Tornado Alley (PROG)

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Louisiana Cancer Clusters

by Wilma Subra, Subra Company/Louisiana Environmental Action Network
Agriculture Street Landfill, New Orleans

Statistically Significant Breast Cancer Incidence
Identified in 1997
City of New Orleans Municipal and Industrial Waste Dump 95 acres 1909 - 1958
Hurricane Betsy Debris Disposal Site 1965 - 1966
HUD Housing 390 properties constructed on top of the landfill 1977-1986
47 acres
67 Individual owned homes
179 Rent to own townhouses
128 senior citizen apartments
Elementary School
Community Center
Retail Stores
Playground
48 acres undeveloped
December 1994 - Environmental Protection Agency Designated Agriculture Street Landfill a Superfund Site
The City of New Orleans was named the potentially responsible party
Yards of homes, apartments, school yard and playground consist of:
landfill waste, river sand and some soil
contaminated from the surface down to 17 to 20 feet with:
Carcinogenic polynuclear aromatic hydrocarbons –
Benzo(a)anthracene
Benzo(a)pyrene
Benzo(b)fluoranthene
Dibenzo (a,h) anthracene
Pesticides
Dioxin
Heavy metals - Arsenic, Lead
October 1997 ATSDR Health Consultation report
Rate of Breast Cancer in women from 1988-1993 was statistically significantly increased
60% excess of breast cancer in all females and in black females on the Ag Street Landfill census tract
There is evidence that Polynuclear Aromatic Hydrocarbons can increase the risk of developing breast cancer
Emergency Cleanup Funds Used to Remediate - 1998
Remove and replace 2 feet on only 10 % of the site
No removal under homes, structures, streets and driveways.
Remedy cost $20 million, relocation would have cost $12 million
2005 Hurricanes Katrina and Rita Damaged, destroyed and flooded the entire Ag Street Site
The Hurricanes Storm Surges contaminants added to the toxic burden on the Ag Street site
Leachate from the landfill flowed across the site
Only a portion of the individually owned homes were reconstructed following the hurricanes
The remainder of the site was abandoned by HUD and the City of New Orleans
The exposed population was substantially reduced
Coteau, Louisiana Leukemia Cluster

Rural area at the intersection of Iberia, Lafayette, St. Martin and Vermilion parishes
In 1996 4 children in Coteau were diagnosed with leukemia
Parents and relatives became involved
40 children in the four parish area were diagnosed with ALL and AML Leukemia between 1983 and 1997
The community had a more complete list of cases than the Louisiana Tumor Registry
The health agency identified the high rate of Leukemia as unusual
The Community Identified the Commonalities
All drank from shallow water wells- individual and municipal wells
All had agricultural fields in the back yard, front yard or side yard - farmers applied pesticides and herbicides on a regular basis and diluted the chemicals with used diesel and oils
All lived near Glycol Dehydration Units along natural gas transmission pipelines - Glycol units released large quantities of benzene into the air
Changes That Ocurred as a Result of the Leukemia Cluster to Reduce Exposure
The municipal water system:
expanded its service area to serve individuals on private water wells
dug deeper water wells to serve the system
improved the water treatment process
added new water board members who were engaged in the Leukemia issue
State Agency increased their regulation and oversight of Glycol Dehydration Units
The new EPA rules for the Oil and Natural Gas Sector that went into effect August 16, 2012, revised the NESHAP requirements for Glycol Dehydration Units process vents and LDAR requirements.
Neuroblastoma in Amelia/Morgan City
1986-1987 5 cases of Childhood Neuroblastoma
classified as an excess number
1985 Marine Shale Processors in Amelia, began operating an incinerator
first burning oil field waste/drilling muds
burned creosote waste from superfund sites as a fuel source
burned heavy metal contaminated hazardous waste as a bulking agent
accepted and burned a wide variety of hazardous waste
generated aggregate which contained high levels of hazardous waste that was used as fill material
Contaminated
Air with hazardous contaminants not appropriately burned by the incineration process or removed by the inadequate scrubbers
Water bodies by allowing hazardous waste to be deposited in the water bodies during unloading activities
Land by disposing of the contaminated aggregate in residential areas, industrial areas and recreational areas
The grandmothers of the 5 Neuroblastoma victims became involved in fighting for the lives of their grandchildren and fighting to shut down the hazardous waste incinerator.
Similar clusters of Neuroblastoma were identified in:
Taylorville, Illinois where the exposure was linked to coal tar. Coal Tar has the same chemical components as the creosote waste burned by Marine Shale Processors.
Bakersfield, California where the exposure was linked to pesticides. Off spec pesticides and pesticide waste from Bakersfield were improperly burned in the Marine Shale Processors incinerator.
In response to request from the city government of Morgan City, the public and the LSU Medical School, ATSDR conducted a public health assessment of Marine Shale Processors. In 1994, ATSDR concluded that there was evidence to suggest that adverse health outcomes in the community could be related to environmental exposure. However, insufficient data existed to link the hazardous waste incinerator at Marine Shale to the adverse health outcomes in the community.
During the summer of 1996, a federal judge closed down Marine Shale Processors and their incinerator. The owners of Marine Shale paid the government a settlement of $7 million for the closure and remediation of the site.
Hazardous waste manifested into the facility in 1996 remains on the site today. The generators of the waste, sent to the facility, agreed to remediate the site. The site is still not remediated.
Nicole the surviving victim of the Neuroblastoma cluster died in May 1997. She lived long enough to see the facility closed down.
Mossville, Calcasieu Parish - High Incidence of Cancer and other Diseases

