Cancer Alley
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Cancer Alley (French: Allée du Cancer) is an area along the Mississippi River between Baton Rouge and New Orleans, in the River Parishes of Louisiana, that contains numerous industrial plants and has been shown in some scientific studies to have an incidence rate of cancer higher than the national average.
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[edit] History
In 1987, some residents in the tiny community of St. Gabriel, Louisiana called Jacobs Drive, the street on which they lived, "cancer alley" because of fifteen cancer cases in a two-block stretch. Half a mile away, there were seven cancer victims living on one block. The eighty-five-mile stretch of the Mississippi River from Baton Rouge to New Orleans was formerly referred to as the "petrochemical corridor" but after reports of numerous cases of cancer occurring in the small rural communities on both sides of the river, the entire area became known as cancer alley.
In 2002 Louisiana had the second-highest death rate from cancer in the United States. Although the national average is 206 deaths per 100,000, Louisiana's rate is 237.3 deaths per 100,000.
In 2000 Toxic Release Inventory (TRI) data showed that Louisiana ranked second throughout the nation for total onsite releases, third for total releases within the state, and fourth for total on- and offsite releases. Louisiana, which has a population of 4,469,970 people, produced 9,416,598,055 pounds of waste in 2000. Seven of the ten plants in the state with the largest combined on- and offsite releases are located in cancer alley, and four of the ten plants with the largest onsite releases in the state are located there. [1][2][3]
[edit] Cancer Studies
There are many scientific studies that clearly indicate that the incidence of cancer in this region is above the average for the rest of the United States ).[1][not in citation given] This area in Louisiana, along the Mississippi River, is predominately low-income, African-American, and Latino.
There are also studies (by Shell Oil Company) that indicate that the cancer rate is actually lower. Shell Oil Company is one of the major contributors of pollution along the stretch of the Mississippi River known as "Cancer Alley." [4]
In one Louisiana town with a population under 20,000, 3 cases of rhabdomyosarcoma were reported in a 14 month period.[5] Rhabdomyosarcoma, an extremely rare and devastating childhood cancer, has a national average of one child out of a million.
A study by Frederic T. Billings III, M.D., argues that Louisiana does indeed have an alarmingly high lung cancer rate, but that the source is not the "cancer alley" parishes, but the other parishes of Louisiana, where tobacco smoking can be blamed for most of the lung cancer.[6]
[edit] See also
[edit] References
- ^ a b http://www.pollutionissues.com/Br-Co/Cancer-Alley-Louisiana.html[unreliable source?]
- ^ Centers for Disease Control. (2002). Cancer Prevention and Control "Cancer Burden Data Fact Sheets, Louisiana." Atlanta, GA.
- ^ Coyle, Marcia. (1992). "Company Will Not Build Plant: Lawyers Hail Victory." The National Law Journal, October 19, p. 3.
- ^ Tsai SP, Cardarelli KM, Wendt JK, Fraser AE (April 2004). "Mortality patterns among residents in Louisiana's industrial corridor, USA, 1970-99". Occup Environ Med 61 (4): 295–304. doi:10.1136/oem.2003.007831. PMC 1740760. PMID 15031386. http://oem.bmj.com/cgi/content/abstract/61/4/295.
- ^ http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/A760420
- ^ Billings FT (2005). "Cancer corridors and toxic terrors—is it safe to eat and drink?". Trans. Am. Clin. Climatol. Assoc. 116: 115–24; discussion 125. PMC 1473137. PMID 16555610. http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi?tool=pmcentrez&artid=1473137.
[edit] Further reading
- Nitzkin JL (April 1992). "Cancer in Louisiana: a public health perspective". J La State Med Soc 144 (4): 162. PMID 1613306.
- Sierra Club "Toxics." Available from http://www.sierraclub.org/toxics
- The documentary film "Fuel" by Josh Tickell. [www.thefuelfilm.com]
[edit] External links
- http://www.pollutionissues.com/Br-Co/Cancer-Alley-Louisiana.html
- Cancer Alley: Myth or Fact?, Unwelcome Neighbors: How the poor bear the burdens of America's pollution. New Orleans Times-Picayune.
- Cancer Alley. BBC.
