Consultant Dan
24 January 2012
Medical experts reject dodgy medical science claims of anti-wind lobby
Government documents released under Freedom of Information provisions in NSW have raised serious questions about the credibility of anti-wind activists. Australia’s Climate and Health Alliance has put out a Position Statement confirming the health safety of wind farms.
ABC TV ran a good story on both issues, which included an ill-informed response from the NSW Premier, Barry O'Farrell, who has been criticised for his anti-wind policy.
NSW Government FoI
Cam Walker, spokesperson for Friends of the Earth is quoted in an article by Ben Cubby in the Sydney Morning Herald this morning.
ABC 702 ran the story on the lead NSW radio news bulletin at 745am.
Giles Parkinson has written an analysis piece on Renew Economy.
I’ve known Cam for a long time and consider him ethical and intelligent. Cam put out a statement to explain how he sees the situation:
These documents show that NSW Health has determined that Waubra Foundation activism is a beat-up, lacking scientific credibility and promoting unfounded fear in the community about wind mills.
The Waubra Foundation has been caught out using dodgy science to make a lot of noise about wind, without any sound medical justification.
The scientific consensus is that wind is a safe technology used all over the world.
There is no scientific evidence for any of the Waubra Foundation’s health scares and we call on it to come clean on the revelations in the NSW Health FoI documents.
Health and Wind Turbines paper
The Climate and Health Alliance includes Australia’s leading medical organisations, such as the Royal Australasian College of Physicians (RACP) and Royal College of Nursing Australia (RCNA).
CAHA has written a position paper on Health and Wind Turbines and put out a media release.
Adam Morton has covered the story for the Sydney Morning Herald.
The paper makes it clear that wind farms are a healthy energy generation technology. There is clear evidence that the wind industry has been able to coexist with health human communities.
This paper is very significant because the CAHA convenor, Fiona Armstrong, has worked hard to ensure that CAHA represents the science of climate and health issues accurately. The Waubra Foundation, by comparison, lacks credibility.
CAHA’s membership is a highly credible coalition of organisations, in addition to RACP and RCNA:
- Australian Association of Social Workers (AASW)
- Australian College of Rural and Remote Medicine (ACRRM)
- Australian Council of Social Service (ACOSS)
- Australian Hospitals and Healthcare Association (AHHA)
- Australian Health Promotion Association (AHPA)
- Australian Institute of Health Innovation (AIHI)
- Australian Research Alliance of Children and Youth (ARACY)
- Australian Women’s Health Network (AWHN)
- Australian Nursing Federation (ANF)
- Australian Psychological Society (APS)
- Australian Rural Health Education Network (ARHEN)
- CRANAplus
- Doctors for the Environment Australia (DEA)
- Doctors Reform Society
- Health Consumers’ Network (Qld)
- Public Health Association of Australia (PHAA)
- North Yarra Community Health (NYCH)
- Services for Australian Rural and Remote
- Allied Health (SARRAH)
- Women’s Health in the North
- World Vision
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