People who live and work near the US-Mexico border have complained for years about the harmful effects of cross-border pollution: noxious odors, headaches, breathing difficulties, nausea, stomach ailments.
Now they will have the face-to-face opportunity to tell the country’s public health agency how the toxic mix of wastewater and other pollutants dumped into the Tijuana River Valley affects them. The effort begins Thursday with a large team from San Diego County and San Diego State University notifying more than 6,000 households of an upcoming visit from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the possibility that their household may be selected for an interview, county public health officials said Wednesday.
In cooperation with the county and state, the CDC will conduct 210 door-to-door surveys with randomly selected households from 2 to 7 p.m. from October 17 to 19. Each survey, which is expected to last about 15 minutes, is in-person, voluntary and anonymous.
The process is formally known as Community Assessment for Public Health Emergency Response, or CASPER. These assessments are typically quick and produce data about what a community needs “so public health leaders and emergency managers can make informed decisions,” according to the CDC website.
“This is our opportunity for our community to voice their concerns, their experiences,” said Seema Shah, the county’s acting deputy director of public health. “This is how we can share what is happening. “We can share the concerns, the impact it has had on their properties, the mental health of their families, all of their health outcomes.”
It is unclear what type of questions households will be asked, but the goal of the CASPER survey is to quickly gather information from residents as they have been exposed to “increasing environmental pollution from the Tijuana River estuary,” according to an agreement that Aaron Bernstein, director of the CDC’s National Center for Environmental Health, signed on September 11 to confirm the public health survey.
That agreement noted that “more than 100 billion gallons of raw sewage, urban runoff and industrial waste have been dumped into the Tijuana River over the past five years.”
This summer, the county and state formally requested help from the federal health agency to conduct an epidemiological investigation, also known as Epi-Aid. The agencies determined that a CASPER survey could better identify what resources are needed and what additional actions public health can take. The agreement mentions two objectives for Epi-Aid:
• Conduct the CASPER survey and assess how transboundary pollution has affected people, including water and air exposures, and what resources they may need.
• Identify transitional, non-community water systems, such as those that supply camps and other water sources. Review the regulations and operations of these sources and recommend ways to improve them.
To obtain a random selection of participants, CASPER surveys involve selecting 30 census blocks and interviewing seven households within each block. The census tracts matched the majority of air pollution complaints the San Diego County Air Pollution Control District had received from people, Shah said.
The CASPER survey is expected to produce the most comprehensive information to date by a government agency on the health impacts of persistent pollution on people in the southwest region of the county. And it will be some of the most visible work on the ground by public health officials in response to numerous concerns raised by residents, elected officials and others.
In addition to ocean water-related illnesses, residents have reported experiencing symptoms such as nausea, coughs, and headaches after being regularly exposed to strong odors emanating from the Tijuana River. As the United States and Mexico work to repair treatment plants, concerns have grown in recent years about the short- and long-term effects of living and working near pollution.
Shah said the goal is to deliver at least some data results to the public before the end of the year.
Original Story
First phase of CDC survey on health impacts of sewage crisis launching