SUNDAY, MAY 30, 2010
KLMNO
Attention turns to spill-related health risks
Reports of illness
among cleanup crews worry officials
by Rob Stein
Amid increasing reports of ill- nesses among workers helping to clean up oil in the Gulf of Mexico and residents living along the coast, concern is rising about health risks posed by the disaster and cleanup efforts. “We’re very concerned about the impact of the disaster on the public health of people in the gulf region,” said Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Se- belius as she outlined steps the government was taking to re- spond to any physical and mental health problems that emerge from the spill. In a sternly worded letter sent
Friday to BP Chairman Lamar McKay, Sebelius urged the com- pany “to take responsibility for the health consequences of the disaster.” The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is mon- itoring poison centers and the BioSense tracking system for signs of any emerging medical problems, Sebelius said. The En- vironmental Protection Agency had tested more than 15,000 air samples from Venice, La., to Pen- sacola, Fla., and had not yet de- tected dangerous substances at hazardous levels, she said. More than 500 water and soil samples have also been tested, she said. Nevertheless, the National Dis- aster Medical System has been activated to provide additional medical care in the five gulf states, and a federal mobile med- ical unit was being sent to Louisi- ana to help assess anyone com- plaining of illness, Sebelius said. At least nine workers were hos- pitalized last week, including seven who were taken to the hos- pital Wednesday after complain- ing of nausea, dizziness and headaches, prompting the Coast Guard to order all 125 boats working in the Breton Sound area to return to port as a precau- tion. An investigation was un- derway to try to determine the cause. Residents living along the coast have been reporting similar symptoms. Although BP officials and fed-
eral authorities have emphasized that all necessary precautions were being taken, questions are being raised by independent sci- entists, members of Congress and other federal officials, espe- cially for the thousands of work- ers spending long hours in often overpowering fumes being emit- ted from the oil. “There’s no way you can be working in that toxic soup with- out getting exposures,” Hugh Kaufman, a senior policy analyst at the EPA’s office of solid waste and emergency response, said during an interview Thursday. He likened the response to previ- ous toxic waste disasters and the World Trade Center cleanup, which left workers with long- term respiratory problems de- spite repeated official claims that workers did not need respirators because the working conditions were safe. “It’s unbelievable what’s going on. It’s like deja vu all over again,” he said. The situation is being compli-
cated by weather conditions, which include severe heat and humidity. That can cause symp- toms similar to those triggered by some of the chemicals workers may be exposed to. Assessing the health risks is also difficult because of several unknowns, including a lack of in- formation about the makeup of chemicals being used to disperse the oil and how those substances might affect the toxicity of the oil, several experts said. The most worrisome chemi- cals are volatile organic com- pounds, such as benzene, which can cause cancer at high levels and in long exposures. But those and other substances in the oil can cause acute symptoms in- cluding severe skin irritation, headaches, dizziness, nausea and burning eyes, as well as breath- ing problems and neurological complications including memory problems, confusion and disori- entation. Most acute symptoms from the chemical exposure disappear af- ter the exposure ends, but long- term complications can occur. Some fishermen involved in cleaning up the Exxon Valdez oil spill in Alaska suffered long-last- ing neurological problems. The National Institute of Envi- ronmental Health Sciences de- signed a safety course in English, Spanish and Vietnamese that all cleanup workers are supposed to complete before they can begin work. They are also supposed to be equipped with protective gear, such as gloves and boots. Never- theless, reports have emerged of workers doing cleanup in street clothes and with bare hands. David Michaels, the assistant
secretary of labor for occupation- al safety and health, last week complained in a memo to nation- al incident commander Thad Al- len about “significant deficien- cies” in BP’s handling of the safe- ty of oil spill workers, according to published reports. The National Institute of Occu-
pational Safety and Health, meanwhile, is gathering informa- tion about cleanup workers to track their health and document any problems that might emerge.
The most worrisome substanc- es in the oil that can become air- borne are expected to have dis- sipated by the time most of the oil reaches shore, reducing the risk from dangerous fumes to residents along the coast. But they will still face risks from get- ting the thicker oil on their skin. And because so much of the oil is traveling underwater, exactly what form it will take when it emerges remains unknown. Over the long term, the oil
could pose a risk to human health by getting into the food chain. The Food and Drug Ad- ministration is working with the National Oceanic and Atmos- pheric Administration to help de- termine when fishing can safely resume. “There’s going to be a legacy of contamination in the gulf food web,” said Gina Solomon, a sen- ior scientist for the Natural Re- sources Defense Council.
steinr@washpost.com
S
The Nation
In the gulf, where do we go from here?
Cleaning up the largest oil spill in U.S. history will be a mammoth undertaking. In addition to removing oil from beaches and marshes will be the challenges of defining lines of authority, responsibility and liability. Post reporter David Brown asked Roger Helm, 56, the environmental quality division chief at the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, about those challenges. Helm has dealt with many smaller spills over the past 15 years. Read his responses at
washingtonpost.com/nation.
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