Nearly half of surveyed residents in Louisiana's coastal parishes experienced adverse health effects that could be linked to chemical exposure in the months after the Gulf of Mexico oil gusher last year, according to a poll released yesterday by a green group in partnership with Tulane University's disaster leadership academy.

The health impact poll, billed as "the largest known face-to-face survey of communities impacted by the oil spill" by its authors at the Louisiana Bucket Brigade (LABB), also found that locals' health complaints sometimes went untreated, even among those with health care coverage. While 54 percent of respondents held health insurance, 15 percent sought medical care for more direct exposures and 31 percent did so for symptoms.

The share of respondents using over-the-counter medication "more often than usual" to deal with health problems in the wake of the oil spill also hit 31 percent in the LABB-Tulane poll, which was conducted with support from the Patagonia clothing company.

LABB conducted its survey of 954 residents in the Louisiana coastal parishes of Plaquemines, Jefferson, Terrebonne and St. Bernard during the day, a limitation it noted would "likely exclude" many of the fishermen and other coastal locals hired by BP PLC and federal responders to help clean up the spilled oil.

Nonetheless, the group -- which often faces off against the oil industry, particularly on the issue of air emissions from local refineries -- expressed hope last year that its project could help inform a sweeping National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS) study of the Gulf Coast health impact from the 86-day leak (Greenwire, Aug. 19, 2010).

NIEHS's prospective study, carrying a $10 million-plus budget and expected to survey upward of 55,000 oil spill cleanup workers, was officially kick-started this week (Greenwire, March 1).

"More data should be gathered, but most important is action," LABB wrote in its report on the survey results. "Absence of data should not be used as an excuse for inaction."

The green group's recommendations, which it described as coming largely from interviews with affected coastal residents, included an increase in access to health care providers trained in treating the consequences of exposure to oil and dispersants, a focus on treatment in addition to study of symptoms, and training of locals in seafood sampling and other long-term spill recovery work.

Whether that call for more attention to medical treatment will pay dividends remains unclear. Both the Obama administration and BP reported during the spill that their sampling of air and water along the Gulf Coast yielded little cause for concern about lingering environmental health consequences in the area. Monitoring of chemical exposure among cleanup workers, however, raised alarms among environmentalists and some veteran industrial hygienists (Greenwire, June 11, 2010).

Click here to read the full survey results from LABB and Tulane.