CHARLESTON, W.Va. — The state Bureau of Public Health received information from 63 doctors who treated patients in the days and weeks following the Jan. 9 chemical spill in Charleston and resulting water emergency in parts of nine West Virginia. The bureau released the preliminary raw data from those reports Friday.
The information shows most of the visits came from Jan. 9-23 and most of the patients reported the same type of symptoms including itching, irritation, coughing, rash and vomiting.
The chemical crude MCHM spilled from a storage tank on a site owned by Freedom Industries. It got into the Elk River and into the West Virginia American Water Kanawha Valley water plant just downstream.
State Health Officer Dr. Letitia Tierney said 800 medical providers were contacted and 63 submitted information.
“What we are seeing is consistent with the information that has been previously reported by the West Virginia Poison Center, the Center for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) initial medical chart review from emergency departments and the population survey conducted by the Kanawha-Charleston Health Department,” Dr. Tierney said in a news release from the state DHHR.
Tierney said the state Bureau of Public Health is still waiting on a report from the CDC in connection with door-to-door surveys, CASPER, the agency conducted from April 8-10.