The rule, finalized on March 15, 2005, fails to protect the health of the current generation of America's children. It delays significant reductions in mercury pollution from power plants by at least 10 to 15 years, and allows dangerous levels of mercury to spew unabated with a 'cap and trade' pollution control standard.
The EPA is required by the Clean Air Act to protect public health to the greatest extent possible. With its mercury rule, the EPA fails to comply with the law. These national groups, representing more than 300,000 public health professionals, are filing suit to prevent future injury among another generation of children.
The lawsuit will be prosecuted by the Southern Environmental Law Center on behalf of Physicians for Social Responsibility, the American Public Health Association, the American Nurses Association and the American Academy of Pediatrics. It will demand that the EPA address the public health implications of a 15-year delay in reducing current mercury emissions from power plants, the risks of hotspots, and the EPA's decision to favor industry by removing mercury from power plants from its official list of hazardous air pollutants.
Unlike recent litigation by major environmental organizations and 11 State Attorneys General, the litigation will focus specifically on the medical and public health impacts of mercury pollution on children and other vulnerable populations, articulated by health professionals who practice medicine or support population health and patient care.
Widely accepted scientific research shows that mercury is a potent neurotoxin that can harm developing fetuses in the womb, young children, and at higher doses, adults. Once consumed through fish and other sources, mercury travels through a mother's bloodstream, crosses the placenta and can harm healthy brain development in the fetus EPA scientists estimate that one in 12 women of childbearing age has mercury levels in her blood that are high enough to damage the developing brain of her child, potentially impacting IQ and learning of 630,000 newborns each year.
According to research by the Mt. Sinai Center for Children's Health and the Environment, "The resulting loss of intelligence causes diminished economic productivity that persists over the entire lifetimes of these children, impacting the future health and economic security of the U.S. This lost productivity is the major cost of methyl mercury toxicity, which amounts to $8.7 billion annually. Of this total, $1.3 billion each year is attributable to mercury emissions from American power plants."
A copy of the public health lawsuit and related documents with U.S. state-specific information will be posted on http://www.mercuryaction.org as soon as the lawsuit is filed in D.C. Circuit Court on June 14.
Please join us for a one-hour teleconference on Tuesday, June 14 at 10:30 a.m. The call will be open only to members of the working press. The dial in number is 800.860.2442. Please ask to be connected to the Mercury Lawsuit call.
Expert speakers will include:
Kent Bransford, MD
President-elect
Physicians for Social Responsibility
Barbara A. Blakeney, MS, RN
President
American Nurses Association
Representative TBD
American Academy of Pediatrics
John Suttles, J.D., LLM
Southern Environmental Law Center
Kyle Kinner, JD, MPA - moderator
Legislative Director
Environmental Health Programs
Physicians for Social Responsibility
Contacts:
Dianne Saenz, Media Director,
Physicians for Social Responsibility
202-587-5215 or Dianne@psr.org
Kyle Kinner, Legislative Director
Physicians for Social Responsibility
202-587-5228 or kkinner@psr.org