Mossville, Calcasieu Parish - High Incidence of Cancer and Other Diseases
Mossville is a historic, African American community that was founded in the 1790s. The Mossville community is now surrounded by 14 heavy industrial facility consisting of petroleum refineries, petrochemical facilities, four vinyl chloride manufacturing facilities and a coal fired power plant.
In 1998, the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston conducted a health study of Mossville residents.
Cancer
Respiratory Ailments
Kidney and Liver Diseases
In 2008 a Health Survey of the Mossville Community was performed and resulted in 57% of the individuals surveyed consider themselves sick and reporting being sick from 3 days to every day per month. The same health conditions were reported in 1998 as well as 2008.
Blood Dioxin Levels in Mossville Residents
3 times the National Comparison Group (21 ppt)
1997 Dioxin in Blood - Law Firm
1998 Dioxin in Blood, 28 individuals – ATSDR
Mossville residents 3 times the National Comparison Group - 68.3 ppt
2001 Dioxin in Blood - ATSDR 22 individuals
17 from 1998 ATSDR Study
5 from 1997 Law Firm Study
Mossville residents 3 times the National Comparison Group- 61.0 ppt
Eight of the 14 industrial facilities surrounding Mossville release Dioxins and Furans into the environment.
The top 5 Dioxin congeners in the blood of the Mossville community, matched 77% of the dioxin congeners released by Georgia Gulf, a Vinyl Chloride Monomer manufacturing facility.
The same Vinyl Chloride Monomer facility which corresponds to the Dioxin fingerprint in the community blood, not only releases Dioxin, but also releases Vinyl Chloride and Ethylene Dichloride into the air of the Mossville community in concentrations up to 5.6 times in excess of the Louisiana Ambient Air Standards.
So Dioxin as well as Vinyl Chloride, a known human cancer causing agent, and EDC, a carcinogen and mutagen, exposure is continuing at unacceptable levels in the Mossville community.
Dioxin has also been detected in fruits, vegetables, nuts, fish, yard soil, indoor dust and attic dust from the homes of Mossville participants.
The attic dust samples had the highest concentration of Dioxin of all samples collected 922.77 ppt
The toxic chemicals released by the industrial facilities into the air of Mossville exceed the ambient air standards in the Mossville community and the chemical health impacts correspond to the health impacts experienced by the Mossville community members.
For the Mossville community, exposure continues and a very sick community continues to be made sick by the chemicals being released by the industrial facilities that surround their community.

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