“We have identified gaps in environmental data that could be important in determining health effects,” director Howard Frumkin of The federal Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry said in a statement posted Friday on the agency’s Web site. “The gaps we found indicate that we cannot state categorically that no health hazards exist in Vieques. We have found reason to pose further questions.”
For those of you who do not know the history of Vieques, I'll give you a crash run of the importance of this re-analysis.
Vieques is an island-municipality of Puerto Rico in the northeastern Caribbean. Its population is roughly 10,000. After World War II, U.S. purchased two thirds of the island for a naval base. After the war U.S. still continued to use the land as a test site for bombs, missiles and other artillery. The activity on the island eventually lead to abnormal toxicity levels, which affected plant, animal and people’s health. The U.S. Navy admitted to using depleted uranium (radioactive and a toxic metal) on the island. Long story short, Puerto Ricans protested in 1999 and finally U.S. Navy withdrew in 2003. Some 7,000 past and current Vieques residents have filed a federal lawsuit seeking billions of dollars in compensation for illnesses they have linked to the bombing in Vieques.
After a sloppy analysis in 2000 (done for obvious reasons) of the islands conditions by the US Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry, they concluded that the island was free of public health hazards. Untill now...further re-analysis is cureently in the process.
-The same way Puerto Ricans stood for the withdraw of the U.S. Navy out of Vieques is the same we still stand until the Viequenses are recompensed fully for the damaged you have recklessly applied on the islands natural sustainability and the health of our people.
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