Toronto Star

 

Grassy Narrows, again

Published On Thu Apr 08 2010

In 1999 – three decades after the health risks from mercury dumped into a northwestern Ontario river system were first understood – Health Canada stopped testing local residents. It claimed that mercury levels had decreased to "within normal levels."

It is surprising, then, that a Japanese expert in mercury poisoning has found that, despite declining mercury levels, the natives who live by the Wabigoon-English rivers are still getting sick.

According to a recent translation of the study, the majority of the residents tested in 2002 and 2004 suffered from a range of Minamata disease symptoms, which include tremors, tunnel vision, impaired hearing and speech, and numbness in the extremities.

Such findings raise troubling questions.

Did Health Canada stop testing people living in the Grassy Narrows and Whitedog reserves prematurely? Are Canada's acceptable mercury levels too high to protect people who face prolonged exposure? Has Ontario done enough to clean up the river system and protect the people who live along it?

When the extent of the mercury contamination of the rivers from the paper and chemical plants upstream was discovered in 1970, the province closed the commercial fishery to protect people who might unknowingly eat mercury-laced fish. However, it does not appear to have been as clear or consistent in its message to local natives about the dangers of eating the fish. As a result, it appears that the fish remained a diet staple for many on the reserves.

To his credit, Premier Dalton McGuinty has said the Japanese study, which competes with Health Canada's assurances that everything is fine, places a "heavy responsibility" on the province to get to the bottom of the matter. The Ontario government should move quickly.

If the Japanese scientist's conclusions are correct, then two First Nations communities are still suffering from an environmental disaster that our federal and provincial governments have known about for 40 years. That is shameful.