. and international environmental regulations. Risk assessment is so biased in favor of industry and doesn't factor in what we DON'T know. Many people don't know what the phrase "Precautionary Principle" means, but they support its meaning. But then again, most people don't give any conscious thought to the principles on which our regulations are based. I think Barry Commoner said it best: "Risk assessment is legalized homicide."


What or who continues to inspire you in your work?

People like Diane Wilson (a former shrimper turned activist/author who has taken on Dow Chemical very personally) who continue to speak truth to power, even in the face of great personal risk, inspire me. All of my fellow travelers on the journey with Parkinson's inspire and amaze me on a daily basis, and the love and support of my husband, Paul, allows me to continue to do what I can.


Any thoughts about CHE?

Starting with my own work group, I think we still have a lot of work to do to make CHE materials and calls more "user-friendly" to non-scientists. CHE has done an excellent job of staying on top of the most current science on a panoply of issues. We just need to make it more available to the average working parent who gets most of his or her information from YouTube.com, USA TODAY and FOX News.

Posted: 27 February 2007

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