Program won't cover 9/11 responders for cancer - CNN.com
Rescue workers search for survivors in the rubble of the World Trade Center in New York.New York (CNN) -- Workers who were involved in the response to the World Trade Center attack will not have their cancer treatments compensated under a program set up after September 11, according to a controversial decision released Tuesday by the World Trade Center Health Program.There is inadequate "published scientific and medical findings" that a causal link exists between September 11 exposures and the occurrence of cancer in responders and survivors, program Administrator John Howard said in a statement.
The decision forms part of the first periodic review of what the James Zadroga 9/11 Health and Compensation Act will provide.
After a lengthy battle, President Obama signed the $4.2 billion legislation in January to provide health care for those who helped clear the rubble and search for human remains at the World Trade Center site in New York. [...]
Full article at cnn.com
We seem to make a habit in this country of putting on very high pedestals people who fulfill the duties of dangerous jobs well (military veterans, firefighters, police officers, rescue workers, so on and so forth)... and then leaving them there. We praise them endlessly but forget about treating them with decency or even seeing that their needs are met when it comes down to nuts and bolts. Maybe that's how we avoid the actual dealing with the problems presented when we have too many people who've had to do too much dangerous stuff for too long, which is generally a direct result anyway of careless stewardship on the part of a society and it's government (meaning the people of which the society is made up at every level) and the decay of the mechanisms driving it. Anyway, I'd like to hear less empty praise and see more direct support of and care for those who've been ground up in the teeth of the machine and spit out at the top of some ivory tower.
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