Read the full article by Lee Hedgepeth (Inside Climate News)
“When Danielle Cusimano brought her newborn baby, Saylor, home from the hospital in December 2022, it was hard to keep the smoke out.
The Cusimano family lived a few miles from the site of the Moody landfill just northeast of Birmingham where a month earlier, in November 2022, a fire had sparked to the surface, causing a blaze that covered dozens of acres and, in places, burned as deep as 150 feet, according to fire officials.
That fire, which more than a year later has not been fully extinguished, billowed thick, dark smoke for months. Cusimano said there was no way to keep her child from being exposed. And soon, Saylor’s symptoms began. Her daughter experienced nosebleeds and constant ear infections, symptoms her doctor ascribed to the child’s exposure to smoke, according to her mother. Once, Saylor was so congested an ambulance had to come to her home to treat her.
Eventually, the Cusimano family moved, no longer willing to suffer at the hands of what they saw as rampant polluters and a government unwilling or unable to stop them. Now, more than a year later, the family is still searching for answers about what impacts the fire could have had on their health.” …