A Quiet Town’s Nightmare Heard Around The World
The story of Dupont’s dirty tricks and how the chemical industry is poisoning us
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We want to believe the world we live in is a safe place. But is it? Ask DuPont de Nemours Inc (NYSE: DD). They’ll tell you it is.
But it’s a lie.
The people living in Parkersburg, West Virginia, thought their world was a safe place. In the 1950s through the 1990s, 1,700 of the town’s 30,000 people were more than happy to have a job at the Dupont chemical plant on the Kanawha River banks. Not only was Dupont the largest employer, but they also invested heavily in the town's athletic and arts programs, building their reputation as a trusted corporate provider.
Except they were knowingly poisoning workers in the plant, dumping toxic waste into rivers and landfills, and causing cancer in thousands of people and their families in the surrounding area. Oh, there’s more.
They also made billions on Teflon, using PFOA or C-8, the toxic forever chemical compound in Teflon that has found its way into the blood supply of 99.7% of Americans, if not all humans. It’s also found in polar bears, babies on remote islands, birds, seals, water supplies, and seawater.
Tracy Danzey grew up in the 1980s in a small town near Parkersburg as a competitive swimmer, spending up to eight hours a day in what everyone thought was clean water. In 2000, at the age of 20, her thyroid ceased to function correctly, a known side effect linked explicitly to C-8.
Five years later, she developed osteosarcoma (a rare form of bone cancer), which led to her right hip and leg amputation. Tracy says, “We now know that it (C-8) has caused cancer and other illnesses for many people within my community. Many of my friends and family have been affected or died as a result.”
Tracy is now living across the state in Shepherdstown, where she received her nursing degree in 2004. She’s a mother, wife, and advocate for water protection and has a new battle on her hands.
Rockwool, a Danish company and maker of stone wool insulation, is building a plant over Sheperdstowns’ aquifers with two twentyone story smokestacks that will discharge over 700 tons of organic…
