The Future of Your Health?

 

Now the information is starting to flow; at a pace similar to the flow meter reading on the equipment that ‘failed’ and resulted in the “release” of hundreds of thousands of gallons of chemicals into our community environment.

Did it happen that way? Apparently, that may have been one way that it happened. The community and the employees of the IBM Endicott facility still don’t know ALL the details.

 

They do know, however, what the effect has been.

 

They also have been informed by the media, that chemical waste was dumped, spilled, released many times and in many areas, away from the IBM Endicott plant. Confirmation of those ‘releases’ is yet to come;

And no one knows why, yet. Speculation says that it was done ‘illegally’. The community and the employees of the IBM Endicott facility still don’t know ALL the details.

 

They do know, however, what the effect has been.

 

Studies by New York State in 2005 revealed that “people living near the polluted area have higher rates of birth defects, testicular cancer and kidney cancer than would be expected. The study was undertaken after residents learned they had been exposed to low levels of industrial solvents pushing into basements through a process called vapor intrusion. The study takes into account 22 types of cancers from 1980 to 2001. It concludes that elevated rates of testicular and kidney cancers during that time are ‘unlikely due to chance alone.’ ” 

 

Apparently, this ‘effect’ continues to be disturbing. More and more residents and employees and former employees of the IBM Endicott site are asking questions. Many of those questions can’t be answered in a ‘sound bite’ fit for television news or even news print.

 

Here’s what has been accomplished as remedy and as inquiry into this enormous and disturbing problem:

 

 

 

There are still many unanswered questions.

  

Properties in the area have been ‘devalued’ because of the pollution. Unknown numbers of IBM Endicott employees have suffered and/or died from health problems that could have originated from the exposure to the chemicals that were used, up until the early 1990’s. Some of the exposures were a “double whammy”, due to the resident also being an IBM employee. Exposed at work and exposed at home. No escape unless they quit their job and moved away. Not a choice by most; and certainly not a luxury for many.

IBM retirees are sometimes the hardest hit by these circumstances. In the 1990’s, many already retired IBM employees were suddenly forced to make monthly payments toward their IBM medical benefits, that were free when those same employees retired in 1980’s. With some pensions as low as $500.00 per month; a deduction of even $25.00 per month was a severe impact to them. Worse than just a broken promise.

 

There’s been resistance to the inquiries, right from the beginning. It has come from all directions. A portion of it has been from businesses and community residents that are either in denial, extremely frightened, or totally uninformed about the reality of toxic chemical exposure. The deniers claim that studies by NYS show the problem to be small or isolated. Yet some say, NYS has been caught ‘stonewalling’ about how much data has existed that could have been studied years ago. NYS has even reported that the population size (that remains in the area) is “too small” a sample to be used to determine ‘anything’!

The deniers also defend the company, by saying that those chemicals were discontinued in the late 1980’s and that the company took all the necessary and proper precautions to limit the exposures in the workplace. The evidence suggests otherwise. It appears that precautions, at least, weren’t taken to limit exposure to the residents.

 

Nebulousness and ignorance seem to have been in great quantity

 

Carelessness is then diluted with blame on the part of other businesses that contributed to the pollution. And lastly, the chemicals (TCE) were, at the time, not thought to be as harmful as we now know they are; (potentially, 65 times more harmful) according to the EPA draft risk assessment of 2001 which says in part: “This assessment presents EPA's most current evaluation of the potential health risks from exposure to trichloroethylene (TCE). TCE exposure is associated with several adverse health effects, including neurotoxicity, immunotoxicity, developmental toxicity, liver toxicity, kidney toxicity, endocrine effects, and several forms of cancer. Mechanistic research indicates that TCE-induced carcinogenesis is complex, involving multiple carcinogenic metabolites acting through multiple modes of action. Under EPA's proposed (1996, 1999) cancer guidelines, TCE can be characterized as "highly likely to produce cancer in humans."

 

When NIOSH completes its study of 28,000 IBM Endicott employees past and present; we just might find out, definitively.

Until then, Alliance@IBM and past and present employees will continue to press for remedy and full disclosure.

 

This situation is not isolated to IBM Endicott. There are toxic chemical exposure problems in other IBM locations; such as Burlington VT, Kingston NY, San Jose CA, and Fishkill NY so far. There could be more TCE problems in facilities that IBM sold; such as Manassas VA and Austin TX. That reason is the most compelling, for IBM and x-IBM employees to demand environmental justice. The initial NIOSH study of the 28,000 IBM Endicott employees could be a precedent to studies in all the aforementioned IBM and past IBM locations.

 

Those employees and communities are owed it.

They need to demand it. Alliance@IBM is working with many different environmental advocates, scientists, medical epidemiologists, and state and federal government officials to move forward these studies.

 

Ultimately, those studies could be applied to other circuit board manufacturing sites, in other communities across the USA; suffering from similar if not identical circumstances.

Lee Conrad; National Coordinator, Alliance@IBM CWA Local 1701:

“For IBM there will be no peace and no rest until there is justice for IBMers living with and dying from toxic time bombs”

 

We can not give up until there is Environmental Justice for the damage to our health, our livelihood, our community, and our children’s future; by the careless and reckless behavior of IBM.

 

Please contact us if you have any information that will help.

 

Rick White

Co-Chair Health and Safety & Web Maintenance
CWA Local 1701

607-658-9285
Alliance@IBM

http://www.allianceibm.org/contact.php