MI health officials are investigating whether outbreaks of Legionnaires’ disease in the area are connected to the lead levels.
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MARCH 27: Flint officials say the quality of its water has improved and that testing finds the water meets all state and federal standards for safety.
Eighty-seven Legionnaires’ disease cases were confirmed between June 2014 and November 2015.
Researchers found elevated levels of lead in Flint’s water supply and reported that blood tests found that lead contamination had almost doubled and tripled in children younger than 5 who were exposed to the highest lead levels.
Though Flint has reconnected to Detroit water, emails released Wednesday by Gov. Rick Snyder said it could take as long as 15 years and more than $60 million to replace lead water service lines in the city.
During his address Tuesday night, Snyder admitted mistakes were made and accepted responsibility for letting down the people of Flint.
“Of course, some of the Flint people respond by looking for someone to blame instead of working to reduce anxiety”. “We can’t tolerate increased lead levels in any event, but it’s really the city’s water system that needs to deal with it”.
White House spokesman Eric Schultz said “primary responsibility” rests with state and local officials but that Obama would do what he can to help.
So, he explained, “we’re not able to avoid the subject”.
U.S. Representative Brenda Lawrence, a Democrat, requested the February 3 hearing of the House of Representatives Oversight and Government Reform Committee last week, said her communications director, Tracy Manzer. You deserve to know that the buck stops here with me.
As governor, his office is protected from public records requests under the Freedom of Information Act.
According to Vox, Flint’s State Rep. Sheldon Neeley sent a letter to Snyder in January 2015, pleading for help and warning that Flint “stands on the precipice of civil unrest” because its residents can not trust the water.
In 2014, Flint’s emergency manager Darnell Earley disconnected the city from the Detroit Water and Sewerage Department and started providing residents with water from the Flint River in order to cut costs. The city’s 100,000 residents have to buy bottled drinking water, and some parents are bathing their children in mineral water after reporting skin rashes from the taps.
Snyder has said he was first briefed on the “potential scope and magnitude” of the crisis on September 28. At this time, the city of Flint determined that it needed to treat the water to control for corrosives, the emails read, a process that would go into December.
Dated Oct. 2, 2015, Snyder asks staffers to look into “financing mechanisms” that are available to Flint.
The city of Flint, Michigan, has generated national attention because of high levels of lead in the water supply.
He estimates more than a million Americans would’ve lost their jobs.
Snyder, a Republican, has rejected calls from critics for his resignation over the crisis.
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“Skin rashes, hair loss and long-term health consequences that result from copper and lead poisoning are just some of the impacts that Flint residents like me and my family have been dealing with for over a year”, said Melissa Mays, Flint resident and founder of Water You Fighting For?
