Vampire freak hits close to home

Dallas Hansen

September 16, 2006

It's been five years now since the World Trade Center was attacked and destroyed. On that day, 2,973 people died, and a giant wound opened up in lower Manhattan, bleeding asbestos, lead, Fiberglas, antimony, mercury, benzene, dioxin and many other toxins into the air.

The toxic dust moved uptown, even past 14th Street; it moved across the East River, landing throughout downtown Brooklyn. The first responders -- those police, firefighters, and emergency medical technicians who rushed to the rescue effort -- inhaled the dirty dust, as did those who worked at Ground Zero in subsequent months. Now it appears that thousands of people who worked and lived in lower Manhattan may be looking at lifelong health problems, even early deaths, resulting from their contamination, despite the federal government's quick assurances that the air was safe.

On Sept. 16, 2001, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (and ex-New Jersey governor) administrator Christine Todd Whitman declared: "Our tests show that it is safe for New Yorkers to go back to work in New York's financial district." But a recent study -- the largest ever done about 9/11 health effects -- at Manhattan's Mount Sinai Medical Center has found that 70 per cent of rescue workers at Ground Zero have respiratory problems that began after Sept. 11. And, according to Dr. Jaqueline Moline, the study's co-author, 38 per cent of the nearly 10,000 people who took part in the Mount Sinai study have no health insurance, while 42 per cent are under-insured.

Yet another recent report, by the Sierra Club, a renowned American environmental organization, points the blame at the top.

"The Bush administration," claims a Sierra Club press release, "knew the health risks and ignored its own long-standing body of knowledge about the harmful products of incineration and demolition. It should have issued a health warning immediately on that basis.

"The people affected by Ground Zero pollution include not only those who worked directly on the pile, but also workers who restored cable and electricity, fixed windows in area buildings, cleaned up debris in the streets and buildings, as well as residents, employees, schoolchildren and business owners."

And now the EPA is getting sued. A class-action lawsuit earlier this year on behalf of Brooklyn and Manhattan residents got the go-ahead from New York District Court Judge Deborah Batts, who described Whitman's Sept. 16 statements as so "deliberate and misleading" that they "shock the conscience."

There are innumerable stories of New York City residents who are today suffering, and no shortage of doctors who blame 9-11 particles for their patients' troubles.

Jo Polett, 54, of Duane Street in downtown Manhattan, notes: "I had no visible dust in my home, but I still got sick." Lab analysis of her apartment showed it was contaminated with WTC dust, which included high levels of lead and antimony. Mariama James, of Gold Street, just a few blocks east of Ground Zero, watched helplessly as dust began to invade her apartment. First came a sharp pain in her chest, followed by cysts that appeared from her face to her groin, then respiratory problems that affected her and her children, now 4, 14 and 20. (She was pregnant at the time of the attacks.). Her husband, out of town for months before and after 9-11, has no such symptoms. On Sept. 5, 2006, in a ruling that was the first of its kind, a New Jersey coroner declared the death of a police officer James Zardoga, who worked at Ground Zero and died in January, was "directly linked" to 9-11.

Mayor Michael Bloomberg has responded, inviting those still suffering from 9-11-related ailments to seek treatment at the city's Bellevue Hospital. Last Thursday, U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Michael Levitt pledged an initial $75 million for treatment of illnesses related to 9-11.

This is too little, too late to the New Yorkers who were, at best, ineptly misinformed and at worst were flatly lied to when the EPA declared lower Manhattan safe just days after the WTC complex had been turned into what might have been the worst toxic waste site in human history. Too many of these men, women, and children -- including the many heroes who provided emergency services at the scene -- have suffered for years, enduring denials and dismissals that their ailments had anything to do with 9-11, insufficient health-care coverage, and the suffering that comes with restricted breathing capacity, or kidney failure, or skin diseases, or any number of ill effects.

Even if, five years ago on Sept. 11, the U.S. government failed to stop the disaster that led to the WTC's destruction, it could have prevented the subsequent disaster that was the mass exposure of the New York City population to dangerous toxins from the dust. Workers at Ground Zero could have had proper safety equipment, such as masks. Instead of the EPA telling downtown residents to dust their apartments with a wet rag, lower Manhattan could have been thoroughly and properly decontaminated before being reopened.

None of this happened, despite speculation from the beginning that the dust would be highly detrimental to human health. And now, five years later, a second round of WTC-9-11 casualties looms, and the slowly mounting death toll could easily surpass that of Sept. 11, 2001.

www.dallashansen.com

Category: Editorial and Opinions
Uniform subject(s): Terrorism and assassinations
Length: Long, 733 words

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