New health study coming

After more than a decade of waiting, Marietta residents will finally have a study on the health effects of airborne manganese, members of several environmental agencies confirmed Tuesday.

Funding from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has been obtained for the local health effects study and testing is expected to take place in Marietta Aug. 16 to 19, with full results available in two years.

"I know there's some fatigue after all those years," said Rosemarie Bowler, a neuropsychologist from San Francisco State University who will head up the process. "But here we are - you're going to have your study."

The Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry (ATSDR) had recommended the health study after completing a year-long air investigation in the Mid-Ohio Valley to determine levels of manganese emitted from the Eramet plant south of Marietta on Ohio 7.

Manganese is an essential nutrient needed in the human body, but studies have found that in high doses it can cause movement disorders and neurological damage in children.

The study will be a first in several ways, said Bowler.

"This is the first study of low-dose manganese exposure over a long period of time and the first comprehensive environmental study of manganese-exposed adults in the U.S.," she said. "This is a very high-profile study that can have immense contributions. Clearly it will advance knowledge for other communities and other cities."

Bowler was in Marietta Tuesday to explain the study at a public meeting held at Marietta College. She will return with a 15-person team in August to test 100 participants.

Recruitment letters have already been sent out to 350 residents and follow-up phone calls will be made next week. Participants must be randomly selected, between 35 and 55 years old, been residents of Marietta for at least 10 years and have never worked at Eramet. Participating women can't be pregnant or breastfeeding. Those who take part will receive a $50 gift card to a local store.

Participants will undergo about three hours of testing in August that will include blood work, interviews, questionnaires and neurological and neuro-behavioral testing. That will include motor skills testing, tremor testing and memory and problem-solving exercises.

"The effects you can have from manganese are quite similar to the symptoms of Parkinson's Disease," said Bowler.

The results will be compared to testing done of 100 people in Mount Vernon, Ohio, a city with similar demographics but no exposure to an airborne source of manganese.

Initial findings will be revealed next summer but the whole study should be wrapped up in two years, Bowler said.

"We're hoping we know at the end of this at what point we start to see health effects," she said.

The previous ATSDR study, which included air monitoring and a sophisticated analysis of particles left in filters at five sites in Ohio and West Virginia near Eramet, determined that local manganese levels exceeded health-based guidelines but were hundreds of times lower than the levels known to cause adverse health effects.

"We're still concerned about what that means for the general community," said Mark Johnson, a toxicologist with ATSDR. "There's very little information about manganese health effects in the general community (rather) than those who work with manganese."

Complete results of the ATSDR studies completed locally are available at www.atsdr.cdc.gov/sites/washington_marietta.

U.S. Environmental Protection Agency officials at Tuesday's meeting said the long-awaited health study in Marietta has taken so much time to get off the ground because of a lack of funding, the number of agencies involved and the difficulties associated with doing scientific experiments using live people.

"I understand that a lot of people have been waiting a long time for this," said George Bollweg, with the U.S. EPA's Region 5. "That's the way science goes sometimes."

Several people at the meeting said they were just happy to have the study finally taking place.

"We're very grateful with the interest in this," said Caroline Beidler, a member of the local group Neighbors for Clean Air. "This community lives with this every single day."