A vehicle drives through a neighborhood as a flaring tower and storage tanks stand on the horizon at the Marathon Petroleum Corp. El Paso oil refinery on December 10, 2021, in El Paso, Texas.
“Numerous medical societies, government agencies, and systematic reviews have concluded that exposure to chemicals and pollution… is an important risk factor for multiple diseases and health inequities and probably contributes to these increases,” the report notes, adding that increases in disease and petrochemical production at the same time “alone cannot be interpreted as causal.”
EDCs are part of an overall pollution burden that has become the leading cause of premature deaths around the world, according to the analysis. Chemical pollution is estimated to be responsible for at least 1.8 million deaths each year, the paper states. People of color and those living in low-income areas, or otherwise disadvantaged communities are often facing higher exposure risks than other people. The analysis cites data showing levels of EDCs in urine and blood of Black and Hispanic women “persistently higher” than levels found in non-Hispanic White women.what it said are an array of health-related problems in predominantly Black communities in south-east Louisiana tied to oil and gas operations there.