AAMJIWNAANG FIRST NATION, Ont. -- The people of the Aamjiwnaang First Nation know they make up a statistic that has raised eyebrows around the world, but the bigger concern is the chemical plants they are living with.

The birthrate ratio of boys to girls normally falls close to an even split. In Aamjiwnaang, two girls are being born for every boy -- a scientific anomaly that has stunned researchers.

Visitors to this reserve near Sarnia, Ont., are struck by the sight of dozens of massive industrial facilities spewing out smoke and their close proximity to the First Nations community of about 850.

Residents live in an area known as "chemical valley" -- Canada's largest cluster of chemical, allied manufacturing and research and development facilities -- and co-exist with smoke stacks and nauseating smells that carry with the wind.

The girl-boy ratio anomaly has been the subject of international study, most recently in an article published in Environmental Health Perspectives based on the work of researchers from the U.S. and Japan.

"To our knowledge, this is a more significantly reduced sex ratio and greater rate of change than has been reported previously anywhere," the study reads.

"We got blue skies and there doesn't seem to be anything wrong with where I'm sitting. But when I zero in on [the skewed birthrate and the nearby chemical plants] I ask myself: How long is my life going to last? Will I be hit with cancer?"

The phenomenon snuck up on everyone a few years ago. They were surprised to learn there were enough girls in the community to field three baseball teams while there would be only one boys' squad.

Lockridge thought of her own family -- her two sisters have nine kids between them, of which there's only one boy -- and started to get worried.

"We always said that the air stinks, but we never thought about what it could be doing to our health. We just thought somebody was watching out for us."

"Literally, [the chemical plants] are on the other side of the street," Miller said, adding that in other communities there would likely be a 300-metre zone between residential and industrial areas.

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