Victoria Gillet: From patient care to community advocacy: Why a Milwaukee physician is fighting against toxic gas plants

The column below reflects the views of the author, and these opinions are neither endorsed nor supported by WisOpinion.com.

I am a primary care physician in Milwaukee. I chose this profession to help people who are suffering, but I’ve learned that my ability to heal extends only so far within the walls of my exam room.

During the day, I work one-on-one with patients to manage their diabetes, asthma, and high blood pressure, and in the evenings, I fight to build healthier communities for them to live in.

Stopping the Oak Creek gas plant is part of that fight.

Burning gas releases a toxic mixture of particulate matter, nitrogen oxides, ozone, and dozens of other harmful pollutants into the air. These pollutants damage every organ system in the body and worsen almost every disease.

Yes, coal pollution is even more dangerous. But as a physician, I would never prescribe a treatment simply because it’s less harmful than the worst option, not when better, safer choices exist.

And thank goodness, we do have better choices. Wind, solar, batteries, geothermal, and advances in energy efficiency offer clean, safe ways to power our future. These are not far-off dreams; other states are already taking advantage of these technologies, and they are not only effective, but they create good-paying jobs and can help lower bills.

We Energies has been telling reporters that they “ran the numbers” and concluded that Wisconsin must build this enormous new gas plant. That there’s “no other choice.”

Unfortunately for them, I’m a primary care doctor, and that means I have a finely tuned radar for corporate excuses, and I know when health is being pushed aside for greed. It is the same greed I see every day, battling insurance companies who try to tell me and my patients that safe, effective medications aren’t an option. That “the numbers” say we have no choice but to accept second-rate treatments — treatments that everyone in the medical field knows don’t work well and come with terrible side effects, because it saves the insurance company money.

The truth is, health insurance companies and utility companies operate on the same playbook: they should be working for the public good, but their primary loyalty is to their shareholders and their bottom line.

We Energies makes far more profit from gas plants than from solar panels. And when that gas plant makes people sick, they lose nothing.

And make no mistake, this gas plant will make people sick.

Independent analysis shows the Oak Creek gas plant would cause around 700 new cases of asthma, 60 heart attacks, 250 emergency room visits, and 200 premature deaths over its lifetime and $92-144 million in health costs every year.

But these aren’t just statistics, these are human beings.

These are people like my patient Sammy, a retired neighbor who loves helping others by mowing lawns, but who went to the ER three times last summer because bad air quality triggered his asthma.

Or, Rachel, who recently moved to Milwaukee from rural Minnesota, and started experiencing asthma symptoms for the first time in a decade. She had to stop exercising, and just this week, I started her on an inhaler.

As a physician, it is my responsibility to save lives and prevent disease.

As a utility company, We Energies’ responsibility is to maximize profits for shareholders.

As a regulatory body, the Public Service Commission has a responsibility to ensure our public utilities serve the public good.

I urge the commission to use that regulatory power. Deny the approval of We Energies’ $2 billion fossil fuel grab because the Oak Creek and Paris gas plants, a liquified natural gas facility, and new gas pipelines are not in the public’s best interest.

It is an unnecessary, dangerous addition to Wisconsin’s electricity grid that will harm the health of our communities.

Wisconsin deserves better.

Dr. Victoria Gillet is a primary care physician and the Director for the Primary Care Track in an Internal Medicine Residency. She earned her Doctor of Medicine (MD) from the University of Chicago Pritzer School of Medicine and completed her residency in Internal Medicine at the University of Wisconsin.