A neat, if overdue, solution to a pressing problem with the bonus of semi-green electricity? Or dinosaur technology with emissions that will ruin health and take years off islanders’ lives? The energy-from-waste row rumbles on. (Montage by John O’Neill for illustration only, 0802223)
Dr Dick van Steenis was also defended by Deputy David De Lisle, who invited him to the island to deliver a lecture on the risks, which director of public health Stephen Bridgman called the worst scientific presentation he had ever seen.
Dr van Steenis responded: ‘I work with top American attorneys who use me as an expert witness.
‘Do you think they would do that if I didn’t know my field? I am not a twit.’
He said he had lectured at scientific conferences in the United States, including at the American Health Foundation, and questioned what basis Dr Bridgman had for his comments.
‘They were wild comments from the public health director, who presented no data and no references,’ he said.
‘I gave a proper lecture that had proper data and science and the information I used was from Guernsey’s own government and Jersey’s government.’
That related to cancer rates and infant mortality, which he said was much higher in Guernsey than Jersey.
‘He can’t deny that. His own department produced the data.’
Former Environment minister Deputy De Lisle said that in inviting Dr van Steenis, he had done what the States ought to have done long ago.
‘He was presenting material that has been covered in highly respected journals in the last few years,’ he said.
Deputy De Lisle referred to an article published in The Irish Times in 2002, which featured groups of doctors seriously concerned about the health risks presented by incinerators.
‘Dr van Steenis had references for all of his data and much of it came from the government, too.’
He criticised Dr Bridgman: ‘He presented no data, no evidence and no references and walked out before the end. The people were angry and disgusted with him.’
Deputy De Lisle said Health had been negligent because no tests had been done to study the relationship between emissions from the power station and the hospital incinerator and medical problems.
He also accused Dr Bridgman of not being independent, but relying on the advice of PR companies and lobbyists.
Dr Bridgman said: ‘I went to his presentation with an open mind to hear what he was saying, but I soon saw that it was ludicrous.’
He considered claims such as the one that incineration reduced life expectancy in Coventry by 14 years ridiculous.
‘This is clearly not the case. It is a ludicrous claim.’
He said that before the meeting, he had warned Deputy De Lisle that he would have to leave to go to an important swine flu meeting. That was why he walked out.
‘And I was speaking independently. I am independent.’
He also questioned Dr van Steenis’s background.
‘He has been called an academic – well, I have been a senior lecturer in universities for 15 years and I don’t think they would call me an academic,’ he said.
Dr Bridgman gave his assurance that figures would be released to reassure the public.
‘I told Deputy De Lisle that I had serious concerns that this scaremongering could have health risks, which are significant,’ he said.
- To view the Public Services Department’s presentation, click here.
- Suez’s computer-generated ‘artist’s impression’ video of the proposed incinerator can be viewed below.
Article posted on 9th July, 2009 - 11.30am
20 Article Comments
Working with top American Attorneys is not that much of a recommendation as they will believe anything.
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Credible point John- i worked in law for a short while, and one thing i realised was that both sides can usually find a professional witness to back up what they want to say!
i have a masters in environmental geochemistry and as far as i can tell this guy is coming out with some bad-science, based on his own interpreation of the statistics.I appreciate that he feels passionate about the matter- but that doesn’t mean its credible.
as Disraeli said…
Lies, Damned Lies and Statistics!
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So, Frsoty, if you have a masters in EnvGeochem, you will know that the science behind particulates and concentrated toxins doesn’t need reinventing. They’re toxic.
The dispute is whether they are acceptably toxic.
The Suez proposal is lazy and expensive and will be outdated before the end of its 25 years. This is foolish short termism at a time when short termism is widely seen as the major driver of DIM MISTAKES.
Why pollute unnecessarily? If we’ve got £93M to burn useable resources, then we have the cash to be a bit more forward, don’t we? or is it that Guernsey just cannot shake this ‘We are determined to be as out of touch as possible’ mentality?
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Ok, I did a very quick Google search for infant mortality.
Guernsey 4.53%
Jersey 5.01%
Correct me if i’m wrong? But he said infant mortality was higher in Guernsey? And I have proven, with references, that it is not.
Google
“indexmundi” “guernsey/jersey” “infant mortality”
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Frsoty
If you have a masters in environmental geochemistry you should realise that your statement “and as far as i can tell this guy is coming out with some bad-science, based on his own interpreation of the statistics” is itself of no value without supporting evidence.
Bingo-Janes 1.11pm post has a lot to comment it especially the comment “The dispute is whether they are acceptably toxic.”.
