Online Leader Is Welcome

I was pleasantly surprised when I received The ASHA Leader Online. As an 80-year-old life member, I find it much easier to read than the standard mailed edition. Great innovation and, of course, much less costly for ASHA.

Melvin Paris
Largo, Florida

Cultural Competence

Your article about cultural competence (Nov. 2) was of great interest to me. Some years ago, I attended an international conference on language problems in a multilingual society in Haifa, Israel.

One session stressed the difficulties of translating language tests, even tests that require only picture identification. For instance, in Israel, milk comes in plastic bags (placed in special containers at home), so Israeli children could not identify a container of milk. (A Coke bottle was substituted for that item!)

One speech-language pathologist tested a group of 3- and 4-year-olds who had come to Israel from Russia and Ethiopia. She puzzled over most of the children's inability to identify any gardening tools. She then realized that the year she performed the tests was "sh'nat shmita," wherein many Israelis allow the land to lie fallow every seven years. Except for the use of hydroponics, no flowers, plants, or food was planted; the children had not experienced gardening since their arrival.

Another problem is that most tests are normed on a homogeneous population. I practice in a large Orthodox Jewish community. Many of the students have no access to television, movies, or rock music. Tests aimed at middle and high school students do not measure these children's language expertise. I had to return several social language competency tests I had ordered because the items were irrelevant to the community.

I, sadly, imagine that many students are labeled deficient because of the lack of cultural knowledge on the part of those doing the assessment.

Leah Lando
Baltimore, Maryland

Toxicants and Vaccines

As both a practitioner and a parent, I was excited to see an article in The ASHA Leader(Nov. 22, 2011) on protecting children from toxicants. The information on neurotoxicants as well as an infant's susceptibility in the article was outlined perfectly. But not one single mention of vaccines in this article? Their contribution to the incidence of developmental disabilities? It was almost comical to see a section in the article about the proven adverse effects of mercury, yet no mention of its presence in both past and present vaccinations. Advising parents to steer clear of thermometers, light bulbs, and seafood isn't the answer. A clear, honest, open dialogue about the neurotoxicants our society is knowingly injecting into our children is what is needed, not an article that picks and chooses which toxicants to describe. Highly disappointed.

Julie Liberman
Plano, Texas

More on Toxicants

Thank you for publishing Ms. Hepp's article, "Protecting Children from Toxicants" (Nov. 22, 2011). Ms. Hepp clearly outlined the risks and made good suggestions for reducing them. Many of the toxins Ms. Hepp listed can be traced to one source: air pollution from biomass incineration. Biomass burning emits many of the same toxins as tobacco smoke, but it is often colorless and odorless. The absence of smoke is no guarantee of safety.

Burning municipal waste and wood for energy, wrongly touted as "green" power, is increasing across the United States and is creating an entirely new source of dioxins and nanoparticles with multiple health risks including cancer, asthma, and neurological problems in children. Do you think the government will protect you through regulations? The U.S. government allowed lead in gasoline and paint, formaldehyde, asbestos, benzene, dry cleaning fluid, dioxins in Agent Orange, DDT and more. Its damage to humans is well documented.

The American Academy of Family Practice, representing 94,700 physicians, last year issued a letter of concern about biomass burning because of the increased health risks to humans. For the health of your children, demand that your legislators incentivize truly clean energy sources such as solar, wind, water, and hydrogen fuel cells and stop the promotion of dangerous biomass burning. Meanwhile, if you see a smokestack burning wood (biomass), coal (fossilized biomass), or municipal waste (biomass), keep children far away from it if you can.

William J. Blackley
Sandie Barrie-Blackley
Elkin, North Carolina