Take Action! Throw a house party to watch the showâ€"invite a few friends over, discuss the episode, and urge everyone to send comments to NBC.

You may write Programming Department NBC, 3000 W. Alameda, Burbank, CA 91523; or click here and we'll submit your comments.

Physicians for Social Responsibility - Los Angeles, with Pesticide Action Network consulted with "Law & Order" executive producer Neal Baer and writer Jonathan Greene in developing this episode. PSR and PAN are calling for the public to contact NBC to support this type of reality-based programming about environmental health and justice.

Click here for materials you can send ahead or hand out to house party guests

In the episode, several children and their families -- including a Honduran immigrant familyâ€"are unwittingly tested with a dangerous organophosphate pesticide (a class of acutely toxic chemicals) by a fictional chemical company. In real life, EPA's recent human testing rule contains loopholes that allow chemical corporations to test pesticides on women and children. A 2005 Congressional report by Senator Barbara Boxer's and Congressmember Henry Waxman's staffs revealed human testing studies where pesticide corporations told their subjects they were ingesting vitamins or drugs. No study of the well-documented long-term effects of pesticide exposures were conducted in follow-up on those test subjects.

"Loophole" reminds the public of EPA's all-too-real life "CHEERS" program, where the federal government proposed in 2004 to offer low income families in Florida $970, a camcorder, and some clothes if they would record "routine exposure" of their one and under infants to household pesticides. The script is careful to point out the opposition of EPA staff scientists to the human testing rule crafted by EPA political appointees.

House Party Materials