No judicial review concerning toxic emissions from an incinerator, or any other industrial source has been successful so far in the UK, as far as I'm aware.

It's a strategy that often backfires, as was found out when such an action was brought in respect of a cement works in Wiltshire a few years ago, when Alan Dalton, a former Board Member of the Environment Agency, attending the hearings at the High Court, which were initiated by a Mr David Levy.

The ruling boiled down to "whatever the Environment Agency say is safe must be safe", which wasn't a very scientific judgement as the Environment Agency do not monitor any health or mortality data around any incinerator, or cement works, or power station, or oil refinery, or foundry, or any other source of industrial PM2.5 air pollution.

I'm sorry that I'll miss hearing Dr van Steenis speak at the Bellhouse Hotel tonight.

Those who still think that incinerators are safe should look at the following electoral wards around Edmonton incinerator: Chingford Green, in Waltham Forest;
Noel Park,
Tottenham Green,
White Hart Lane,
Northumberland Park,
Stroud Green,
all in Haringey;
Upper Edmonton, in Enfield; as the above seven electoral wards are among the twelve wards with the highest infant mortality rates for the 4-year period 2003-6 and range from 12.6 per 1,000 to 15.6 per 1,000 live births.

The other five wards with very high infant mortality rates are all near, or within distance of emissions from, one or more of the incinerators at:
St Mark's Hospital, Northwick Park, Hillingdon Hospital, Colnbrook, Kings Colleg Hospital, Denmark Hill, and SELCHP.

The forty-three London electoral wards which had zero infant deaths recorded by ONS during the 4-year period 2003-6 were all free from emissions from incinerators.

Gerrards Cross incinerator will add to the toxic load already suffered in Harrow, which already gets PM2.5 emissions from incinerators at Colnbrok, Hillingdon and Northwick Park.

If you think that infant mortality is something that only affects poor people, you've an unpleasant shock awaiting you.

Kind regards,

Michael Ryan,
Campaign Co-ordinator for Safe Waste in Shropshire

Mr Ryan
I've examined your data, no other environmental or economic possible causes have been considered.

Little or no data on what pollutants have been identified as the cause of said increases in infant mortality or even if the incinerators in question have produced them in any meaningful quantities.


I suggest therefore it's flawed and all you are seeking is the spotlight.

The councillor at the meeting said that he would look into Plasma Gasification and why it had not been considered as an alternative to these lethal incinerators. I do hope this resonse is forthcoming as it seems like madness to me. A cost-effective, clean alternative, what more can we ask for?

Steve, of Totteridge, is mistaken in thinking that air pollution plays no role in infant mortality. If he bothers to check the US National Library of Medicine archive at:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.
nih.gov/sites/entrez

and search for 'air pollution, infant mortality', he'll find 75 peer-reviewed scientific journal reports listed, the latest being "Fine particles, a major threat to children", by Heinrich & Slama. The abstract of the above report starts: "There is a growing body of evidence for serious health consequences of exposure to ambient air pollution."

The results part of the abstract starts: "Ambient fine PM is associated with intra-uteriune growth retardation, infant mortality; it is associated with impaired lung function and increased respiratory symptoms, particularlyt in asthmatics. Concerning infant mortality, PM is strongly and consistently associated with postneonatal respiratory mortality and less consistently with sudden infant death syndrome."

Steve is very wrong in thinking I seek the spotlight, but I do wish the spotlight to be shone on the actual data so that anyone in the UK who is capable of reading this blog can see the data and understand at a glance that incinerators and other sources of industrial PM2.5 emissions are a provable and proven cause of a range of illnesses and premature deaths at all ages.

If Steve checks out the cited causes for infant mortality, he'll see that several of the conditions are caused by industrial PM2.5 emissions, and so it's not surprising that locations with high infant mortality rates have high rates of low birthweight babies, high rates of babies born with defects, and also high rates of childhood asthma as all are caused by industrial PM2.5s.

Here in Shropshire, I did a survey of asthma inhaler incidence in primary schools and found that one school had just 1.9 per cent of years 3 to 6 children bringing inhalers to school for asthma. That school is in Dothill ward, where there has not been an infant death recorded by ONS for at least fourteen years.

It's very different in other wards, particularly those downwind from Ironbridge Power Station, as the ONS infant mortality data for electoral wards showed correlation between high infant mortality rates and high percentages of asthma inhaler usage in schools.

Subsequent examination of the Coroner's register of suspicious deaths showed that the suicides were mostly clustered in the electoral wards with high infant mortality rates, just as Dr Dick van Steenis had predicted to Michael Gwynne, Coroner for Telford & Wrekin, when we met Mr Gwynne at his office on 27 June 2005.

On that Monday, a baby boy was born to a couple who lived in the ward where there was a school with one hundred percent of Yeasr 3-6 children bringing inhalers to school. That baby boy died the following Monay, 4 July 2005. Coincidence?

There is nothing coincidental about scientific fact & Steve is the one who needs to stay out of spotlight, & to keep his identity and motives secret.

If he'd had to bury a child, as my wife and I have had to on two occasions, he'd be very keen to reduce future tragedies.

When Steve thinks about the causes of infant mortality, he should also think about why none of those "reasons" occur in certain electral wards that are free from industrial PM2.5 emissions like Dothill ward above for 1993-2006, and the 43 London wards for 2003-6.

My asthma survey is at www.ukhr.org/asthma

Kind regards,

Michael Ryan,
Campaign Co-ordinator for Safe Waste in Shropshire

I've seen several other infant mortality maps around EfW incinerators (London map, Edmonton, Bexley Borough, Coventry, Kirlees), all with 300% downwind infant mortality peaks. Sometimes for people like Steve of Totteridge Hill they are unlikely to be convinced whether 7 same maps are produces, 25, 50, 100. After half a douzen folk need to stop denial, look at the collective ONS data and rub more than 2 brain cells together to reakise their is a continued health problems connected to metal enriched toxic PM2.5 from incinerator stacks, unaccoutable by deprivation or other sources etc.