08 Mar 2006

Respected Epidemiologist Concludes Health Reports Promoted by Plaintiffs Fail to Prove Diseases in the Oriente Were Caused by Petroleum

Reports to the Court of "several problems in all" of the studies prepared by Dr. Miguel San Sebastian in support of Plaintiffs

QUITO, Ecuador, March 8, 2006 - Dr. Michael Kelsh, a renowned expert on environmental health, today in a written report informed the Superior Court in Nueva Loja that the health studies promoted by the plaintiffs in their environmental lawsuit against Chevron "do not provide evidence that diseases were caused by petroleum."

Dr. Kelsh, who has done extensive work on environmental health issues in Latin America and the U.S., is an adjunct professor at the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) School of Public Health. His written report was submitted today at the judicial inspection of the Sacha Sur production station near San Carlos. Dr. Kelsh was asked to provide his independent analysis of various health studies authored by Dr. Miguel San Sebastian and collaborators and that were promoted by the plaintiffs' attorneys suggesting a link between various health problems and petroleum exposure.

With respect to a study of cancer in San Carlos, Dr.Kelsh reported the court,

"Dr. San Sebastian observed a total of 10 cancer cases in his study of the San Carlos community. If a single environmental agent was responsible for an elevated incidence of cancer in San Carlos, the elevation would have to occur in one or two specific types of cancer. However, Dr. San Sebastian reported eight different types of cancer. It is highly unlikely that a single environmental agent can cause these very different cancers. Furthermore, the consensus of scientists is that exposure to crude oil does not cause the types of cancers reported in San Carlos."

Dr. Kelsh notes that Dr. San Sebastian himself cautions against drawing any conclusions in his studies:

"Dr. San Sebastian's studies are not the type of studies that can provide information about disease causation, a point he acknowledges in many of his published studies… There are several problems in all of these studies that severely limit their ability to prove what caused the observed health effects."

Dr. Kelsh's written report to the Superior Court can be found at http://www.texaco.com/sitelets/ecuador/docs/report_kelsh_en.pdf (PDF, 127KB)

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