ATSDR - Hanscom AFB Site Public Health Assessment

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ATSDR MEDIA ANNOUNCEMENT

ATSDR Issues Hanscom AFB Site Public Health Assessment
For Immediate Release: May 14, 2004

ATLANTA — The Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry (ATSDR), a federal public health agency of the Department of Health and Human Services, has released its public health assessment for the Hanscom Air Force Base site.

According to the report, the Hanscom site's groundwater is not a public health hazard because groundwater onsite and immediately offsite is not a source of drinking water.

Past exposure to surface soil is an indeterminate public health hazard because ATSDR scientists lacked sampling data about conditions before site remediation activities.

However, ATSDR considers current and future contact with surface soil to pose no public health hazard because:

Some soil at the sanitary landfill has been capped with clean fill to prevent exposure to potential contaminants. Where soil is uncapped, contaminants are not present in quantities sufficient to cause adverse health effects.

Contamination at the former filter bed is inaccessible. The area has been capped, fenced and posted to prevent access.

Soil at the Scott Circle landfill has been capped and contains no contaminants at levels expected to cause adverse health effects.

Contaminants in surface water and sediment in the Shawsheen River and in wetlands and other bodies of water surrounding the Hanscom site are not present in sufficient concentrations to cause adverse health effects in the past, currently or in the future.

The public health assessment is available for review at the following repositiories:

Hanscom AFB
Environmental Flight Office
Building 1810
Bedford, Mass. (781) 377-9698

Hanscom AFB
Base Library
Building 1530,
Bedford, Mass. (781) 377-9698
For more information, community members may contact Environmental Health Scientist Jeffrey Kellam or Health Communications Specialist Januett Smith-George, toll free, at 1-888-422-8737. Regional Representative Gary Perlman also may be contacted in Boston at (617) 918-1492. Please refer to the Hanscom Air Force Base site in Bedford, Massachusetts.

Established by Congress in 1980 under the Superfund law, ATSDR conducts public health assessments at each of the sites on the EPA National Priorities List, as well as other sites when petitioned. Headquartered in Atlanta, ATSDR is staffed by more than 400 health professionals including epidemiologists, physicians, toxicologists, engineers and public health educators.
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Members of the news media can request an interview with ATSDR staff by calling Jennifer Sarginson or Jill Smith in the ATSDR Office of Communication at 770-488-0700.

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Updated by R. Searfoss May 25, 2004
For more information, contact ATSDR at:
770-488-0700 or e-mail (news media)