Publication of a landmark government study probing whether diesel engine exhaust causes lung cancer in miners — already 20 years in the making — has been delayed by industry and congressional insistence on seeing study data and documents before the public does.
A federal judge has affirmed the right of an industry group and a House committee to review the materials and has held the Department of Health and Human Services in contempt for not producing all of them.
Jim Morris is a senior reporter at the Center for Public Integrity, a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization dedicated to producing original investigative journalism on issues of public concern.
The much-anticipated study of 12,000 miners exposed to diesel fumes carries broad implications. If the research suggests a strong link between the fumes and cancer, regulation and litigation could ramp up — with consequences not only for underground mining but also for industries such as trucking, rail and shipping.
Exposure isn’t limited to workers; people who live near ports, rail yards and highways also are subjected to diesel exhaust.
But for the time being, at least, the results of the $11.5 million investigation by the National Cancer Institute and the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health are under lock and key.
Richard Clapp, emeritus professor of environmental health at Boston University, is among several public health experts who called the situation unusual.
“I’ve never heard of an industry group demanding manuscripts from a government agency before a study has been accepted for publication,” Clapp said.
Andrea Hricko, a professor of clinical preventive medicine at the University of Southern California who has followed the dispute, said a statistically powerful government study could have far-reaching impact.
“They feel compelled to challenge it because they don’t want more regulations on mining equipment and locomotives and trucks,” she said of the mining industry.
Henry Chajet, a lawyer with D.C.-based firm Patton Boggs who represents the Mining Awareness Resource Group (MARG) declined to comment for this report. But in a recent court filing, Chajet and other lawyers for the group wrote that publication of the diesel study, along with government plans to notify its subjects of any health risks, is “likely to spawn public concerns, regulatory actions, and lawsuits, likely based on inaccurate and faulty Study reports.”
Republicans on the House Committee on Education and the Workforce have expressed similar worries. But the committee’s ranking Democrat is skeptical.
“It’s alarming that special interests appear to be trying to derail independent, peer-reviewed science,” Rep. George Miller (D-Calif.) said in an e-mailed statement to the Center for Public Integrity. “Politics and profits should never be allowed to meddle with the scientific process, especially when health and safety are at stake.”
The panel’s chairman said there is no such agenda. “The committee’s ongoing interest is to ensure the results of this research are accurate and meet the highest standards of scientific review,” Rep. John Kline (R-Minn.) said in a statement.
Long fight over records
The legal and political tangling over the diesel study began in the mid-1990s, with countless twists and turns since.
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