Risk communication and public response to industrial chemical contamination in Sydney, Nova Scotia: a case study. (Practical Stuff!).

* Community mobilization resulting from environmental hazards is a nonlinear process.

* Mediating factors other than the extent and nature of contamination are important determinants of mobilization.

* The determinants include

-- interpretations of the situation,

-- perception of the hazards,

-- actions taken to alleviate fears and to correct environmental problems, and, possibly,

-- alteration of emotional responses to the negative stimulus (so as to feel better about a situation or to justify its existence).

* Thus, a genuine disjunction between visible environmental contamination and public consciousness of contamination is possible.

* This study examined the process of community mobilization in Sydney, Canada.

* Located on the north coast of Nova Scotia, Sydney is Canada's most contaminated community.

* The local tidal estuary, called the tar ponds, was used as a receptacle for industrial waste from a century of coke production and steel making.

* The short-term and chronic health effects of industrial-chemical exposures have been an issue in Sydney since mining and steel production began in the 19th century.

* Nevertheless, Sydney residents for many years opposed more stringent environmental restrictions.

* They may have favored economic benefit over personal health impacts.

* In the 1960s, however, the Dominion Steel Company started to suffer.

* Periods of decline in demand for steel made Sydney's residents fully aware of the town's economic dependence.

* If a community feels that the negative impact of an industry outweighs the benefits, concerns will be expressed, and public outrage may result.

* In the mid-1980s, chronic environmental contamination in Sydney developed into a public-health issue.

* Rumors, first-hand accounts of friends and family dying from cancer, and media stories alerted the town, the province, and the rest of Canada to the issue.

* In Sydney, personal claims of health effects from carcinogens were congruent with the epidemiological evidence.

* Recent environmental studies estimate a 30 to 40 percent increased incidence in several types of cancer within the community.

* Nevertheless, politicians and industry representatives dismissed these concerns as a general conspiracy to stop steel production.

* The response of the government was to downplay the potential health effects and degrade the reputations of those behind the research.

* The provincial government also emphasized the uncertainties of science.

* Thus, public concerns and attempts at mobilization were illegitimated.

* Ultimately, attempts by various stakeholders to frame the issue (whether in terms of acceptance, action, or conflict) only served to arouse fear and anxiety.

* The anxiety was facilitated by the media and subsequently expressed within the local population as frustration.

* These reactions illustrate why communities dealing with chronic environmental contaminants experience difficulties when attempting to mobilize.

* The difficulties arise mainly from the need to respond to conflicting framings of the issue.