Green Living Did you volunteer to clean up the Vancouver Oil Spill? Your health is in danger!

Leave the clean up to those with proper training and gear. Don't be like the people in the following video.


The oil itself as well as chemical disperants are harmful to your health. Clean up workers are exposed to oil fumes, particular matter from controlled burns, volatile organic compounds (VOCs), polycylic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) and heavy metals.

Studies have found that oil spill workers are at a higher risk of cancer and organ damage. The chemicals damage your kidney, liver, lung and blood vessels. They also disrupt your hormones and nervous system which includes your spinal cord and brain. They have also been shown to affect your mood and cause depression and anxiety type symptoms.

Take a look at the science!
http://www.amjmed.com/article/S0002-9343(13)00494-4/
http://www.nejm.org/doi/pdf/10.1056/NEJMra1007197

 

I don't think Burrard Inlet oil spill is on the same scale as the gulf oil spill but at the same time I wouldn't volunteer either. It's not a Dawn commercial where you can put on some yellow kitchen gloves and squirt some dish soup on rocks and baby ducks. There's a reason why people are paid to put on proper gear and respirators. The life expectancy for workers who cleaned up the Exxon Valdez oil spill is about 51 years. Almost all of them are dead according to this article. As you pointed out, they are beginning to see the health effects of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill as well so even with the best gear, there are occupational hazards.

 

OP equates ignorant wanker.