Michigan National Guard members are expected to arrive in Flint Wednesday after Gov. Rick Snyder, who declared a state of emergency, asked for federal help in distributing water to residents who still have contaminated tap water.
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Though the water sourced from Detroit is considerably cleaner, public health officials are still concerned that the year of drawing water from the Flint River may have left residual lead in the pipes.
Flint residents have filed a federal lawsuit accusing the city and state of endangering their health. I’m glad the State is putting in resources and we welcome the Michigan National Guard with open arms.
Last week Snyder declared a state of emergency in response to high levels of lead in Flint’s water after the city redirected Flint’s water supply from Detroit Water’s Lake Huron source, a safe and tested drinking source, to the Flint River in 2014.
But the crisis could have been anticipated before it ever began, back in April 2014. The study found that the mineral-rich river water would need to be treated with phosphate, unlike the Detroit supply, to avoid leaching lead from the city’s pipes. Flint residents are the victims in this crisis and they deserve a more urgent response equal to the gravity of this crisis.
A Legionnaires’ disease outbreak in western IL last summer that killed 12 and sickened dozens was likely spread by an aging water system at a 129-year-old facility that lacked several safeguards, The Associated Press reported last month based on a federal report. The Michigan State Police and the volunteers with the American Red Cross will continue going door to door in Flint neighborhoods to distribute bottled water, water filters, replacement cartridges and testing kits. On Tuesday, local officials told the network that volunteers and police hoped to serve 500 to 600 houses a day.
More than 30 Guardsmen will be in place by Friday in Flint, which has 99,000 people.
Old plumbing leaked lead into homes after the city switched water sources.
Now, after just 2 percent of the city has been tested, 43 children have already been diagnosed with risky amounts of lead in their blood – a condition that can cause mental and physical development problems.
“We see the consequences of lead poisoning a lot later”, Hanna-Attisha, told ABC News last month.
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U.S. Rep. Dan Kildee, a Democrat who represents the Flint area, said: “It is the state’s ultimate responsibility to act and make it right”.
