KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Congressman Sam Graves is calling on Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to review a “concerning number” of cancer cases at an elementary school in Liberty.
Graves’ letter, dated May 12, references six staff members at Warren Hills Elementary School who have been diagnosed with breast cancer since 2013. Another staff member died from liver cancer in the fall of 2024.
LINK | Read Graves' letter
“That’s an unbelievable and unimaginable amount of tragedy for an elementary school with fewer than 650 students and 40 teachers to experience over such a short time,” Graves (R-6th District, Missouri) wrote in the letter.
The incidents have been the focus of reporting in recent weeks from the "Kansas City Star."
The issue originally caught the eye of state regulators in 2015, when the Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services performed a radon study. The study found no issues of concern.
Seven years later, in 2022, the Clay County Public Health Department conducted a public health study that did not show any evidence that the cancer rate at the school was higher than expected.
The Liberty School District created a section of its website to help the community learn more about the issue and various studies and reviews published since 2013.
Despite those two studies and other reviews, Graves said "many parents, teachers and staff members have concerns that these analyses were not sufficient and thorough enough to explain the large number of cancer diagnoses at the school.”
“I firmly believe that you and your agency are the best hope we have at getting to the bottom of this and getting these folks the answers they need,” Graves said in the letter to RFK Jr. and the HHS.
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