Paul Green has made an incorrect statement by claiming that "research carried out to date shows no credible evidence of adverse health outcomes for those living near incinerators" and I suggest that he starts by looking at research published by Professor Owen Lloyd while he eats his words.

Unfortunately for the incinerator lobbyists, the Office for National Statistics data consistently shows higher rates of infant mortality and also premature deaths at all ages in electoral wards which are downwind of incinerators and other industrial sources of PM2.5 emissions when compared with upwind electoral wards that are free from such emissions.

Prior to the start of South London's SELCHP incinerator in December 1993, the infant death rate in the London Borough of Newham had been falling - just as the London average rate had been falling. After SELCHP started, the Newham infant death rate rose sharply and has stayed high ever since. Newham PCT are puzzled at the upsurge in infant death rates and also in the increase in the Newham death rate from coronary heart disease in persons under 75 years after 1993 which also rose sharply. Don't take my word for the above trends which buck the London average, but check out "Health inequalities: the Newham perspective" by Jacqui Barker, Deputy Director of Public Health, Newham PCT, 22 January 2004.

Newham is downwind of SELCHP with SW wind - just as Fallings Park, Essington, Great Wyrley Town, and Gt Wyrley Landywood are electoral ward downwind of Wolverhampton incinerator with SW wind. The above 4 wards form a single group which has average infant death rate of 15.3 per 1,000 live births, ie 22 infant deaths and 1440 live births, in the 5-year period 2003-2007. Only one Wolverhampton ward had zero infant deaths in same 5-year period and that was Tettenhall Wightwick, which "just happens to be" the ward that's most upwind of incinerator when SW wind blows. If you look at the infant death rates in South Staffs, you'll see