Story at a glance
- A new report from Human Rights Watch highlights the health harms besides cancer impacting residents of ‘Cancer Alley.’
- ‘Cancer Alley’ refers to an 85-mile stretch of land along the Mississippi River between Baton Rouge and New Orleans that is home to roughly 200 petrochemical plants and refineries.
- People living in those parts of Louisiana have complained about the harmful toxins for decades.
Pregnant women living in parts of Louisiana’s ‘Cancer Alley’ are far more likely to give birth prematurely and to babies that have low birth weight compared to women living outside the state, according to research in a Human Rights Watch report published Thursday.
The research, which is part of a study currently under peer review, argues people living in Louisiana’s most air-polluted areas have premature birth rates as high as 25.3 percent, almost twice the state average of 13.5 percent.
That number is also about two and a half times the U.S. average of 10.4 percent , according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.