When I worked at the plant, I tried to help the workers. I went to the company supervisors and told them people shouldn't work in these situations, with these chemical exposures. I tried to look out for their safety, but those people needed their jobs. Now I think they'll be better off knowing what s going on with their health. The research questions R esearchers designed the epidemiological study to replicate previous studies to enable them to confirm or refute earlier data that linked occupational mercury exposure with long-term neurological, renal, or reproductive toxicity.
Nobody really knows how to measure a person s mercury level.
Blood or urine levels have typically been measured, says Frumkin. On a group level, these measures reflect exposure. But on an individual level, both measures are highly variable and have limited value as biomarkers of exposure. Marsha Pierce, an occupational nurse specaialist with the local health department, and Rick Letz, a behavioral scientist, survey the site. While early findings have suggested that porphyrin profiles are a signature of mercury exposure, this hypothesis has not been confirmed.