EPILOGUE

The people sickened by the sludge plague are victims of germ warfare being waged against them by the waste industry and US EPA. They are forcibly subjected to this biologically active waste against their will. Sludge pollutants are trespassing into their air, land and water... indeed, right into their homes. Their health, property values and quality of life are being destroyed by these powerful entities who dismiss them as "acceptable risks".

Sludge victims are told by the public agencies who should be protecting them that they are hypochondriacs and their illnesses are "psychosomatic." Victim after victim say that when they appealed to local, state and federal agencies for help, their pleas fell on deaf ears.
"No one cared....... No one would listen". "The EPA says it's safe so it can't be making you sick".

Many victims told me: "The person who owns the land where they are spreading the sludge is rich, powerful, politically influential. He doesn't live here so he is not affected ... we are afraid to go up against him"

Land spreading is the cheapest way to get rid of sludge, saving cities and POTWs millions of dollars over the cost of land filling or other disposal methods. Also, many property owners are being paid to put sludge on their land. Thus, the EPA's sludge policies are driven by financial motives which supersede any concern for the health and well being of the neighbors.

Another reason sludge victims may be treated with disdain and contempt by the waste industry and EPA is because they usually are people of modest financial means living in sparsely populated areas with little or no political clout. No sludge is land spread in well-to-do communities. Thus, the land spreading of sewage sludges is an issue of environmental injustice:
the infliction of polluting facilities or environmentally degrading activities on Rural Americans who do not have the money or political connections to fight back.