Government thwarted scientists looking at high cancer rates in northeast N.B.

New Brunswick government officials urged health researchers looking into high cancer rates in the Belledune area toplay downlead contamination as a possible cause, CBC News has learned.

According to documents obtained by CBC News under the Right to Information Act, Health Department officials asked researchers at Memorial University to make changes to a study proposal, including removing references to environmental contamination.

There has been a lead smelter in the northern community of Belledune since the 1960s and several environmentalists, along with the province's conservation council, have alleged it has contaminated the surrounding area and impacted residents' health.

Researchers at Memorial submitted several versions of a research proposal during 2006 and in July of that year, a committee of health officials asked for changes.

The researchers wanted to look at environmental contamination and toxicological exposures in Belledune andtheir possible links to cancer.They also proposed comparing the findings from Belledune with another community "without environmental exposures."

But according to the copy of a memo obtained by CBC News, government officials asked, "What environmental contamination? How are you going to make these associations?"

"To begin with, lead is not cancer-causing. It doesn't cause cancer," said Dr. Chris Balram, New Brunswick's chief epidemiologist.

The Memorial University researchers later removed the references from the study proposal.

A 2005 study by consultants Goss Gilroy found that groups of people had experienced exposure to levelsof lead and cadmium from 1967 to 1984 that were unsafe and that cancer rates around the community were higher than elsewhere in the province.

It's natural for researchers to look for some kind of link between the exposure and the cancer rates, environmentalist Inka Milewski said. "Wouldn't the province want to know whether those exposures resulted in these disease endpoints?"

The government's toning down of Memorial's proposal is an example of the province not wanting to know the truth, Milewski said.

"The Belledune area health study found that people had been exposed to these levels that had been above the province's risk benchmarks. They also know that each contaminant has a disease, or several disease, endpoints. Why would they not be interested if my exposure, if their exposure, resulted in these disease endpoints?" she asked.

Peter Wang, the head of the Memorial research team, told CBC News he didn't feel pressured to play down the contamination factor.

The study was cancelled when the province and the university couldn't agree on the cost, Wang said.