Valori Mace has five times more C8 in her blood than the average American. Russell Miller has three times more. So does William Rhodes.

Mace, Miller and Rhodes worry that drinking water contaminated with the DuPont Co. chemical put them at risk of getting cancer, liver disease or some other illness. And they want DuPont to pay for medical screening so they can catch any diseases early enough to treat them.

The trio of Parkersburg residents need such medical monitoring - and so do all of their neighbors who drink the city's water, a federal judge was told Thursday.

"It needs to be done on a communitywide basis," Dr. Barry Levy told U.S. District Judge Joseph R. Goodwin. "All members of the population are at increased risk."

Levy, an expert witness for the residents, testified Thursday in the second day of a crucial hearing in a lawsuit over DuPont's pollution of area water with the Teflon-making chemical.

Lawyers for the residents want Goodwin to certify the case as a class action. This would allow them to represent thousands of residents in one big case, rather than spending time and money on individual lawsuits.

DuPont argues that there are too many differences among the residents - such as the amount of water they drink or levels of C8 in the water - to litigate the cases as a class action.

Through 1 1/2 days of testimony, Goodwin repeatedly has been skeptical about the plaintiffs' expert testimony that C8 has put residents at risk and in need of medical monitoring.

On Thursday, Goodwin wondered aloud whether it might be best to screen some number of the residents first. If they show illnesses related to C8, then perhaps a full-blown, communitywide testing program would be warranted, the judge said.

"I do understand the principle of a canary in a coal mine, and it seems to me that has some merit," Goodwin said.

In some ways, such a project is already underway as part of a previous settlement between DuPont and nearly 70,000 current and former residents of communities outside of the city of Parkersburg.

Under that September 2004 settlement, DuPont paid to clean up local water supplies outside the city. Additional money from the $107.6 million deal was funneled to two related studies aimed at pinpointing any adverse health effects from C8 exposure. If adverse effects are confirmed, DuPont will then be on the hook for up to $235 million for future medical monitoring.

But Parkersburg city residents are not part of that deal. At the time, the city's water did not appear to be contaminated. But by late 2005, levels had increased, and a follow-up lawsuit was filed.

Valori Mace has five times more C8 in her blood than the average American. Russell Miller has three times more. So does William Rhodes.

Mace, Miller and Rhodes worry that drinking water contaminated with the DuPont Co. chemical put them at risk of getting cancer, liver disease or some other illness. And they want DuPont to pay for medical screening so they can catch any diseases early enough to treat them.

The trio of Parkersburg residents need such medical monitoring - and so do all of their neighbors who drink the city's water, a federal judge was told Thursday.

"It needs to be done on a communitywide basis," Dr. Barry Levy told U.S. District Judge Joseph R. Goodwin. "All members of the population are at increased risk."

Levy, an expert witness for the residents, testified Thursday in the second day of a crucial hearing in a lawsuit over DuPont's pollution of area water with the Teflon-making chemical.

Lawyers for the residents want Goodwin to certify the case as a class action. This would allow them to represent thousands of residents in one big case, rather than spending time and money on individual lawsuits.

DuPont argues that there are too many differences among the residents - such as the amount of water they drink or levels of C8 in the water - to litigate the cases as a class action.

Through 1 1/2 days of testimony, Goodwin repeatedly has been skeptical about the plaintiffs' expert testimony that C8 has put residents at risk and in need of medical monitoring.

On Thursday, Goodwin wondered aloud whether it might be best to screen some number of the residents first. If they show illnesses related to C8, then perhaps a full-blown, communitywide testing program would be warranted, the judge said.

"I do understand the principle of a canary in a coal mine, and it seems to me that has some merit," Goodwin said.

In some ways, such a project is already underway as part of a previous settlement between DuPont and nearly 70,000 current and former residents of communities outside of the city of Parkersburg.

Under that September 2004 settlement, DuPont paid to clean up local water supplies outside the city. Additional money from the $107.6 million deal was funneled to two related studies aimed at pinpointing any adverse health effects from C8 exposure. If adverse effects are confirmed, DuPont will then be on the hook for up to $235 million for future medical monitoring.

But Parkersburg city residents are not part of that deal. At the time, the city's water did not appear to be contaminated. But by late 2005, levels had increased, and a follow-up lawsuit was filed.

"DuPont acknowledged almost four years ago that getting that poison out of the drinking water for all the other communities surrounding Parkersburg and setting up a program to address medical monitoring issues communitywide was the scientifically, ethically and morally right thing to do," lawyers for the residents argued in court papers. "It remains the right thing to do and the customers of the Parkersburg Water District are deserving of no less from DuPont."

Levy, an environmental health physician, testified Thursday that his review of scientific literature shows that C8 pollution has put Parkersburg residents at a greater risk of liver damage, cancer and reproductive disorders.

In 1999, the state Supreme Court decided West Virginians should be able to sue for medical monitoring in certain situations.

The ruling allows medical monitoring suits when residents have been "significantly exposed" to toxic chemicals by the wrongdoing of another party. Residents must show that this exposure has put them at "an increased risk of contracting a serious latent disease." And, residents must also show that medical tests exist that could give them an early warning of any illnesses caused by the toxic exposure.

DuPont has been a major opponent of the state's medical monitoring ruling. The company has lobbied the Legislature to outlaw the suits, and won a state Supreme Court ruling in the earlier C8 case that blocked court-ordered blood testing before the September 2004 settlement.

Currently, DuPont is seeking a state Supreme Court review of a jury verdict that the company fund a $130 million medical monitoring program for residents near a former zinc smelting plant in Harrison County.

The West Virginia Chamber of Commerce lists elimination of medical monitoring suits as among its top legislative priorities.

In May 2004, the state Supreme Court revisited the issue, and said "critics of medical monitoring obviously do not understand [the] rationale for such a cause of action.

"A simple explanation to demonstrate justification for recovery of such damages would be a situation in which a single industrial polluter admittedly dumped a toxic substance into a stream that ran through a neighborhood of six homes," the court said.

"The families in three of the homes contracted cancer that was traced directly to the toxic substance, but no one in the other three families contracted any disease. However, medical doctors for the three families who were currently free of disease advised those families that they should undergo annual medical examinations to monitor for disease from the toxic substances for the remainder of their lives.

"Costs for the medical monitoring would be, according to doctors, estimated to be $500 to $1,000 per year," the court said. "Common sense should suggest that these medical monitoring costs be borne by the negligent industrial polluter of the toxic substance, and not the innocent victim of the toxic exposure."

Reach Ken Ward Jr. at kw...@wvgazette.com or 348-1702.