Members of the North Carolina House of Representatives have proposed investing up to$ 80 million to renovate a building at North Carolina State University that has been linked to cancer-causing agents and has been shut down since November.
The school closed Poe Hall after testing discovered polychlorinated biphenyls, or PCBs, in the composition. Around 200 original students and employees who have tumor believe their diagnoses are related to their day spent in the building, which has caused the people institution to face legal battles and controversy.
Now, North Carolina State University attorneys have petitioned the state’s highest court to stop independent tests of Poe Hall, a building that much housed the university’s psychology and education departments. According to the Carolina Journal, the judge granted a temporary remain to independent testing while the matter was being reviewed.
Due to being banned in 1979, PCBs were a human carcinogen that was frequently used in commercial and industrial materials. In 1971, Poe Hall was constructed.
As of June 19, WRAL, a Raleigh-based media broadcast station with extensive research into the subject, reported that it had received “more than 200 studies of cancer cases in people who worked or studied in the creating.”
” Many of the people who reported illnesses to [WRAL ] 5 On Your Side ] have criticized N. C. State leaders, claiming that the institution was slow to act and not forthcoming with their concerns.”
Although a number of top NCSU officials have not responded to emails from The College Fix asking for comment, the university has set up a webpage to address concerns and respond to questions.
Our goal is still to provide a safe and stable environment throughout the transition period and beyond for all impacted, it states as we plan for building remediation and renovation.
The University at Albany School of Public Health and Department of Environmental Health Sciences ‘ David O. Carpenter, a public health physician, addressed The College Fix via email that the best-known cancers linked to PCBs are female breast cancer, non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, and melanoma, among others.
” In my judgment”, Carpenter added, “PCBs increase risk of all kinds of cancer”.
Possible health and safety concerns involving the presence of PCBs, lead, and asbestos in Poe Hall were first reported to the school’s environmental health and safety unit in August of 2023, as described by NC State vice president Warwick Arden in a webinar from that month.
After that, according to Arden, additional preliminary testing was conducted in the fall, finding that lead and asbestos were within acceptable limits. However, Arden and NCSU Chancellor Randy Woodson ordered more thorough testing “out of an abundance of caution” and ordered the building to be closed in November.
Woodson continued that the university is working with the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health to investigate the situation and is adhering to environmental protection agency rules.
Investigative reporting from WRAL News, however, paints a more complicated picture.
According to the timeline posted to the WRAL website, NC State first learned about the dangers of “dangerous levels of PCBs on exterior caulking” in 2018 and that a former NC State employee had already warned the university about “multiple breast cancer cases in Poe Hall” in 2020.
According to previous reports from WRAL, there have also been concerns about Poe Hall’s air quality dating back to 2012.
However, the university did n’t take action until after health and safety concerns were reported to various government agencies, including the EPA and the North Carolina Department of Labor in August 2023, according to the timeline put together by WRAL.
Darren Masier, an assistant professor of human resource management at Meredith College in Raleigh, who received his doctorate from NCSU in 2013, reported to The College Fix that he was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukemia last summer. He earned his doctorate there in 2013.
He claimed in a telephone interview from the middle of June that he had made the decision to contact an attorney after realizing several former NC State graduate assistants he knew spent a lot of time in Poe Hall and were dealing with serious illnesses.
Skeptical about how the Poe Hall administrators handled the PCB testing, Masier said,” I became the petitioner for us to get in there and conduct our own private investigation.”
According to Masier, Masier claims that Poe Hall officials were aware of the health risks for a longer period of time than they had previously stated.
” I think they were well aware of the issues in that building, and I do n’t think they responded as quickly as they should have,” he said.
Carpenter told The Fix that, in his opinion, there are” some major problems” with the sampling done in Poe Hall thus far, criticizing technical aspects of methods, measurements, and analyses that have been performed, especially with regard to air sampling.
Carpenter argued that better testing could be used to determine whether Masier and others ‘ cancer diagnoses could be related to their time working in the building.
One would need to demonstrate that cancer is a common disease and that those who work in the building have cancers are significantly more prevalent than those who did not.
When asked what he hopes to get out of his lawsuit in his interview with The Fix, which took place prior to the state supreme court’s decision, Masier responded,” What we just wanted to get some professionals in there to just do some studying on the caulking and the potential PCBs linked to the HVAC system, and just get the answers,” he said.
” If indeed there are some numbers that are not good, I want to notify my doctor as soon as I can so he knows,” Masier said, “because one of the first questions he asked me in July was, Have you been around anything toxic?”,” he said.
” Who knows, maybe that will help my treatment or other peoples ‘ treatment”?
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IMAGE: WRAL screenshot
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