Iowa water quality and cancer rates dominate midterm campaigns

Summarised from 2 outlets · Updated 14 Oct, 05:32 · Archive

Iowa is making water quality and rising cancer rates central issues in its midterm election campaigns, appearing in debate questions, roundtable events and campaign advertisements across both parties. These issues have historically been politically sensitive given Iowa's status as one of the country's top producers of corn, soybeans and hogs.

Iowa has the second highest rate of newly diagnosed cancers in the country. Prostate, breast and lung cancers are increasing in Iowa faster than in the US overall, affecting both urban and rural parts of the state.

Chemical fertilizers and animal waste from farming create runoff containing nitrates and phosphorus that pollute Iowa's rivers and lakes with rain and snowmelt. This has long caused tension between Iowa's more liberal urban centres, which rely on these water sources for drinking water, and the mostly conservative farming communities. Farmers are increasingly adopting practices to prevent runoff, although critics say the lack of regulation forces downstream Iowans to pay for the pollution. Political attention has grown following back-to-back years of water use restrictions in the Des Moines area.

How it is being reported

• Iowa faces a reckoning over water quality and cancer rates in midterm campaignsIowa is grappling with water quality and cancer rates, bringing these issues to the forefront of state politics.News4Jax · 14 Oct, 05:08
• Iowa faces a reckoning over water quality and cancer rates in midterm campaignsIowa is grappling with water quality and cancer rates, bringing these issues to the forefront of state politics.Clickorlando · 14 Oct, 05:08

In this story: Iowa · Des Moines · United States

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