In this final post on my series related to the January
9 chemical spill in West Virgina, I address wrongheaded claims that the spill
also exposed Charleston residents to dangerous levels of formaldehyde.
A few weeks after the spill, West Virginia Environmental
Quality Board Vice Chairman Scott Simonton alleged that final traces of crude
MCHM are breaking down and exposing residents to dangerous levels of
formaldehyde. “I can guarantee that citizens in this valley are, at least in some
instances, breathing formaldehyde,” Simonton told legislators at a
public hearing. Simonton said that he found formaldehyde in three water samples
from a Charleston, West Virginia, restaurant. But West Virginia’s Bureau for
Public Health Commissioner Dr. Letitia Tierney called these claims “totally
unfounded,” as well as “misleading and irresponsible,” for good reason. As she
explained to reporters, Simonton is not part of any official investigation
related to the spill, and she cannot validate his tests. In any case, she noted
that the MCHM would need to be heated to 500° Fahrenheit before it would break
down into formaldehyde. Others have offered similar criticisms of Simonton’s
assertions.
In any case, traces of formaldehyde are not alarming or
particularly risky. Humans produce it simply by breathing because it is a
byproduct of respiration. It is also released through cooking and is relatively
high when one cooks such things as Shiitake mushrooms. …. To Read More……
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