E-mails: Snyder aide was told of Legionnaires' in March

LANSING — An aide in the office of Gov. Rick Snyder was notified in March — more than nine months before Snyder said he learned of the problem — that there was an increase in Legionnaires' disease in Genesee County and a county health official attributed the change to drinking water taken from the Flint River, according to records released Thursday by the liberal group Progress Michigan.

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Former Department of Environmental Quality Communications Director Brad Wurfel sent the e-mail on March 13, 2015, to Harvey Hollins, who is Snyder's director of urban initiatives. It was copied to Dan Wyant, who was DEQ director at the time.

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"More than 40 cases reported since last April," Wurfel said in the e-mail. "That's a significant uptick. More than all the cases reported in the last five years or more combined."

Wurfel said that Jim Henry of the Genesee County Health Department is "putting up the flare," and has "made the  leap formally in his e-mail that the uptick in cases is directly attributable to the river as a drinking water source."

Snyder's office issued a statement late Thursday that said the e-mail from the DEQ also said linking the outbreak to the river water was "premature" and "beyond irresponsible."

Hollins asked the DEQ to check into the report to determine if it was credible, and Snyder "was not briefed on this issue until January 2016," the statement said.

Critics were skeptical.

“For months the public has been asking Gov. Snyder what he knew and when he knew it regarding the Flint crisis and this e-mail shows that one of his top aides was aware nearly a year ago that county health officials were concerned that the switch to the Flint River could be potentially deadly,” said Lonnie Scott, executive director of Progress Michigan.

On Jan. 13, Snyder disclosed that water from the Flint River could be linked to two outbreaks of Legionnaire's disease in Genesee County. He said he'd been told about the public health problem just a few days earlier.

Brandon Dillon, chairman of the Michigan Democratic Party, for the first time called on Snyder to resign. Dillon said in a news release that Snyder "is either a victim of the culture of secrecy that he created or he’s lying."

"There is a limit to how many times you can play dumb when it comes to events and actions that take place on your watch," Dillon said.

"It is time for him to resign."

Snyder has said repeatedly he has no plans to resign and instead wants to work to fix the lead and health problems in Flint.

Flint's drinking water became contaminated with lead in April 2014 after the city, while under the control of a state-appointed emergency manager, switched its drinking water source from Lake Huron water supplied by the Detroit Water and Sewerage Department to Flint River water treated at the Flint treatment plant. The DEQ failed to require the addition of needed corrosion-control chemicals, resulting in lead leaching from pipes, joints and fixtures into an unknown number of Flint households. Lead causes brain damage and other health problems especially for children. The more recent concern is that the river water could also be behind the Legionnnaires' cases.

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There were at least 87 cases across Genesee County during a 17-month period, including nine deaths, but the public was never told about the increase when it was happening — even after an initial wave of more than 40 cases was known by early 2015.

“The increase of the illnesses closely corresponds with the time frame of the switch to the Flint River water. The majority of the cases reside or have an association with the city,” Henry, Genesee County’s environmental health supervisor, wrote March 10 to Flint leaders, the city’s state-appointed emergency financial manager and the state DEQ.

“This situation has been explicitly explained to MDEQ and many of the city’s officials,” Henry said in the e-mail that was forwarded by the DEQ to a Snyder aide three days later. “I want to make sure in writing that there are no misunderstandings regarding this significant and urgent public health issue.”

Legionnaires’ disease is a pneumonia caused by bacteria in the lungs. People get sick if they inhale mist or vapor from contaminated water systems, hot tubs or cooling systems.

The back and forth behind the scenes occurred while residents were complaining about poor water quality, even before lead contamination became an extraordinary health emergency roughly six months later.

The emails reveal tension between the county health department, which was on the front line of the Legionnaires’ outbreak, and the city and state about how to investigate the disease. The e-mails also show some angst in the Snyder administration over the controversy.

Both Wyant and Wurfel resigned on Dec. 29.

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Murray, citing the large executive office staff, said this week that the Republican governor only learned about the Legionnaires’ outbreak days before he publicly disclosed it — despite Hollins being flagged about  it 10 months earlier. Snyder’s former chief of staff, Dennis Muchmore, has said neither he nor Snyder knew but they should have been told earlier.

“Important information flow isn’t always forthcoming,” he said in mid-January on WKAR-TV’s “Off The Record” show.

Scott said the e-mails expose “another glaring example of Gov. Snyder saying one thing and e-mails really revealing something different.”

His group, which has asked Snyder to release staff e-mails that are exempt from the Freedom of Information Act, is still reviewing thousands of pages of state e-mails related to Flint’s water.

On March 12, Stephen Busch, a DEQ district supervisor, wrote back to Henry and challenged his assertion that the DEQ had declined to meet since being initially informed in October 2014 about a rise in Legionnaires’ cases. Busch said the department never was asked for a meeting, but he agreed a multi-agency partnership would be beneficial moving forward.

“Conclusions that legionella is coming from the public water system without the presentation of any substantiating evidence from your epidemiologic investigation appears premature and prejudice (sic) toward that end,” Busch wrote.

Janet Stout, a Pittsburgh microbiologist and expert on Legionnaires’ disease who has researched links between Legionella bacteria and public water supplies, believes the Flint River caused an increase in Genesee County Legionnaires’ cases.

“The county was alerting and alarmed and seeking cooperation and help from outside agencies,” Stout told the AP. “What I read tells me they did not get much help for various reasons.”

The state Department of Health and Human Services had already begun assisting the county in the fall of 2014, and the Legionnaires’ investigation had become “very intensive” in early 2015, said Dr. Eden Wells, Michigan’s chief medical executive.

Because Legionnaries’ disease is not transferred person to person, efforts to fight it are focused on determining sources of infection and notifying doctors so they have the option of doing a special test, Wells said.

About half of the cases had an “association” with a Flint hospital in the two weeks prior to their illness, Wells said. McLaren Hospital spent more than $300,000 on a water treatment system, banned showers and also turned to bottled water for patients.

The state has said it cannot conclude that the Legionnaires’ surge is related to the water switch, nor can it rule it out, in part because of too few case specimens from patients.

The first wave of 45 cases was commonly known within the state health department, Wells said, but the agency did not take the information to the governor until confirming a second wave of 42 cases and analyzing them together.

Melanie McElroy, executive director of Common Cause in Michigan, said the latest disclosure illustrates why the governor's office exemption from the Michigan Freedom of Information Act must be removed.

"The only way that the people of this state will have faith in the information he provides is if he becomes fully transparent and accountable," McElroy said.

Contact Paul Egan: 517-372-8660 or pegan@freepress.com. Follow him on Twitter @paulegan4. The Associated Press contributed to this report.