Her closing comment and questions “Why pollute unnecessarily? If we’ve got £93M to burn useable resources, then we have the cash to be a bit more forward, don’t we? or is it that Guernsey just cannot shake this ‘We are determined to be as out of touch as possible’ mentality?” deserve close attention.
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bingo-Jane-i fear i was not clear on why i believe this to be bad science. I refer you to Paracelsus “the father of toxicology” i.e. All things are poison and nothing is without poison, only the dose permits something not to be poisonous. salt, oxygen…you name it.. there WILL be a level when it is toxic.that was not the point of my message.
The point i make is that considering all the multitude of sources of PCBS, dioxins ( not only mass burns but traffic fumes, domestic wood burning, natural fires, plastic packaging…)coupled with the acceptable limited, and technology used…well, i fear van Steens suporters are grasping on to a pesuedo-scientific excuse to justify their NIMBYISM ( by the way, i live about 500m from the proposed site) rather than truly examining the facts.
I’d also recommend everyone reads a book called “freakonomics” identifying aparent relationships which then ACTUALLY have a correlation to another factor that may not be obvious at first.
for example van Steen’s general findings say ( very broadly i’m aware, but i’ve already taken too much space!)that if you live in an area in proximity to an incinerator, you are more likely to develop cancer, asthma etc.
The freakonomics way of thinking might suggest the data is flawed because,e.g. industrial plants tend to get sited in poorer areas, i.e brown field development sites, = lots of traffic,smoggy particulates in the air etc.
Most people living around these areas are in a lower socio-economic group than those than can afford the nice white picket fence cottage job out in the fresh countryside air. Lower socioeconomic groups are often associated with higher smoking and drinking rates, poorer diets, closer proximity of living…which all adds up to ill-health, asthma, increased cancer rates etc… so epidemiologically iwould suggest it’s very hard to tell if its chicken (your general living standards) or egg( the new incinerator).
seeing as we all live shoulder to shoulder in Guernsey, it might make for an interesting comparison- or we can stick it in the higher parishes, and watch! Just my two cents worth!
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Are there results from an Environmental Impact Assessment that can be studied?
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Oh yeah, and comparing higher concentrations of dioxins and heavy metals with oxygen and salt is stretching the analogy a bit.
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it wasn’t an analogy- i was trying to explain the concept of toxicity. sigh.
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Yes Frosty. I only said it because you imply that any wilful discharge of dioxins only becomes toxic when a symptom can be directly attributed to it. Hence the difficulty in ascertaining proper causal relationships when incinerators are built in lower socioeconomic environments.
That does not make it ok to discharge dioxins and other concentrated known poisons when there may be ways to do it without dicing with the concepts of relative toxicity.
At least van Steenis inspires debate, and although attracting criticism for his use of language, he should not be dismissed by the corp and its supporters as simply wrong.
The lack of evidence only means that there is insufficient data to prove absolute causality and that is not enough to pronounce things ’safe’. We know it’s one of the most poisonous things to have around. It’s a worry.
Give us the independent EIA so the anti Suez scheme can challenge the findings coherently or stand corrected. Colourful leaflets with friendly statements are not good enough, PSD.
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Josh, you said
“I did a very quick Google search for infant mortality.
Guernsey 4.53%
Jersey 5.01%”
That means the chances of your child dying in Jersey is over 10% higher in Jersey than Guernsey (simple maths 5.01/4.53 = 110.6%)?
This seems pretty significant to me… especially since Jersey has had an incinerator for a while now…
Would be interesting to see what the mortality rate was prior to the Jersey incinerator being built?
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I’ve had a letter dated 8 July 2009 from Justin McCracken, Chief Executive of the Health Protection Agency explaing why the HPA haven’t bothered to examine the rates of illness or of premature deaths of all ages in the electoral wards around any incinerator and his reply states: “Furthermore,the reason that we have not studied the rates of illness or premature deaths at electoral ward level around any incinerator is that the number of people around an incinerator is too small to detect whether or not the incinerator is having an impact on health.”
The brighter bloggers among you will realise that if the HPA haven’t studied any relevant data, how can they possibly pass any valid opinion on the possible health effects of incineration.
In Saginaw County, Michigan, they are examining infant death rates at at US census tract level which is equivalent to electoral wards here in UK. Not surprisingly, the high infant death zones are downwind of the sources of toxic airborne emissions.
Wake up Guernsey & clean up the air you breathe which should be the purest of all in the British Isles.
Kind regards,
Michael Ryan BSc, C Eng, MICE
Shrewsbury
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Lee says:
‘Josh, you said
“I did a very quick Google search for infant mortality.
