A teacher battling a terminal brain tumour believes her illness was caused by toxic chemicals found at the school she worked at in North Lanarkshire.
Jeana Watt, 48, who taught maths at the Skills Academy in Coatbridge, was given 18 months to live in June last year when she was diagnosed with Glioblastoma - a fast growing form of cancer.
The school, which is built on an old industrial waste site, shares a campus with Buchanan and St Ambrose high schools, where blue water was previously discovered running from the taps. Staff and pupils claim to have contracted serious illnesses as a result, the Sunday Mail reports.
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An independent review commissioned by the Scottish Government in 2019 found no link to ill health and the complex was reopened to staff and pupils that August.
But the mum-of-three, who is from Newarthill near Motherwell, believes her condition is a result of ground contamination and chemicals from the water she drank and washed her hands in during her three years working at the academy.
Jeana said: “The Academy sits just in front of Buchanan High and two teachers have been diagnosed with terminal cancer in just a few short years. I’m one of them – I have brain cancer.
“When the blue water came to light, it also emerged that four teachers from Buchanan High who worked in the same corridor had all been diagnosed with bladder cancer – something that the report said was ‘coincidental’.
“I don’t believe in coincidences. I was previously fit and healthy but fell ill with different things about a year after I started there. I was then diagnosed with cancer.
“I believe my cancer is linked to the blue water and ground contamination. We all drank the water, washed our hands and ate the food from the high school.”
The campus, which opened in 2012, was built on the former landfill site used by Gartsherrie Ironworks for industrial waste, including lead and arsenic, between 1945 and 1972.
Steps were taken to make the grounds safer before opening by bringing in fresh top soil.
Despite concluding the site was safe, the report published in 2019 highlighted an elevated level of banned chemical polychlorinated biphenyls on the campus edge. Jeana now wants a second independent probe.
A Scottish Government spokesperson defended the findings of the 2019 probe, saying: “It concluded the school and site were safe and there were no links between ill health and the campus.”
North Lanarkshire Council echoed that, with a spokeswoman saying: “Any claim to the contrary is simply untrue. At no time has this staff member brought these claims to the attention of her employer.”
And public health consultant John Logan, insisted: “There is no causal link between the school or site and any ill health in those who work or are taught on the site.”
Jeana is now fundraising to receive specialist immuno-oncological therapy in Cologne, Germany, at a cost of £250,000.
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