Potential elevated cancer risk For the Gills, that answer came in July 2019 while watching the local news about an online article written by WebMD and Georgia Health News, which uncovered a 2018 report by the Environmental Protection Agency called the National Air Toxics Assessment. It used 2014 data and new calculations to identify 109 areas in the U.S. which showed potentially elevated cancer risk. Most of the risk was driven by ethylene oxide. Until that moment, the Gills had never heard of ethylene oxide. “I’m still not 100 percent sure what it is other than it’s a carcinogenic chemical,” Roxanne said.