Residents of the Literature Building, home to a suspected cancer cluster ‘mdash; including eight cases of breast cancer since 2000 ‘mdash; staged a demonstration Feb. 17 in response to the university’s slow reaction to a report linking abnormally powerful, electromagnetic fields generated by the building’s elevator system to the high rate of cancer in longtime employees.
The protest, organized by professors John D. Blanco, Dennis Childs and Luis Martin Cabrera, led nearly 100 department affiliates from their classrooms and offices across campus, past Geisel Library, to arrive at the office of Chancellor Marye Anne Fox. There, demonstrators delivered a petition ‘mdash; signed by more than 1,300 concerned citizens ‘mdash; that called on Fox to take immediate action.
Blanco read the petition’s introduction directly to the chancellor.
‘We know the administration is capable of doing the right thing,’ he read aloud. ‘But until the administration takes action, many of us cannot in good conscience disavow the crisis of safety in the Literature Building, which has led to a fundamental crisis of confidence in your leadership.’
In July 2008, responding to a study conducted by epidemiologist and UCSD professor Cedric Garland, the university vacated areas with risk of exposure to high EMF levels, and later replaced elevator motor devices and fluorescent light fixtures with equipment to reduce these levels.
Still, protestors expressed dissatisfaction with anything but a comprehensive facelift of the building ‘mdash; or permanent relocation ‘mdash; at a presentation held Feb. 10 by epidemiologist and UCLA professor Leeka Kheifets, who was selected by the university to perform a follow-up investigation on the building’s potential dangers.
‘Give these people a new building,’ said Stan Melad, son to a former staff member who passed away after being diagnosed with breast cancer. ‘These people just want to work somewhere safe; let’s not drag this out.’
Childs ‘mdash; concerned about Kheifets” affiliation with the Electric Power Research Institute, an independent nonprofit organization funded in large part by companies in the electric utility industry ‘shy;’mdash; questioned her funding sources. However, Kheifets insisted on the organization’s independence and emphasized that without the work of the EPRI, there would be scarce, if any, research on the connection between cancer and EMF.
On Feb. 12, the two elevators suspected of causing elevated EMF levels were shut down by administrators from general use, and on Feb. 17, after the demonstration, the elevators were blocked by a mock coffin wrapped with pink ribbon and quarantined with caution tape by protesters.
According to Environment, Health and Safety Director Steve Benedict, the university is making EMF-measuring equipment available to anyone entering the Literature Building.
EHS is also hosting a Web site, blink.ucsd.edu/go/EHS-LIT, where all related documentation ‘mdash; as well as a selection of studies on both EMF and breast cancer ‘shy;’mdash; is posted.
The Web site is part of the administration’s effort to increase the investigation’s transparency, Benedict said.
Graduate student Soren Frohlich, a member of the department committee tasked with representing residents’ interests in regard to the study, said that while transparency is important, it doesn’t mean much if the university isn’t taking the right actions.
Readers can contact David Harvey at [email protected].