The state's Dept. of Health and Hospitals on July 19 said 290 spill-related medical cases had been reported to date. Of those, 216 were workers doing oil-cleanup duty or manning oil rigs, and 74 were people taken ill on shore.

Burning and evaporation of oil and gas have hurt air quality, while residents live near toxic waters  filled with oil and dispersants. As of last week, 363 miles of Louisiana coastline were oiled, far more than in any other state.

In its spill response, BP's first, open-water, burning of oil in the Gulf open-water, burning of oil in the occurred on April 28, according to the company. On June 3, BP started capturing oil and flaring gas at the well with the installation of the Lower Marine Riser Package-containment cap. The LMRP took oil and gas to the drill-ship Discoverer Enterprise, where oil was collected and gas was flared. A second oil-recovery system began operating at the well in mid-June, and carried oil and gas to the Q4000 well-intervention vessel-where both oil and gas were flared.

If you live near the coast and don't feel well, you might want to crack open an old, school chemistry book to look for some reasons. Bhaskar Kura, professor of civil and environmental engineering at University of New Orleans, is researching local air quality, and collected samples by boat at Grand Bayou in Port Sulphur in June with Arizona State University staffers. Kura said a group of air pollutants of varying toxicity to human, know as hydrocarbons, are contained in crude oil. Pollutants that enter the air from evaporating crude include benzene, toluene, ethyl-benzene and xylene. Additional pollutants enter the atmosphere from spill-cleanup activities, like oil slick burning. He is director of UNO's Maritime Environmental Re?sources and Information Center.

Kura's earliest findings will be released soon, and he plans to conduct much more research, including detailed sampling near the well site and other spots with universities from several states.

Nicholas Cheremisinoff, PhD chemical engineer and consultant in West Virginia, said "air monitoring data reported on BP's spill-response website show hardly any impact to air quality, which is inconsistent with the more than 300 fishermen and cleanup workers that have been admitted to Louisiana hospitals in the last two months." He is a former Exxon chemical engineer and a consultant to oil and chemical industries.

Residents as far north as New Orleans who have smelled oil in recent months wonder just how bad the air is and whether the government is downplaying threats to prevent panic.

Cheremisinoff said "the black smoke observed from burning oil slicks in the Gulf contained sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxides, carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide, volatile organics, hydrogen sulfide, poly?aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs). These products of incomplete combustion contribute to the formation of acid aerosols, soot and promote particle formation in the atmosphere. The emissions are toxic on their own, and contribute to the formation of smog and acid rain, which worsens air quality."

Burning oil slicks, known as 'in situ' burning, is more hazardous to humans than flaring gas at the well site, he said. When BP recovered oil from the well and burned the gas, those emissions were not as significant as burning slicks, he noted. Natural gas is comprised of methane, and is a relatively clean-burning fuel, with low levels of particulates. He is a former Exxon chemical engineer and a consultant to oil and chemical industries.

Workers on water are exposed to smoke from controlled burns of oil and to oil evaporating in water. "Workers and possibly residents inhale volatile organic compounds and other hydrocarbons," Chere?misinoff said. "Oil vapors cause headaches, dizziness, nausea, breathing difficulties, vomiting and eye and throat irritation. And bear in mind that crude oil is a mixture of hundreds of chemicals, most of which are toxic." Inhaling quantities of fumes can cause chemical poisoning, called hydrocarbon pneumonia.

"Oil-slick burning generates a broad, particle-size distribution of soot and particulate matter," Cheremisinoff said. "From a health-risk standpoint, there's concern about inhaling small particulate matter that is under 10 microns in size, to particle sizes all the way up to 30 microns-which can be ingested."

Last week, the Deepwater Horizon Incident Joint Information Center said 411 controlled burns had been done to date, removing 11 million gallons of oil from the sea's surface. BP has ceased flaring off gas at the well site, however, after installing a capping stack in mid-July that has shut the well for now.

Meanwhile, the spill has set the stage for more smog, often present near the region's petro-chemical plants and cities. Cheremisinoff said smog is formed from carbon monoxide, nitrogen dioxide, sulfur dioxide, low-level ozone and particulates-like dust, soot and smoke. When hit by the sun, smog breaks down into free radicals that can enter the body, causing lung disease, cancer, Parkinson's and other ailments.

The frequency of acid rain, formed when sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxide, or ammonia combine with water in the atmosphere, could increase along the Gulf. Hydrogen sulfide, released from spilled oil, forms sulfuric acid in the atmosphere, creating acid rain, Cheremisinoff said.

