By Carmi Orenstein, Editor

Not much time ever passes before I again think about how privileged I am to have Dr. Larysa Dyrszka as a colleague. Deeply informed and committed, thoughtful and eloquent, and so generous with her time, Larysa is a retired pediatrician and co-founder of Concerned Health Professionals of New York (CHPNY), since May 2021 a program of SEHN. CHPNY would not be what it is, would not have accomplished what we have to date, without her.

After receiving her medical degree from Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, Larysa began a career that included serving as Director of Pediatrics at Holy Name Hospital in Teaneck, New Jersey. Along with her longtime work as a physician, she has been a United Nations representative to the Economic and Social Council with the World Federation of Ukrainian Women’s Organizations, focusing on the rights of children, particularly with regard to health. She was a member of the State University of New York Sullivan Community College Board of Trustees from 2009- 2018 and served on the Sullivan County Health Services Advisory Board.

It is our own great fortune that Larysa became an advocate for public health as it relates to oil and gas exploration, production, and its infrastructure. She says,

Having just retired from the practice of pediatrics, and living over the Marcellus shale in New York State, I became concerned that children would be impacted by hydraulic fracturing for gas. Together with some like-minded colleagues, we founded CHPNY.

Over ten years ago, when health impacts of fracking were first recognized, our small group of physicians and scientists were at the fore, addressing this emerging harm to human health. We organized the information we had, shared it at hearings, spoke at forums and rallies. Our expertise evolved into the “Compendium of Scientific, Medical, and Media Findings Demonstrating Risks and Harms of Fracking and Associated Gas and Oil Infrastructure.” Now in its eighth edition, the Compendium warns that the harms of fossil fuel extraction continue unabated.

Larysa is also a founding member of Sullivan Area Citizens for Responsible Energy Development and on the Board of Physicians for Social Responsibility - New York. She has provided testimony at government hearings (see photo) and countless community education forums.

Amid the gravity of researching and writing each edition of the Compendium, working with Larysa is a delight. I’ll always remember the summer that she drafted her sections while working as a sleepaway camp nurse. I received entertaining camp updates (as well as the not-so-fun news of various summer camp health afflictions!) alongside her good writing about, for example, radioactive releases from fracking and its infrastructure, the impacts of pipelines and compressor stations, gas-fired power plants, and gas storage, and so on. I’m happy to share with our readers the contributions of Dr. Larysa Dyrszka to vastly expanded frontline community knowledge about the risks and harms of fracking and its infrastructure.

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Celebrating our Colleagues, February 2023: Dr. Larysa Dyrszka