CDC Suppressed Toxic Trailer Warnings

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CDC Suppressed Toxic Trailer Warnings

CBS News: Agency Suppressed Repeated Warnings From Top Scientist

About Formaldehyde Fume Dangers

CBS News - New York,NY*

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/01/28/cbsnews_investigates/main37

61948.shtml

CBS) As CBS News first reported last spring, FEMA has been under

heavy fire for failing to acknowledge then adequately address health

problems like respiratory illness associated with the toxic chemical

formaldehyde found in travel trailers that became home for hundreds

of thousands of survivors of Hurricane Katrina. More than 143,000

families have lived in the toxic trailers, and more than 40,000

still do.

Now, CBS News has learned, the public health fiasco reaches beyond

FEMA - into the one of the nation's most respected agencies.

CBS News has learned that the Centers for Disease Control, the

nation's top public health agency, suppressed repeated warnings from

one of its top scientists, raising questions about whether the CDC

bowed to pressure from FEMA to conceal the long-term health risks of

formaldehyde in the trailers it distributed to hurricane victims -

health risks like cancer and birth defects, CBS News chief

investigative correspondent Armen Keteyian reports.

A string of internal documents obtained exclusively by CBS News

reveal that Dr. De , director of the CDC's Division

of Toxicology and Environmental Medicine, told his superiors " there

is no safe level of exposure " to formaldehyde in trailers. That

warning never made its way into any public report about the

trailers.

In addition, Dr. De wrote in an email that two of his staff

members had been directed by FEMA officials to not " address longer

term health effects " of formaldehyde in this February 2007 report.

" To not do its due diligence on this issue borders on malfeasance, "

said Rep. Bernie , D-Miss., chairman of the House Homeland

Security Committee.

In fact, it wasn't until October 2007 - after eight months and

pressure from congressional investigators that the CDC revised its

February report and finally issued warnings about cancer and other

long-term health risks of formaldehyde.

" For them to punt on this issue does not speak well for them as an

agency, " said.

De refused an on-camera interview with CBS News. The CDC did

not comment on the documents, but said it changed the report after

it realized there was a problem.