ABSTRACT
The potential for hazardous wastes to cause health damage to exposed human populations requires epidemiologic investigations to assess relationships between toxic exposure and possible health consequences, clinical or subclinical. Unfortunately, the classical application of epidemiology is made difficult under a myriad of methodologic complications and uncertainties related to both exposure and health outcome assessment. A particularly problematic feature of all health effects evaluations at hazardous waste sites is the sheer diversity in which toxic wastes and human exposures can be involved. Such diversity not only prohibits the development of a unified analytic approach to exposure and health outcome assessment but also prevents the generalization of statistical inferences drawn about a specific waste site exposed population.
