The pressure to improve health is now placed on individuals as their behaviors are criticized, scrutinized, and sometimes demonized, in the hopes of modifying their behaviors into healthier ones. Personal responsibility for health is important and a good concept in theory. However, a difficulty arises when avoiding disease requires avoiding lead fumes and dust, shunning tainted tap water, or evading mercury emissions from coal-fired power plants, because individuals have little power to control their exposure to industrial pollutants that frequently poison their workplace and neighborhoods.
