06-25-2009, 11:29 AM
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Air Pollution Puts Many at Greater Risk of Cancer
Some 600 neighborhoods nationwide are spewing so much smog that millions of residents are at greater risk of contracting cancer, according to newly released data from the Environmental Protection Agency.
In these communities, cars, factories and other pollution-producers are kicking out 80 cancer-causing agents that are so intense that put more than 100 people per million at risk, the EPA says. The average risk level is 36 people per million. “If we are in between 10 in 1 million and 100 in 1 million we want to look more deeply at that. If the risk is greater than 100 in 1 million, we don’t like that at all … we want to investigate that risk and do something about it,” Kelly Rimer, an environmental scientist with the EPA, told The Associated Press Tuesday. Among the regions with the highest cancer risks are parts of Los Angeles, California and Madison County, Illinois, which had the highest cancer risks in the nation — 1,200 in 1 million and 1,100 in 1 million, according to the EPA data. They were followed by two neighborhoods in Allegheny County, Pa., and one in Tuscaloosa County, Ala. Among those with the lowest cancer risk from air pollution are people in parts of Coconino County, Ariz., and Lyon County, Nev. Kalawao County, Hawaii, and Golden Valley County, Mont., have the least toxic air.
“Air toxic risks are local. They are a function of the sources nearest to you,” said Dave Guinnup, who leads the groups that perform the risk assessments for toxic air pollutants at EPA. “If you are out in the Rocky Mountains, you are going to be closer to 2 in a million. If you are in an industrial area with a lot of traffic, you are going to be closer to 1100 in 1 million.”
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