=============================================================== == == == ----------- ALS INTEREST GROUP ----------- == == ALS Digest (#33, 10 APR 1993) == == == == To subscribe, to unsubscribe, to request back issues, == == to contribute notes, etc. to ALS Digest, please send == == e-mail to: == == bro@huey.met.fsu.edu (Bob Broedel) == == == == All interested people may "broadcast" messages to == == ALS Digest subscribers by sending to: == == als@huey.met.fsu.edu == == == =============================================================== --------------------------------------------------- The April 4th issue of FLORIDA TODAY contained the following Editorial. It also included an extensive article about the ALS cluster by Marilyn Meyer. Copies are available from: FLORIDA TODAY; Gannett Plaza; P.O. Box 419000; Melbourne, FL 32941-9000. FAX: 407-255-9550. --------------------------------------------------- ==== ALS CLUSTER SIGNALS NEED FOR A NEW PROBE. ==== For the second time in two years, a mysterious cluster of deadly disease cases has been discovered in South Patrick Shores. Is it coincidence -- or contamination? Local and state health officials need to find the answer, and soon. Evidence shows that after World War II the area now known as South Patrick Shores served as a dump site, possibly of hazardous substances. In the late 1970s and early 1980s, the community's water source -- the Melbourne water system -- contained levels of trihalomethanes several times higher than federal standards deemed acceptable. Those compounds are suspected of causing cancer. The latest illness cluster involves amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, better known as Lou Gehrig's disease. A three-month FLORIDA TODAY investigation revealed that the illness has stricken six people in the community of 1,415 people. That's nearly 17 times higher than the national rate of 1.6 to 2.8 cases per 100,000 people. Coincidence or contamination? The same question was asked in 1991 after FLORIDA TODAY articles revealed that between 1967 and 1983, eight residents of South Patrick Shores had contracted Hodgkin's disease. That number of cases of a relatively rare disease in one neighborhood also was considered highly unusual by health officials. Several longtime residents of the community recalled that the area, just south of Patrick Air Force Base, had been used as a dumping ground in the 1940s and 1950s. The results of that dumping might well haunt South Patrick Shores today. Monitoring wells installed in recent years at the base have detected heavy metals, pesticide and solvent contamination in groundwater. Canals and ditches on the base have been found to contain levels of heavy metals considered dangerous to wildlife. In the wake of the 1991 controversy, state and federal agencies conducted medical and environmental studies of South Patrick Shores. The investigators determined that the neighborhood had no unusual hazards. In October 1991, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers announced that the community did not qualify for a Department of Defense cleanup program. The reason: Insufficient data that the military engaged in dumping there. Within a few months, the controversy over the Hodgkin's disease cluster died down and the government studies were filed away. But many residents of the neighborhood think the tests were inadequate and that the danger continues. Those residents have been left to wonder whether their choice of a community has placed their health in jeopardy. That's not fair. State and federal health and environmental agencies need to solve this mystery. In light of the ALS cluster, Brevard's state legislators and U.S. Rep. Jim Bacchus should use their influence to get those agencies to reopen the South Patrick Shores investigation. Additional information from the ALS cases might well provide data that could lead to the causes of these disease clusters. Coincidence or contamination? The public needs to know. == end of als 33 ==