The release of last week's Alberta Health cancer study in Fort Chipewyan, Alberta, Canada answered few questions but prompted many more. 

Responding to requests by the community of Fort Chipewyan, the Alberta Government conducted a health study to investigate the cancers being found in this small community located directly downstream from Alberta's tar sands oil development.  On my last few visits to this region and with this community, I kept hearing similar stories being told by the people I met.  Stories of their brother, mother, sister, or best friend who had acquired a rare form of cancer that ultimately took their life.  These tragic stories continue everyday and have left this community with many questions about their environment. 

Interestingly, the study concluded that indeed, there are more cases of cancer in this small aboriginal community that lies directly downstream from the toxic tar sands, than the health officials expected.  In fact, the study found 47 individuals in the community had 51 different cancers over the 1995 to 2006 study period, more than the 39 cases health officials had expected to find.  The study also concluded that further investigation is required to evaluate if there is a risk posed by living in Fort Chipewyan and that as part of an overall assessment of the health status of the community, further analysis should also be done of many potential risk factors, such as lifestyle risk factors, family history and occupational and environmental exposures.

Clearly there are follow-up measures that should begin immediately.  Another opportunity for follow-up was recently covered in the Edmonton Journal calling for bio-monitoring in the community.  As the story notes, "biomonitoring involves sampling human fluids and tissues to find out which chemicals people have been exposed to, and to see if the levels fluctuate over time."

I am most struck by the statements from Alberta heath officials who are saying that there is no cause for residents to be alarmed.  If cancer rates are increasing, and even the Government's own report concludes that more investigation is needed into the causal impacts for these cancer outbreaks, then what are the other facts in this Study that can provide assurance that tar sands oil development is not polluting their waters and their community.  In fact, the report did not look into the causal connections and this is a serious gap of information that is still needed. 

After meeting the members of this vibrant community over the past couple years, the stories that you hear and the images of the many new gravestones in the community's cemetery are overwhelming.  However, key members of the government are sending signals through their actions and words that they are not concerned with the impacts in this community.  For example, in a recent trip to visit the tar sands in January, Canada's Natural Resources Minister Lisa Raitt did not reach out to the First Nations in Fort Chipewyan for a meeting even though the public health and environmental concerns of the First Nations are well-known.  To add more insult to injury, the health minister Ron Liepert said government efforts should not focus on the environment but rather on other factors such as lifestyle.  While lifestyle could be a contributor to the report's results, it is very surprising that he would preclude review of the role tar sands oil development has on these cancers given that this is, according to Liberal Leader David Swann, "the largest development on the planet".

To date, all the major newspapers both in Canada and the United States have featured stories about tar sands oil development.  There is also an Academy Award nominated film on this very topic called "Downstream" which tells the heartbreaking, yet hopeful, story of the people in Fort Chipewyan an their resolve to stop the strip mining of oil and pollution of their water.  The story is one of a community's deep inner resources and the committed doctor who comes to their aid by simply doing his job and calling attention to a serious public health distortion in this small community.  Therefore, I ask myself, how much more evidence, more public awareness, and more education is needed for the Alberta government to wake up from this fog of denial and finally dedicate sufficient resources and human capital to address this critical situation?  I think the Alberta Liberal Leader David Swann, a former medical officer of health, made a very astutue comment in the Canadian Press last week when he said urgent action is required and suggested it isn't happening because of the location of the problem.  He said, "I guess if this development was upstream of Calgary, we'd know a lot more about what was going on in the environment, in the food, in the air, and what people are consuming on a daily basis, than we do today."

It is my hope that this new study does not end up on some shelf in the Alberta Government collecting dust, but is instead used as a the starting point for more targeted research and investigation into not only why this community is falling ill to so many cancers but also what can be done about it.