(Read the original article from the Lake County News-Sun here)
Lake County Health Department officials announced Monday that they have completed preliminary plans for outdoor air quality monitoring outside two plants that use ethylene oxide, a cancer-causing gas.
The announcement follows a Saturday afternoon protest in Gurnee that drew more than 100 people demanding action on the use of ethylene oxide emissions in Lake County.
At Saturday’s protest, state Rep. Daniel Didech, D-Buffalo Grove, told protesters that their voices were being heard, because he has gone door to door in Gurnee and Waukegan, and “all of their questions were, ‘What are you doing about EtO emissions?’”
“We are standing with you down in Springfield,” Didech added. “These industry executives and their lobbyists, they come down to Springfield and say, ‘It isn’t toxic, it doesn’t cause cancer, it’s not dangerous.’
“It’s the same thing we heard from the tobacco companies; same thing from car manufacturers who said we didn’t need seat belts; same thing we’ve heard from the oil and coal industry who say climate change isn’t real.”
Didech added that, “We know it causes cancer. We know it’s toxic, and we’re going to stop these emissions from being released in our communities.”