An English major with social science interests, I detoured through the business world, before going to law school and focusing on environmental law. I grew up in diverse places, and they have all been part of the inspiration for the work I do. Growing up in India, I lived for a while in a neighborhood with open sewers (where I got quite sick) and in coal-mining towns. I also lived in Botswana, next to Zimbabwe, both rich in wildlife and natural beauty. Since then, I have lived in Cambridge and San Francisco, both eco-conscious places. In San Francisco, I worked for a year as Program Assistant in NRDC's San Francisco office before going to law school. Each of these experiences played a part in my decision pursue a career in the environmental field. After law school, I worked at an environmental justice organization in San Francisco, the Center on Race, Poverty & the Environment, which focused on issues that largely centered on health. Not surprisingly, I work with the Health Program at NRDC.
My wife and I have a young daughter, and it’s great to work on issues that help make her world a healthier one—right around the time of her birth, I got to work on a case that helped eliminate hormone-disrupting chemicals called phthalates from toys sold in the US. That brings the work home in the best possible way.
In my spare time, I like to read, watch movies, listen to music, hike, and enjoy the culinary delights of the Bay Area.
Posted April 23, 2012 by Avinash Kar in Health and the Environment
If you want the truth about FDA’s self-proclaimed announcement of a “sea-change” in the overuse of antibiotics in livestock recently, you’ll have to look beyond FDA’s own words. The truth is that FDA’s announced actions are deeply flawed and are...continued→
Posted April 11, 2012 by Avinash Kar in Health and the Environment
Instead of taking real action to limit the use of antibiotics in healthy livestock, FDA today announced a final version of their list of recommendations – called a “guidance” – for the livestock industry. (They also put out a draft...continued→
Posted March 23, 2012 by Avinash Kar in Health and the Environment
All right. Let me get this out of my system. Woo hoo! Try it yourself. Because I have some news we can all celebrate. We just had a great victory in court yesterday that will help protect the health of...continued→
Posted February 27, 2012 by Avinash Kar in Health and the Environment
In the last few months, I have been talking a lot about what FDA is failing to do to effectively regulate antibiotics in animal feed and protect public health. Today, I thought I would talk about what we, as...continued→
Posted January 11, 2012 by Avinash Kar in Health and the Environment
FDA filed a response this week to our May 2011 lawsuit seeking to compel the agency to protect the public by addressing the unnecessary use of antibiotics on healthy animals, which is linked to the rise of drug-resistant infections in...continued→
Posted January 5, 2012 by Avinash Kar in Health and the Environment
Yesterday, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) proposed banning extra-label, i.e. unapproved uses, of a class of antibiotics known as cephalosporins on healthy livestock. This is a step in the right direction to curtail the rise in antibiotic resistance in...continued→
Posted December 22, 2011 by Avinash Kar in Health and the Environment
Just in time for the holidays, as many among us prepare to sit down to turkey or ham at the dinner table, FDA has taken a big step backwards on the public health threat of antibiotic resistant bacteria in our meat...continued→
Posted December 9, 2011 by Avinash Kar in Curbing Pollution, Health and the Environment, U.S. Law and Policy
Today, the U.S. Court of Appeals in Washington D.C., rejected industry arguments to overturn critical public health protections put in place by EPA last year. In August last year, the EPA put in place regulations to reduce toxic air pollution...continued→
Posted November 9, 2011 by Avinash Kar in Health and the Environment
This week, 12 years after leading public interest groups petitioned for FDA to put a stop to the livestock industry’s unnecessary use of antibiotics on healthy animals because of its risks for public health, the agency finally responded. FDA’s reply:...continued→
Posted September 15, 2011 by Avinash Kar in Health and the Environment
Public health and medical groups have been saying it for a while: the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is not doing enough to combat the rising public health threat of antibiotic resistance linked to the overuse of antibiotics in livestock. ...continued→
Posted September 12, 2011 by Avinash Kar in Health and the Environment
Last week, an impressive list of medical and public health groups wrote to political leaders to urge action on antibiotic resistance and to reiterate the clear scientific evidence linking the misuse and overuse of antibiotics in food animals and...continued→
Posted August 12, 2011 by Avinash Kar in Health and the Environment
The turkey recall I recently blogged about has focused a spotlight on the issue of antibiotic resistance, as evidenced by the recent widespread news coverage of a new study showing that poultry farmers who stop giving their birds antibiotics reduce...continued→
Posted August 9, 2011 by Avinash Kar in Health and the Environment
image courtesy Soil Science, via Flickr I went away for vacation and came back to headlines about a nationwide recall of turkey meat contaminated with an antibiotic-resistant Salmonella strain linked to at least 78 illnesses and to one death...continued→
Posted July 28, 2011 by Avinash Kar in Health and the Environment
This week, an industry-leaning commentary with an academic veneer appeared on the Dairyherd Network, repeating industry arguments that rely on inaccurate facts that have been rebutted by scientists and public health and medical organizations to argue against banning the...continued→
Posted June 7, 2011 by Avinash Kar in Health and the Environment
Things on the antibiotic and livestock front have not been quiet since my last post. Last week, the House Appropriations Committee approved an amendment to an appropriations bill proposed by Rep. Rehberg (R-MT) which was approved in part, as its...continued→
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