The Harvard scientists found an increased rate of fetal and newborn deaths among pregnant women whose homes had gotten the largest quantities of the water. Among children in the Pine Street neighborhood, an area of high exposure, they found increased rates of allergies, skin afflictions such as eczema, and respiratory disorders—chronic bronchitis, asthma, and pneumonia. They also found a “significant excess” of congenital defects to the eye and ear, of kidney and urinary tract disorders, and of “environmental” birth defects, a grouping that included cleft palate, spina bifida, Down’s syndrome, and other chromosomal aberrations.

Jonathan Harr, A Civil Action, loc. 636