Multiple East Palestine Investigators Fall Ill With Mysterious Sickness After Extended Exposure, Residents Experienced Symptoms for Months

Seven out of the 15 governmental investigators from the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry that were tasked with studying the possible adverse health effects in East Palestine fell briefly ill themselves. CNN reported that those individuals who fell ill experienced “sore throats, headaches, coughing and nausea” which were identical symptoms that “some residents experienced after the February 3 train derailment that released a cocktail of hazardous chemicals into the air, water, and soil.”

As Just The News states this team went door to door in areas near the train derailment site in East Palestine asking residents about their symptoms and usually worked 18-hour days. A Centers for Disease Control (CDC) spokesperson commented that the “[s]ymptoms resolved for most team members later the same afternoon, and everyone resumed work on survey data collection within 24 hours. Impacted team members have not reported ongoing health effects.”

CNN, however, noted that “the team, some of whom are officers and physicians in the CDC’s Epidemic Intelligence Service, found it suspicious that they became ill at the same time and with the same symptoms, according to an official familiar with the cases who spoke to CNN.”

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David Michaels, a public health professor at George Washington University and former head of the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, said that this incident “adds confirmation that the symptoms reported by East Palestine residents are real and are associated with environmental exposures from the derailment and chemical fire.”

Andrew Whelton, a civil and environmental engineering professor who has been conducting independent tests for East Palestine, told CNN that “I think it is important for not only government officials to communicate with each other, but also to communicate their experiences with the public so that everybody can understand what’s going on, and how help needs to be brought to East Palestine and the surrounding areas.”

As noted by Just The News this news item comes amid the backdrop of a Justice Department lawsuit against Southern Norfolk for its train derailment. The outlet in particular pointed out that “the government alleged that the company ‘unlawfully polluting the nation’s waterways and to ensure it pays the full cost of the environmental cleanup.'”

Senator J.D. Vance (R-OH) has sponsored legislation in the Senate called the Railway Safety Act of 2023 for the purpose of enhancing “safety requirements for trains transporting hazardous materials, and for other purposes.” Senator Vance defended the bill as directly related to the East Palestine tragedy and that “the most ridiculous thing that I’ve heard from industry groups and other activists in response to this bill is that it’s somehow a kind of Bolshevism to require the railways to engage in proper safety standards.”

He further explained that it was absurd that the same activists begged “the government to bail you out of a labor dispute three months ago and then say that it’s big government to have proper safety standards in the way that you conduct your railroads.”