Cdc Director Julie Gerberding Holds a News Conference

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Cdc Director Julie Gerberding Holds a News Conference

DIRECTOR GERBERDING HOLDS A NEWS CONFERENCE

FEBRUARY 14, 2008

SPEAKERS: CDC DIRECTOR JULIE GERBERDING

FEMA ADMINISTRATOR R. DAVID PAULISON

[*] GERBERDING: I'm Dr. Julie Gerberding, the Director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and I'm joined today by with Administrator Paulison from the Federal Emergency Management Administration, CDC and FEMA. We're here to provide some provide some perspective on a recent tests in homes that are being used by some of the Katrina survivors. And I really couldn't help but think, as I was flying in today and flying over some of these homes, that while we're going to be talking about trailers and mobile homes and park trailers, what we're really talking about are people and the homes that they've been occupying, sometimes for up to two years since the Katrina situation occurred.

And I think we want to keep in mind that these people have exhibited great patience and great courage with us. We hope that the information we provide today can help them make the decision so that we can help them relocate to a safer environment.

Let me start wit a few facts. CDC and FEMA have been working together to conduct tests of the trailers and mobile homes and park trailers that are the residence of many people in the Gulf region since that hurricane occurred.

We conducted a test of 519 of these places. It represents a random and statistically appropriate sample of the variety of areas that people were staying. And we conducted this test beginning in December, completing on January 23rd.

The raw data came to us at CDC on February 4th and we were able to get those data out in, at least their preliminary forms today, to the people who need them most, the people who are living in these homes.

What we observed, first of all, was that there is no magic cutoff for formaldehyde that indicates safe or not safe. And there's great variability across everything that we measured in terms of the levels. And we can't predict, in any given situation ba...

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