Legionnaires’ disease adds to water concerns in Flint

Rick Snyder activated the National Guard to help the American Red Cross distribute water to Flint residents to help them deal with the lead contamination that is in the City of Flint’s water supply.

“We are utilizing all state resources to ensure Flint residents have access to clean and safe drinking water and today I am asking President Obama to provide additional resources as our recovery efforts continue”, Snyder said.

Lead leached into the tap water of some city residents following the decision to temporarily switch to the Flint River for drinking water.

Snyder declared a state of emergency on January 5 for Genesee County, following the county’s local emergency declaration on January 4.

Barbie Biggs raises her fist as more than 150 protestors from Flint and Detroit chant in solidarity in the main lobby asking for the resignation of Gov. Rick Snyder in relation to Flint’s water crisis, …

MLive.com and WDIV-TV report that the protesters arrived in Lansing via buses from Flint and Detroit.

Chief health officer Mark Valacak tells The Associated Press he “had no idea” that Gov. Rick Snyder was holding a news conference Wednesday to disclose the findings.

Nick Lyon, director of the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services, explained that between June 2014 and November 2015 87 Genesee County residents got Legionnaires’ disease.

MI health officials said they can’t conclude that the increase in Legionnaires’ cases was related to Flint’s water.

“The circumstances of these cases prompted the chief medical examiner and other leaders at the Department of Health and Human Services to brief the governor, and he decided to quickly make the information public”, Snyder spokesman Dave Murray said. People can get sick if they inhale mist or vapor from contaminated water systems, hot tubs and cooling systems, but the bacteria don’t spread from person to person.

The Reverend Jesse Jackson says he will attend a rally over bad water in Flint on Sunday.

While Lyon and Gov. Snyder maintain that they are unsure if the switched water source is directly responsible for the uptick, the researchers behind the Flint Water Study (aka the people who first recorded a spike in lead levels) are saying it’s highly likely that Legionnaires’ disease is a result of getting water from the Flint River.

Valacak says Legionnaires’ disease isn’t associated with drinking tainted water. A man made disaster if we’ve ever seen one. It was intended as a stop-gap measure until the completion of a pipeline to Port Huron Lake as the source for Flint’s water. He says work on the investigation will begin immediately. The first four truckloads of bottled water were scheduled to be delivered Thursday.