NIH announces $10M to study East Palestine derailment’s health effects

The five-year funding is a big increase from the NIH’s $1.2 million, two-year grants awarded last year to study the matter.

“The people of East Palestine have a right to clear, science-backed answers about the impact on their health,” Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said in a statement. Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine called it “great news.”

In February 2023, a Norfolk Southern train carrying hazardous chemicals derailed, spilling some into the soil and water and causing several cars to burn for days. Officials then decided to burn off carcinogenic chemicals in other tank cars to avoid an explosion. The National Transportation Safety Board has called that “unnecessary.”

The company declined to comment on the news of the new research grants.

‘Scary as hell’

Jami Wallace and nearly 50 family members live within about a mile of the derailment site. She said she personally has developed hypothyroidism, asthma, a chronic cough and periodontal disease since the incident. Her mother has a concerning chronic cough, too.

“The illness that we’re seeing in the community already is scary as hell,” she told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

Wallace has become an environmental advocate since the incident, founded the Chemically Impacted Communities Coalition and said she is helping with one of the existing NIH research grants.

She says other locals are complaining of thyroid and liver issues, cancers, diabetes, respiratory problems, loss of hair, teeth, eyesight and blurry vision.

The new grants are a “step in the right direction that the government’s even admitting that there’s going to be long-term health issues,” she said. “For so long we’re told, nothing to see here, everything’s fine.”

“But it’s not all we need.”

Allison lives a mile from the derailment site. She serves as a community advisory board chair for another of the existing NIH grants and has testified in Congress about the subject.

She said her family hasn’t seen chronic effects, although they did have acute problems for a year, including “horrific” nosebleeds, congestion and rashes. Among friends, however, she’s seeing new chronic asthma cases, anxiety and PTSD.

She agreed the news is “a step of reassurance that the community desperately needs” and a “clear demonstration of the federal government’s commitment.”

Plus, the research proposals — which are due in a month — are supposed to have a crucial community-centered approach: “Nobody wants to be a lab rat.”

Although some locals haven’t had any symptoms, she noted, others are reporting upper respiratory problems, sinus issues, headaches, inconsistent menstruation and cancer.

“Can you directly link it to the train derailment? No, but it’s always in the back of people’s minds, especially when you hear of first responders who were on the scene that night who have cancer,” she said.

The University of Kentucky grant she said she’s been helping with has also found PTSD levels in East Palestine similar to those among survivors of 9/11.

“There is a clear trend … but it’s still going to take some time” to determine causation versus correlation, she said.

Credit: TNS

Credit: TNS

Health care compensation

Both Allison and Wallace expressed frustration that even as research continues, residents still haven’t seen the level of compensation they’re seeking for health care costs already incurring — and that might come in the future.

“It’s like, ‘Hey, we know you guys have long-term exposure. Just go ahead and stay there and keep being exposed, and we’re going to study you,’” Wallace said.

With some financial backing from Norfolk Southern, the state of Ohio opened a mental health center as well as a primary care clinic in East Palestine, though that clinic is set to move.

The additional care is “nice,” Allison said, but it doesn’t address the larger problems, including the absence of broader guidance for local medical providers to know what to test and watch for in their patients.

To this point, residents of East Palestine have been offered capped “personal injury” compensation as part of a $600 million class action settlement with Norfolk Southern.

But that process hasn’t been smooth; the administrator was recently removed by the judge following complaints about compensation calculation errors.

Plus, in order to receive personal injury compensation, residents were required to waive their rights to future legal claims surrounding possible later diagnoses, Allison said. Her family opted not to take the personal injury payment as a result.

Allison and Wallace both said they have hope a pending lawsuit by the state of Ohio against Norfolk Southern might still provide health care help perhaps through a special fund — or that the Trump administration might yet declare a federal disaster and trigger Medicare coverage.

There’s also a pending settlement between the company and the Department of Justice that hasn’t yet been distributed.

The bottom line, Allison said, is “there is still no organized health care guidance” nor enough funding for anticipated health care needs.

As to how it gets paid for, “The community doesn’t care, as long as those needs are covered,” she said.