Um...um...um... An Important Concern? The safety of chemicals on, um, Mars?

Frankly, I won't have published this one about whether Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos or (insert distractable billionaire here) will be safe on Mars from chemical contamination: Toward “Safe” Chemicals and Materials on Mars: Knowledge Gaps for Expanding Planetary Protection Requirements John D. Hader, Alberto G. Fairén, Marlene Ågerstrand, Matthew MacLeod, and Bernd Nowack Environmental Science & Technology 2026 60 (13), 9744-9760.

There aren't enough resources on Earth to really send more than a few people - for no good purpose - to live on Mars.

This said, in a remotely cogent way, the concern is a paradigm for concern for the health of the few, in this case the extreme few, over the concerns of the bulk of humanity. In a way, we already live in this world, since rich nations are quite willing to send their toxic waste to poor nations. We care for ourselves at the expense of everyone else. In this case we can decide to screw the Earth, something we do with abandon, so long as Mars is "safe."

The paper is open to the public to read. If interested, one can read it at the link. I have nothing more to say on the topic other than, "sigh..."