Guernsey 4.53%
Jersey 5.01%”
That means the chances of your child dying in Jersey is over 10% higher in Jersey than Guernsey (simple maths 5.01/4.53 = 110.6%)?
This seems pretty significant to me… especially since Jersey has had an incinerator for a while now…’
No no no no….!
This is such a mis-statement about statistics. You can’t know whether it’s a significant difference just based on the two numbers – you need to know a lot more information. Quick example: 1 person dies on Sark being run over by a tractor. 1 person dies on Guernsey being run over by a tractor. This makes the risk in Sark 1 in 600 and in Guernsey 1 in 60000 (roughly). This means according to your maths that you are 1000% more likely to die by tractor in Sark than Guernsey.
Ask a real statistician (or even a random person on the street) and they will be able to tell you that these figures are not significantly different.
And presenting relative risks is very misleading – an increase from 4.53% to 5.01% is an increase of 0.48%, or 1 extra death per 208 individuals.
I even doubt the figure of 4.53% – that suggests that 1 in 20 babies dies, which sounds very doubtful to me. Are you sure the figures are not per 10,000 live births (the more normal epidemiological way of presenting data)?
All of which goes to show: if you are not confident (and competent) in your knowledge of statistics, then it is best to refrain from quoting them as “proof” of anything.
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And just to show how easy it is to make an error, I note two minutes after making a post that I should have said 10000%, and not 1000%…
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I bet there would be a fair few lawsuits if it was proven conclusively that Incinerators are causing cancer, infant deaths etc !!
I’d also wager that it wouldn’t be in an incinerator manufacturers best interests either.
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I suggest that James looks at some of the 292 journal articles listed under “infant mortality, air pollution” by searching the Pub Med website.
He can then see the abstract of the 2004 study of infant mortality rates around 63 municipal incinerators in Japan which has the following as the first sentence in the conclusion:
“Our study shows a peak-decline in risk with distance from the municipal solid waste incinerators for infant deaths and infant deaths with all congenital malformations combined.”
J Epidemiol. 2004 May;14(3):83-93.
Links
Risk of adverse reproductive outcomes associated with proximity to municipal solid waste incinerators with high dioxin emission levels in Japan.
Tango T, Fujita T, Tanihata T, Minowa M, Doi Y, Kato N, Kunikane S, Uchiyama I, Tanaka M, Uehata T.
Department of Technology Assessment and Biostatistics, National Institute of Public Health, Wako, Saitama, Japan.
BACKGROUND: Great public concern about health effects of dioxins emitted from municipal solid waste incinerators has increased in Japan. This paper investigates the association of adverse reproductive outcomes with maternal residential proximity to municipal solid waste incinerators.
Dr Dick van Steenis was a medical consultant to Prudential’s legal team when they sued Powergen for crop damage due to toxic fallout from their Richborough power station in Kent which had been burning Orimulsion (The Times, 25 March 1995). Dr van Steenis obtained asthma data in Kent & parts of Holland & France which showed significant rise in childhood asthma rates and that data sank Powegen who settled out-of-court with Prudential and also with Peugeot, Audi and Citroen whose new stockpiled cars had been damaged by the same acidic fallout. The 1997 settlements would but a few Guernsey properties, even on the open market.
Kind regards,
Michael Ryan, Shrewsbury
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Jamie
I bet there woudn`t.
What about all the other things that are known to cause all kinds of illness?
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Jamie
Well that’s put all of Court Row on Flouquet’s side !
One good thing about the massive smoke stack …
all the phone masts around the Island could be resited on this one site for total island cover
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Ray
If you have designs and the technology for a telecommunications mast that would serve the whole Island from a single location then you should put them past the operators. This time next week you could be a multimillionaire and even billionaire in a few years time!
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Dr John Snow was the only person to work out that contaminated water must be the means of transmission of cholera when all the rest of the world thought it was caused by the stench of sewage, ie “miasma”.
Dr Snow wanted all drinking water to be boiled, but his advice was ignored and about 50,000 Londoners died of cholera who might have lived.
Dr Dick van Steenis copied Dr Snow’s mapping technique in West Wales when he got the asthma data for all primary school children and found high rates downwind of oil refinery/power station complex on Milford Have waterway and low rates upwind. See The Lancet, 8 April 1995.
The 1997 out-of-court settlements forked out by Powergen in 1997 were multi-million pound ones – not just a few bob. It was Dr van Steenis’ expertise in Wales that alerted Prudential’s legal team to a “bright” doctor as the asthma map produced by Dr van Steenis had been on the front page of the Western Mail, 3 March 1995.
Kind regards,
Michael Ryan,
Shrewsbury
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