Campbell Brown of CNN recently reported that the vast majority of people that worked to clean up the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill in Alaska are now dead. The average life-span of an Exxon Valdez worker has turned out to be 51 years old.
Amazing.
It doesn't take much to imagine what Exxon Valdez portends for cleanup workers in the Gulf of Mexico.
Campbell Brown's CNN clip is below the fold.
Information that Exxon Valdez cleanup workers have virtually all died is particularly disturbing, given that the Deepwater Horizon oil spill is magnitudes of order greater than the Alaska spill. As incredible as it may seem, it is being reported that almost every Exxon Valdez cleanup worker, regardless of age, is now dead:
Given the size of the spill in Alaska, in comparison to the size of the spill in the Gulf, is it really surprising that burgeoning numbers of cleanup workers are reporting illnesses arising out of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill? CNN reported on June 28, 2010, that 162 cases of illnesses had been reported to the Louisiana state health department. Not surprisingly, many of those falling ill were cleanup workers:
Several of the workers who fell ill reportedly had been exposed to fumes from the dispersants being deployed in the Gulf, the report said.
Most of those affected worked on the cleanup efforts in some way. Twenty-three of those with symptoms worked on an oil rig, the report said.
Most workers went to an emergency room or an urgent care center when they developed symptoms. At least 21 people were briefly hospitalized.
The medical community is calling the symptoms of the cleanup workers "toxicant-induced loss of tolerance", or "TILT". TILT is marked by headaches, fatigue, upset stomach, and problems with memory and concentration. The most suspicious culprit in causing TILT appears to be benzene, although it is too early to say with certainty:
But it is the health effects that will take a long time to show up that are the most concerning. For example, this oil spill has released massive amounts of benzene into the Gulf. Benzene actually enters human cells and damages DNA material. In fact, the Department of Health and Human Services tells us that exposure to benzene has been proven to cause leukemia. So are we about to see a massive wave of cancer sweep the Gulf coast?
At this point nobody knows. What is becoming clear is that a whole lot of people are becoming ill.
Because of the obvious impact of the oil spill on health, Keith Olbermann reports that training is now supposed to be implemented for cleanup workers, but that training just isn't happening like it should:
As the oil spill broadens and reaches shorelines inhabited by millions of people, the general population may be swiftly becoming affected. Anecdotal complaints are beginning to snowball. Consider these testimonies appearing in The American Dream:
I live in Gretna, La just a little past the Huey P Long bridge. I have had headaches for several days now. I am also having trouble breathing like i am having a asthma episode. I don’t even have asthma. If it gets any worse i am going to the hospital. All i can say is someone needs to look into this seriously, The air smells like burning crayons (that is the best way to explain it). It has smelled like this for several days now.
...
We live in the navarre, florida area and in the past week almost every family we know has had vomiting and diarreha. This could just be anecdotal – maybe we just have a stomach bug circulating, but it is strange. We had a huge storm the week before it happened that blew in from the gulf so who knows. Also, the city of destin, florida has taken it upon themselves to close the destin pass with their own purchased boom and barges. This is an elite destination and they are not waiting around for bp and their hired prison workers to clean the beaches. Apparently, the coast guard was at the meeting and told the locals that they will face criminal prosecution, but they don’t care. They are protecting their million dollar properties.
Anecdotal or not, mainstream news organizations like the Guardian out of Great Britain increasingly publish stories with comments like "[t]he smell of the oil on the beach is so strong it burns your nostrils, and leaves you feeling dizzy and headachey even after a few minutes away from it." Can one reasonably doubt that illness will follow from long-term exposure to such conditions?
The Gulf of Mexico must be cleaned up, on that we all agree. The price for the cleanup, however, is going to be very high in terms of human life (if anything can be learned from the Exxon Valdez disaster). One of the great tragedies is that cleanup workers are probably shortening their lives by 20 or 30 years by participating in the Gulf clean up.
These cleanup crews certainly deserve our appreciation, and, unfortunately, much more.