The Florida Department of Heath says an alleged cancer cluster near a Hialeah recycling plant is consistent with the state's cancer rates.
"We have not found or identified a cluster," Lillian Rivera, the Health Department's administrator, told Miami New Times. "Based on the incidence and methodology of our study, this community is not identified as a cluster."
Investigators found that from 2000 to 2010, 634 people in the neighborhood were diagnosed with 693 cancers. However, the patients' ages and types of cancer were consistent with what is seen across the state, CBS Miami reports.
Even so, Miami-Dade Commissioner Jean Monestime, who was part of the effort to secure an investigation, said in a statement that "this information is troubling and bears further investigation," according to Local 10, noting that Broadmoor's rates of stomach cancer are higher than average.
The investigation did not look into cases from 2011 to the present, as such data is not available in the Florida Cancer Data System, Miami New Times reports.
When Broadmoor residents reached out to the commission with fears of a cancer cluster, they mentioned that eight neighbors had died recently and a ninth was close to death.
The neighborhood has been pointing the finger at King Metal Recycling Plant, which abuts the area and is blocks from an Amtrak station and an elementary school.
In August, Monestime and fellow commissioner Barbara J. Jordan co-sponsored a resolution to bring the investigators to South Florida, feeling that there was an "unusually high number of residents" with cancer in the neighborhood.
According to CBS Miami, the county ordered King Metal to stop operations until a wall is built around the entire plant.