The VGCSN is gradually contributing more to the blog, so continue to check in!
Meanwhile, here are some articles on the horrific environmental damage being done by BP as it applies the dispersant, Corexit. The chemical is four times more dangerous than the crude oil itself. Harking back to chain gang days, BP has hired prison inmates for the cleanup. These workers have not been allowed to wear respirators because it would draw attention to the hazards of the chemicals. Yet we know there are reports of workers hospitalized, people wheezing, and rashes appearing.
I heard many stories of people getting sick. I talked to the wife of a Vietnamese fisherman: “My husband has had chest problems ever since he went to work for BP,” she told me. “A lot of people are getting sick. And when the south wind blows, my asthma gets bad,” she said. In an internet café, I overheard a young man talking loudly into his cell about a blistering rash on his chest. “The doctor thinks it’s over-exposure to the chemicals,” he said.
Slow Violence in the Gulf and the BP Coverups
Uncovering the Lies that are Sinking the Oil
I had a Viet Kieu client a few years ago, a commercial fisherman who developed a horrid rash over most of his body. His arms, torso, and legs had black and purple splotches. Neither eastern nor western medicine had the faintest effect on it.
He mostly caught groundfish and shrimp in Northern California. I heard of a study, about 5 years ago, in which an Australian scientist concluded that similar afflictions he saw in the western Pacific were due to those fishermen dragging their lines or nets through seabed deposits of PCB or similar chemical (I don’t remember now, specifically). So when they handled their gear, the gunk poisoned them.
His wife, who co-fished but didn’t handle the nets, was not affected in the least.
By the time I heard that news broadcast, I had ended my relationship with them so I don’t know his subsequent condition.
Perhaps a Gulf Coast scientist has a line on this. Good luck-