Duwamish River poses health threat to those who live nearby

The Duwamish is not just Seattle’s only river, and the original home of its first Native American people, it is now also an industrial waterway classified as one of the nation’s worst toxic waste sites and one of the few federal Superfund cleanup sites in the country to bisect a major urban area. InvestigateWest’s Carol Smith dove through reams of public health data to show people who live near this waterway have shortened life spans, high rates of asthma hospitalization, more infant mortality, babies with lower birth rates and a host of other health problems stemming in large part from living in an industrial neighborhood.