Tracing the Poison: Dr. David Cwiertny on Iowa's Water and What's Actually In It

Iowa leads the nation in corn, soybeans, hogs, and eggs. It also leads in nitrate pollution, agrochemical runoff, and drinking water contamination tied directly to that same production system. In this episode of Tracing the Poison, we sit down with Dr. David Cwiertny, the William D. Ashton Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the University of Iowa and Director of the Center for Health Effects of Environmental Contamination (CHEEC), to get past the talking points and into the data. Cwiertny has spent his career studying what happens to pesticides, fertilizers, and industrial chemicals once they enter Iowa's soil and water, and what that means for the people drinking it. He's advised Congress on this. He runs the state's own research center on it. In this conversation he tells us plainly what the water testing actually shows, why "feed and fuel the world" has a cost nobody's pricing in, and why the people closest to the science are often the furthest from the policy table. This episode traces the same ground Jon Connors covered on his 2015 to 2016 bicycle route through Iowa, revisiting the chemical exposure question with a scientist who has spent decades measuring it directly. In this episode: What's actually turning up in Iowa's drinking water, and why testing alone hasn't fixed it The link between agricultural intensification and public health outcomes What real accountability would require from the state Tracing the Poison is an investigative series following the paraquat and agrochemical exposure trail through rural Iowa, and the public health crisis here. Learn more and support the project: https://tracingthepoison.com Join the Iowa unConference, October 24, 2026: https://events.humanitix.com/iowa-con... #TracingThePoison #Paraquat #IowaWater #AgriculturalPollution #EnvironmentalHealth #Documentary Write a message…