Whether it be artificial intelligence (AI) or the blockchain technology behind cryptocurrency Ponzi schemes, there is no significant public debate about the social, economic, or environmental impacts of new technologies. Rather than rely on technology assessment to judge whether a new technology is good or bad for society, policymakers fall back on a belief that well-functioning markets will weigh benefits and costs better than research teams. The author argues that newness alone is not enough to justify letting the private sector decide what is in the public interest. The public interest is measured in more ways than just the investment returns for technology billionaires.
Issues surrounding drinking water quality and inadequate monitoring of metal contaminants are particularly relevant in Maine, where 55 percent of residents rely on private wells for drinking water, yet only half of those wells test for arsenic. The public health impacts of contaminated water can be compounded by limited access to healthcare in rural areas. To better inform state and local policy, we assessed the potential public health risks that arise from the intersection of environmental and structural vulnerabilities. We used a dataset of 2,664 private drinking water samples collected between 2016 and 2025 by Maine students involved in a secondary school-based citizen science project called All About Arsenic. To evaluate the dual burden of exposure to heavy metal contaminants in areas with limited access to healthcare, we analyzed the distribution of metal contaminants in the subset of private well samples relative to health professional shortage areas across Maine.
