Chicago is certainly a city with problems. One of its biggest problems is racism. Chicago is a segregated city. That means white folks live in one area of the city and black folks live in another. Furthermore, there is a huge disparity (difference) in regard to wealth. It seems that most of the wealth in the city is owned by the white folks. The organization called the Urban Institute states that for every $100 that a white family has in Chicago, a black family will have $10 and a Latinx family will have $12.So black and Latinx neighborhoods are generally poor and most of the gun violence, for which Chicago has become famous, happens in these poorer neighborhoods.
As if that isn't bad enough, it looks as if you have a stronger chance of getting cancer if you drink Chicago's tap water (ordinary water you get from a sink). God help the people of Chicago, since its politicians certainly will not.
An article on Chicago's dangerous tap water:
Chicago's water contains contaminants
Vocabulary from the article:
cancer-linked - something that is linked to cancer, something that probably causes cancer e.g. Cigarette smoking is definitely linked to getting cancer.
a contaminant - something that makes something else less pure or more dangerous. A contaminant pollutes something. The verb is: to contaminate. e.g. A few years ago there was a scandal where milk for babies had been contaminated by a chemical and many babies died.
to deem something to be something - to consider something to be something
not to think twice about something - not to think about doing something at all. e.g. Don't think twice about our friendship, I am definitely your friend and will always be.
the nervous system - the system that starts with your brain and runs through your body, controlling thought and movement. There are many body systems - the digestive system is the system involved in eating, the circulatory system is involved in how your blood flows through your body, your skeletal system is your skeleton.
hormones - chemicals in your body that control how you feel or what you want.
pregnancy - giving birth.
collaborating with - working with.
aggregated and analyzed data - gathered and looked at and tried to understand data.
a water utility - a government organization responsible for providing clean water to people
discrepancy - difference
the current legal limits - what the government says the limits for contaminants in water should be
authoritative studies on what is safe to consume - so the government has established limits to how many contaminants may be in a glass of water, but the limits are not good enough - authoritative studies (studies done by experts) show that the limits should be stronger and there should be fewer contaminants in the water people from Chicago drink.
outdated - from too long ago
to fill the gap - this means that the old limits are not good enough and a gap exists between what the limits are and what they should be. This organization wants to help establish new limits and fill the gap.
immune-system damaging - your immune system helps protect you from catching illnesses.
to impact health - to affect health, to do something to one's health
detected - discovered or found
the regulatory system - the system meant to provide laws for clean water
inexcusable - there is no excuse for it, there is no reason for it to exist
to be saddled with a cost - to be forced to pay for something that you shouldn't have to pay for. A saddle is something you put on a horse in order to ride it.
filtering technology - this is a device you can use to try to clean the water from your faucet before you drink it. Your faucet is the thing that water comes through before it enters your glass.
a band-aid solution - this is something you do to temporarily fix a problem without changing the source of the problem.
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