Lauren (with her little sister Hailey) suffered from cleft lip and palate associated with a commercial solvent.

Lauren Woods was born with a cleft lip and palate; now 11, Lauren has undergone five surgeries—lip closure, palate closure, inserting tubes in her ears, and removing a piece from the middle of her palate—and has at least 13 more to endure. The Shriners facility for children with birth defects did her surgery pro bono. Down the road, lives Peyton, born with a cleft lip and palate and a deformed heart.

In all, nineteen children within a two year period were born in Dickson, TN, with clefts (the national average for a town of this size is three), as well as brain, heart and penile defects, and cancer. Their mothers while pregnant had all drunk water laced with the solvent TCE leaking from a nearby landfill. The polluter was a company which subsequently deserted the town, leaving behind a bankrupt shell. TCE is one of the most common pollutants of water in the U.S.