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Jerry Ensminger is not your typical activist. “Typical” is probably the last word you’d use to describe him. Jerry is a former Marine drill sergeant at Camp Lejeune, North Carolina, who directed all his determination, guts, and smarts to figuring out why his 9-year-old daughter Janey died from leukemia.
Since Jerry started his quest fifteen years ago, he’s been the subject of Semper Fi: Always Faithful, a documentary film short-listed for an Oscar. He’s testified before Congress. And this August, Jerry stood next to President Obama as he signed into law the “Janey Ensminger Act,” which provides health benefits for veterans and their families who were sickened by contaminated water at Camp Lejeune.
Jerry was stationed at Camp Lejeune when his daughter Janey was diagnosed with cancer in 1982. She died three years later. It bothered Jerry that he didn’t understand why Janey got sick, why she had leukemia. But twelve years later, in 1997, Jerry got an answer when he saw a news report about the significant level of contamination of the drinking water at Camp Lejeune by toxic chemicals including trichloroethylene, vinyl chloride, perchloroethylene, and more, all of which are known or suspected carcinogens.
Jerry wrote in a blog on Semper Fi, “Of course, my first thoughts were of Janey, but later that evening I began to think of all the other people who had been potentially exposed at Camp Lejeune who were now literally spread out all over the world! How many of them were still seeking their own glimmer of hope for their own nagging question of what happened to me or what happened to my loved one(s)? I knew right then and there, the only way those people would ever have a chance of finding out was for me to push for answers and do everything I could to make sure they got notified!”
It’s estimated that 1 million people could have been contaminated over the course of 30 years from drinking, bathing in, and eating foods prepared with the polluted water at Camp Lejeune People’s health suffered from the exposure. For example, while only one in 100,000 men is expected to have breast cancer, veterans have found more than 80 cases of breast cancer in men with connections to Camp Lejeune. In a federal survey of families who lived there from 1968 to 1985, 22 cases of childhood leukemia were reported, which could be as much as sixteen times higher than would otherwise be expected, according to Jerry.
There’s so much to Jerry’s story. He’s a grieving father. He’s a former Marine taking on his beloved Marine Corps, which resisted revealing all of what it knew about the water contamination. He’s a fighter. Alex Rindler at Environmental Working Group called Jerry “a modern day hero.” That title fits him, too.
Jerry’s story is about the overwhelming power of love to change the world. The list of people who turned their grief into action to help others is long and inspired. Included on the list is Nancy and Jim Chuda, who lost their 5-year-old daughter to cancer. The Chudas founded Healthy Child Healthy World so parents would understand the relationship between the environment and diseases like cancer. Also Heather Donatini, a 2012 Healthy Child Healthy World Mom On a Mission nominee, who lost her son to cancer, but started a foundation to help other families who had children with cancer.
Before she died, Janey told her family she wanted to live longer to help other people. When the Janey Ensminger bill became law, Jerry said, “I know she’s watching. And by God, she’s made more of a change in this world through her death than most people make in their entire lives.”
Thank you Jerry for turning your love for your daughter into a powerful force that makes the world a better place.
Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/checblog/~3/djTt7efYQSE/
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