In 1948, a professor at the Harvard School of Public Health wrote a report linking leukemia to benzene, a common solvent and an ingredient in gasoline. “It is generally considered,” he wrote, “that the only absolutely safe concentration for benzene is zero.” The report is remarkable not only because of its age and candor, but also because it was prepared for and published by the oil industry’s main lobby group, the American Petroleum Institute. This document and others like it bedevil oil and chemical industry executives and their lawyers, who to this day maintain that benzene causes only rare types of cancer and only at higher doses. Decades after its release, a lawyer for Shell Oil Company flagged the 1948 report as being potentially damaging in lawsuits and gave out instructions to “avoid unnecessary disclosure of sensitive documents or information” and “disclose sensitive benzene documents only on court order.” The Center for Public Integrity, along with Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health and The Graduate Center at the City University of New York, has made public some 20,000 pages of benzene documents — the inaugural collection in Exposed, a searchable online archive of previously secret oil and chemical industry memoranda, emails, letters, PowerPoints and meeting minutes. The aim is to make such materials — most of which were produced during discovery in toxic tort litigation and have been locked away in file cabinets and hard drives — accessible to workers, journalists, academic researchers and others. Combined with journalism from the Center, the archive sheds light on toxic substances that continue to threaten public health, including benzene. Over a year, the Center obtained and examined tens of thousands of pages of documents detailing the petrochemical industry’s campaign to undercut the science linking benzene to cancer. Internal memorandums, emails, letters and meeting minutes suggest that America’s oil and chemical titans, coordinated by the American Petroleum Institute, spent at least $36 million on research “designed to protect member company interests.” Many documents chronicle an unparalleled effort by five major petrochemical companies to finance benzene research in Shanghai, China, where the pollutant persists in workplaces. Others attest to the industry’s longstanding interest in such “concerns” as childhood leukemia. Put in context by interviews with dozens of lawyers, scientists, academics, regulators and industry representatives, the documents depict a “research strategy” built on dubious motives, close corporate oversight and painstaking public relations. Among our key findings: * For decades, the petrochemical industry spent millions on science seeking to minimize the dangers of benzene, a carcinogen tied to leukemia and other cancers. * Our review of some 20,000 pages of internal records reveals the lengths to which the petrochemical industry went to rebut studies showing harmful effects of benzene in low doses. * While seeking funding, the industry’s lobby touted how the expected results of a proposed study in China could be used to reduce liability and combat stricter regulation. * Exposure to benzene in the womb or later during development has been tied to increased risk of leukemia in children. * The petrochemical industry’s sponsored science says data aren’t good enough to support the link between childhood leukemia and benzene; critics say this is a common industry tactic.
