Cancer rates are up, they tell us, because of chemicals, pesticides, electromagnetic fields, a thinning ozone layer, secondhand smoke, auto exhaust, radiation from nuclear power plants, or our failure to eat vegetables five times a day. The reality is that people in western societies are living longer, healthier, more productive lives than at any time in the history of mankind. If we are more likely to die of cancer, it is because we have eliminated most of the diseases and hazards that used to kill us before we were forty. Cancer is largely a disease of old age. But activists long for those days.
Examples are legion.
Here's just one. Organic foods also put consumers at greater risk for salmonella poisoning. The reason is that organic farmers use animal manure, then compound the problem with their reluctance to use antimicrobial preservatives, chemical washes, pasteurization, or even chlorinated water to get rid of bacteria. Two cases of E.coli reported last year from eating fast-food hamburgers turned out to have come from the lettuce, not from the beef. The lettuce had been fertilized with chicken manure.