(4 of 4)
Federal officials had hoped to review and double-check the findings, which quickly came under attack, before releasing them. But the report was leaked to some residents as well as the press. So, with little forewarning, a team of EPA officials rushed to Niagara Falls, borrowed the Homeowners Association building and called in the study participants one by one to tell them the test results.
For the eleven the news was devastating. "It was just the last straw," says Phyllis Whitenight. Both she and her husband Leonard, a printer, had chromosome abnormalities. In 1975 she lost a breast to cancer. Their son, Kevin, 10, has had unexplained stomach problems. Their daughter, Debbie, 26, was plagued as a child by rashes on her legs and throat infections; three years ago she miscarried. Said Whitenight: "We've lived in fear for a long time. Now we'll wonder what we've passed on to the children."
Barbara Quimby, 29, shares those fears. Her daughter, Brandy, 8, is mentally retarded. Another daughter, Courtney, 3, suffers severe breathing problems. Now Quimby has been told by a doctor that her own chromosome abnormalities increase her chances of developing cancer as well as raising the risk of birth defects in any more children she might bear. Says she, fighting back the tears: "It gets to you, it really does." ∎