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What are my children exposed to? Why I want testing for cancer-causing chemicals

1 min read Opinion An argument, written to persuade. Rewritten in plain language
Show what we removed Rules applied: A1×7 A3 C1 D2×4 D3×9 D4×3 E3×10 F2×2 all 30 rules
  • When she moved to the countryside two years ago, Natalie Dugdale thought it would be the spot to raise her family.
  • Now she is part of a group of people who are worried they may have been poisoned by years of exposure to waste, and are campaigning for voluntary blood testing across Wales.
  • Natalie could not believe her local lake in Llwyneinion, just outside Wrexham, had once been a dumping ground for chemicals and wants to see blood testing introduced.
  • Sheen's Buried programme team found elevated levels in soil samples taken in an area open to the public beyond the fenced-off lagoon, as well as at 13 other suspected dumpsites for the firm's waste across the country.
  • The banned chemicals were once widely used and revered for being non-flammable and hard to break down – but are seen today as the first "forever chemicals" - which are building up in the environment, threatening wildlife and human health.

5 sentences from our version of the report, chosen to cover it. Nothing here is written; every line is in the article below. How

Headline check

The headline claims nothing the report does not, but it puts it more firmly than the report does.

  • The headline states “exposed” outright. In the report the claim is attributed to somebody, or hedged.

Figures, names and quoted words in the headline, looked for in the report itself — not in the summary above. How this is checked

When she moved to the countryside two years ago, Natalie Dugdale thought it would be the spot to raise her family.

Close to a lagoon in north Wales, she thought she could walk her baby, toddler and dogs on public footpaths.

Now she is part of a group of people who are worried they may have been poisoned by years of exposure to waste, and are campaigning for voluntary blood testing across Wales.

Members of a newly formed campaign group for those living alongside some of the sites concerned have told BBC Wales they had been left "frightened and upset" and said testing would help provide "peace of mind".

Natalie could not believe her local lake in Llwyneinion, just outside Wrexham, had once been a dumping ground for chemicals and wants to see blood testing introduced.

Llwyneinion lagoon was recently branded "a shame on Britain", following the documentary into historical dumping of PCBs by US chemical giant Monsanto, which had factories in Wrexham and Newport.

Sheen's Buried programme team found elevated levels in soil samples taken in an area open to the public beyond the fenced-off lagoon, as well as at 13 other suspected dumpsites for the firm's waste across the country.

Michael Phillips was also found to have "very high" levels of PCBs in his blood, after private testing commissioned for the documentary.

The banned chemicals were once widely used and revered for being non-flammable and hard to break down – but are seen today as the first "forever chemicals" - which are building up in the environment, threatening wildlife and human health.

Shortened to 1 minute of reading, this version reads 9.2 on the Niral Score.

You are reading our version, not theirs. This is BBC News (Science and Environment)'s report shortened to its most important sentences, in plainer words, with verdicts and loaded words taken out. Plain description stays, and so do adjectives that carry a fact, such as "former" or "federal". The reporting, the facts and the quotations are theirs — quotations are never edited — and the indicators beside it measure this version. Hover or tap Adjectives to see every one left in the text.

How this outlet filed it, and how we rewrote it

No other newsroom we read has filed on this event, so there is nothing to compare it with yet.

Outlet Niral ScoreAdjectivesSourcingSentimentHappiness
BBC News (Science and Environment)as they published this story 12.1 18 78 -0.3 23.1
Mundane Readneutralized from BBC News (Science and Environment) 9.6 11 78 -0.3 23.1

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