Cheremisinoff said it's too soon to know how much noxious chemicals released at and near BP's well have threatened human health. But, he said, "there should be considerable concern over the non-transparent manner in which air-quality data are being gathered and reported by Occupational Safety & Health Administration, Environ-mental Protection Agency and BP's contractor-Center for Toxicology  and Environmental Health.

OSHA releases the frequency and locations of its tests taken at on-shore and near-shore sites, and BP  provides bar graphs summarizing ranges of worker exposures to chemicals in general locations.

Cheremisinoff is particularly concerned that CETH, which is monitoring air for BP, normally works for industry. He said "a considerable amount of its work is in providing expert testimony in support of industry defendants involved in environmental damages. For example, the firm was cited by the EPA and community members for reporting insignificant, particulate matter emissions in the 2008 Tennessee Valley Authority ash spill -which is widely recognized as one of the worst environmental catastrophes in the country."

Cheremisinoff said CETH performed studies in homes containing Chinese drywall on behalf of drywall manufacturer Knauf, and concluded that the chemicals detected did not pose a public-health threat. "However, that is in wide disagreement with many scientific studies," he said.

At EPA, spokesman David Bary provided a statement from EPA experts at the Unified Area Command in New Orleans, saying the agency was quick to respond to the spill. EPA began monitoring Gulf Coast air shortly after the rig explosion, and on April 30 launched a website posting water, air monitoring, air sampling and sediment data. On May 5, EPA started using a mobile air-monitoring vehicle-the Trace Atmospheric Gas Analyzer-to collect data. The agency said it has now gathered over 3,000 air, water and sediment samples, assessing spill impacts, and is sharing them with the public.

EPA said air monitoring in Southeast Louisiana since the spill shows particle pollution and ozone have been mostly good to moderate on the agency's Air Quality Index, with levels reaching "unhealthy for sensitive groups" on a couple of days. "These levels are not uncommon at this time of year," the agency said. EPA is sampling several air toxics that can be formed when oil is burned. That data, through July 13, show concentrations of chemicals along the Gulf that are below levels that would pose long-term health concerns, EPA said.

The EPA said it has worked with the Louisiana Bucket Brigade and other environmental organizations throughout the spill response and has frequently discussed monitoring efforts with them.

Anne Rolfes, director of the Louisiana Bucket Brigade, said she appreciates EPA's assistance and data, but added "monitoring isn't finding much, and meanwhile people are choking."

For its part, OSHA has found little in the air to worry about. Jason Surbey, OSHA spokesman, said "OSHA has taken over 2,000 samples, both on shore and on the boats" in the Gulf since late April. "To date, using the strictest occupational-exposure limits, OSHA has seen no air sampling data that has detected any hazardous chemical at levels of concern."

At BP, spokesman John Curry said, Tthe Unified Area Command-OSHA, NIOSH and BP-is very concerned about the health and safety of workers and the surrounding community." BP has a rigorous program to protect workers, and "worker health is the company's top priority," he said. With safety in mind, the Unified Area Command and EPA constantly take air-monitoring samples, he noted.

"We've literally taken more than 9,000 personal samples, and the vast, vast majority of the results indicate 'non-detect' or below detection levels," Curry said. "It's a lot of data, but it shows the length to which we are going to be protective of workers." Curry said respirators are located on board ships involved in the response at the well, and "personal air monitoring has occurred on board Vessels of Opportunity" for fishermen and others doing oil cleanup.

Curry said respirators are not necessary for workers on beaches because Volatile Organic Com-pounds aren't present there. "And wearing a respirator in this heat, when it's not needed, could contribute to overheating and exhaustion. People typically breathe harder when wearing one."

Medics at Acadian Ambulance, which operates emergency stations at sites serving spill workers, are busy, and hotlines run by Louisiana Poison Center and BP-contractor Rocky Mountain Poison and Drug Center have been flooded with frantic calls. Of the 290 people reported by the state as having spill-related ailments to date, 217 were workers and of those, 194 were male and 22 were female. In the general public, 47 females and 27 males suffered spill-related ailments. Most of those who fell ill visited an emergency room, urgent-care center, clinic or physician's office. Seventeen individuals were hospitalized for awhile.

In New York City, after the 9/11 terrorist attacks in 2001, particulate emissions were a threat to residents, according to scientists. Workers and residents there sued EPA in 2004 for lying about air quality after 9/11. That case was eventually dismissed, however, because EPA director Christie Todd Whitman had been given conflicting instructions, including an order to get Wall St. back to work to keep financial markets humming.

This article was originally published in the July 26, 2010 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper