AGL is quoting the QLD Health Department '"investigation '' but it has been debunked:
NO CLEAN BILL OF HEALTH FOR CSG
(Health Study)
A Critique of the Queensland Department of Health’s Report
on the Health Impacts of CSG Activities on the Tara Community
Summary
The Queensland Government’s Health Report, ‘Coal seam gas in the Tara region:
Summary risk assessment of health complaints and environmental monitoring data, March 2013’, [Health Report] and the reports on which it is based, do not provide a comprehensive investigation of the potential impacts of coal seam gas (CSG) activities on the residents of Tara. The Health Report should not be used by government or industry to claim ‘a clean bill of health’ for the CSG industry in Tara, or any other CSG field for that matter.
The Health Report concludes overall that it was unable to determine whether any of the health effects reported by the community are linked to exposure to CSG activities. This is not an unsurprising finding and one that’s very common in cases of chemical exposures and health impacts, especially when no baseline health data has been gathered.
The Health Report does however provide some evidence that might associate some of the residents’ symptoms to exposures to airborne contaminants arising from CSG activities.
While industry’s sampling on which the Health Report relies was very limited, both in scope and time, a wide range of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) were still detected in the air around residents’ homes in Tara. The Health Report concludes there was no evidence of contamination of concern, yet for many of the chemicals, the level of detection used by the laboratories was set above the level set for the protection of health used in the report. However, benzene, a confirmed human carcinogen1, was detected at levels above the health criteria, yet these results were dismissed with the claim that ‘benzene was not a compound that is found in CSG and therefore cannot be attributed to CSG activities’.
This statement contradicts the Queensland’s Department of Environment and Heritage Protection website2 which states that “BTEX compounds (benzene, toluene, ethylbenzene, xylene) are found naturally in crude oil, coal and gas deposits and therefore they can be naturally present at low concentrations in groundwater near these deposits”. The QLD Health Report “The investigation by itself is unable to determine whether any of the health effects reported by the community are linked to exposure to Coal Seam Gas activities.” Page 5
“The most that can be drawn from the DDPHU report is that it provides some limited clinical evidence that might associate an unknown proportion of some of the residents’ symptoms to transient exposures to airborne contaminants arising from CSG activities.” Page 6
The Health Report released by the Queensland government is not a comprehensive health study. The investigation of the residents’ health complaints was limited to an analysis of reports of symptoms and a questionnaire with little clinical follow-up.
The Health Report’s findings are based on information for 56 people from 11 families living in
the region. However there was only direct participation by 15 people in person and two by telephone. Two other individuals who registered complaints with 13HEALTH were excluded from the analysis as they were not residents of the region.
A broad range of symptoms was reported. The predominant symptoms reported were headaches (34 people), sore, itchy eyes (18), nosebleeds (14) and skin rashes
(11).
An investigation by the Darling Downs Public Health Unit3stresses that one of the main limitations of their investigation was the reliance on residents to report symptoms to either the government or their local health care provider (HCPs). They acknowledged the potential for under-reporting due to the lack of awareness of the government’s reporting mechanism and/or the difficulties in accessing rural GPs at the time of the symptoms being experienced. Costs were also considered a factor. Based on previous experience, some residents were concerned about a negative reaction from health care providers if they reported that their symptoms were related to CSG. The report notes that there were often discrepancies between what was reported by the residents and what was reported by the local HCPs.
The Health Report acknowledges that few clinical examinations of the individuals reporting symptoms were undertaken by the government appointed doctor, who was also surprised at the relatively small number of people who came to see him; ...
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