There are several chemicals that have no taste or smell that could reach our drinking water without us realizing the inconspicuous harm they are causing.
That is the case for MCHM, a chemical that was created to help in the washing of coal.
The incident — which would affect the water supply some 300,000 West Virginians — has become the focal point of the latest documentary from filmmaker Cullen Hoback, “What Lies Upstream.” The film, which is available to stream through PBS, debuted on the network on April 16.
“This chemical, because it had an odor, people started looking into it, looking into the data behind it and uncovering that, gosh, this chemical is actually a lot more harmful than we thought it was,” Hoback says, who adds MCHM has found to be twice as toxic as the initial report that came out from its manufacturer, Eastman Chemical.
Hoback recalls one family where one person’s neck “inflated to the size of a balloon.” Says Hoback: “They had no idea what was causing this originally, and at the same time, the government was coming out and saying, ‘No, the data says that this chemical couldn’t have this effect, certainly not at these levels.
He ended up staying for a whole year, after realizing how deep the issue went at the state and national levels of government — spotting several instances where scientists could use fake data to potentially harm public health.
This included a meeting between industry lobbyists and members of the West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection.
One of the questions Hoback asked Edwards centered around the following: How could agencies such as the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the CDC knowingly publish false reports when the reason for their existence is to protect the public’s health?
Don’t find bad things,” Hoback says.
“Scientists who try to do the right thing, they get fired.