DECEMBER

• Fiterman hope ... I am writing in reference to your recent editorial entitled “Pataki’s Downtown legacy” (Dec. 22 - 28). While you correctly point out that, under Governor Pataki’s leadership, “deadlines to demolish the former Deutsche Bank building and Fiterman Hall were missed” the editorial goes on to say that “the Fiterman project’s beginning remains in doubt.” I am rather hopeful that this is not the case. Earlier this fall, I convened several meetings in my office with the key players involved in the demolition of Fiterman Hall. They included the chancellor of CUNY (which owns the building), officials from the Environmental Protection Agency (which must approve all plans), as well as the chairperson of Community Board 1 and our other local elected officials. I am pleased to report that this project is now squarely back on track and CUNY is now working closely with E.P.A. officials on finalizing a plan to deconstruct the Fiterman Hall building. I believe that we have used these meetings to convince both CUNY and the E.P.A. of the importance of moving this project forward in an expeditious manner and to also do so in a way that insures the safety of local residents and workers. I am also overseeing the creation of a Fiterman Hall Community Advisory Committee to work closely with CUNY, E.P.A. and others involved in this project to insure that the community is fully involved with and informed of all the plans. ... Dr. John O. Agwunobi, the assistant secretary for health at the Department of Health and Human Services, made no commitments other than promising to convey the urgency of the matter to Michael O. Leavitt, the department’s secretary, according to several participants in the meeting, which was not open to the public. Dr. Agwunobi and Dr. John Howard, the director of the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, which prepared the estimate, are co-chairmen of a task force appointed by Mr. Leavitt to examine 9/11 health issues. Holly Babin, a spokeswoman for the Department of Health and Human Services, said yesterday that she was not familiar with the estimate and that several approaches were being considered. “The task force is to come up with a number of different options and models,” she wrote in an e-mail message, adding that it was looking at a variety of approaches and preparing cost estimates for each. ...(Letters to the Editor, Silver, Dec. 29, 2006-Jan.4, 2007)
  
• WTC hero wins health coverage ... Crippled 9/11 hero Vito Valenti's lungs were terminally scarred at Ground Zero, but the injury couldn't stop him from seeing justice finally done this week. For months, the volunteer who was among the first into the World Trade Center's toxic cloud has been relying on the generosity of strangers for vital medicine and oxygen he couldn't afford. On Wednesday, he heard a judge order his health costs covered - putting an end to the wearying legal battle.... Valenti, 42, from Elmont, L.I., inhaled the asbestos and chemical-laden dust at Ground Zero as he answered a call for help in the two days after 9/11. A hacking cough he developed eight months later was eventually diagnosed as pulmonary fibrosis - a scarring of the lungs so severe that without a transplant, he could expect to live for only five to six years. He had to quit his job as a union rep with District Council 37. With it went his health benefits. Technicalities in the workers' compensation system stopped him - like many suffering because of their bravery that day - from claiming coverage. The system, designed for everyday workplace injuries, had a two-year deadline for claims to be made. By the time Valenti's illness was evident, that deadline had passed. He has been forced to rely on donations from medical companies, doctors and members of the public moved to help. But on Wednesday, a judge ruled changes to the law made by Gov. Pataki in August after the Daily News highlighted Valenti's plight, and that of many like him, made him eligible. .... (NYDaily News, by Adam Nichols, Dec. 22, 2006)
• The Year At The World Trade Center Site: Health Concerns Plague 9/11 First Responders ... A staggering 70-percent of World Trade Center first responders are suffering from respiratory problems. In September, Mount Sinai Hospital released a groundbreaking study on the health of the firefighters, police officers, construction, and transit workers who responded to the terror attacks. "I have burnt lungs,” said WTC responder John Graham. “I have asthma, reactive airway disease, gastric reflux, post-traumatic stress and a host of other things." One of the more striking findings was that among those who had no health problems before September 11th, 2001, 61-percent developed symptoms after exposure. "There should no longer be any doubt about the health effects of the World Trade Center,” said Dr. Robin Herbert of Mount Sinai. “Our patients are sick and will need on-going health monitoring and treatment for the rest of their lives." Mayor Michael Bloomberg said it was too soon to draw that conclusion. Still, the city opened an environmental health center at Bellevue Hospital for those first responders and anyone who felt they were suffering from the effects of the dust they inhaled after the attacks. And the state government also did its part to contribute to the health of 9/11 first responders. Earlier, Governor George Pataki signed legislation giving full line of duty benefits to the family of any firefighter, police officer, or uniformed person who dies of a 9/11-related illness. ... But the fallout from the attacks continued, this time in court, as more than 8,000 workers were represented in a federal lawsuit that alleges the city failed to properly protect them from toxic dust and debris after the terror attacks. The plaintiffs include police officers, firefighters, and EMTs. “Yesterday I got a phone call from an electrician whose husband died of stomach cancer,” explained the plaintiffs’ attorney, David Worby. “And three days earlier we got another call from a relative of someone who died from throat and tongue cancer. Those people were given zero protection." ...(NY1, by Rebecca Spitz, Dec. 20, 2006)
  
• Money to Treat 9/11 Workers Will Run Out, Officials Say ... The roughly $40 million that was set aside by the federal government to treat rescue workers, volunteers and firefighters who became ill after helping with the 9/11 cleanup and recovery will run out in months, physicians and federal officials said yesterday. Members of Congress from New York and New Jersey secured $75 million a year ago to pay for health care expenses -- including $40 million for treatments like drugs and medical procedures -- for about 32,000 workers who reported ailments after working at ground zero. Distribution of the treatment money did not begin in earnest until October. Officials at the two major monitoring and treatment programs, one run by Mount Sinai Medical Center and the other by the Fire Department, said yesterday that at the current spending rate, the treatment money would run out by spring or summer. They told top federal health officials that unless more financing was provided, they would be forced to notify thousands of patients that their treatment could soon end.... (NYTimes, by Sewell Chan, Dec. 19, 2006)
• Registration To Begin for EPA's Next Cleaning ... Downtown residents who are worried about residual World Trade Center dust will get one last chance to have their homes tested and cleaned, the federal Environmental Protection Agency announced. The plan, almost identical to one that was announced by the agency to widespread criticism a year ago, will cover the area below Canal Street and west of Allen Street. A 60-day registration will begin in mid-January 2007. (For more information go to www.epa.gov/wtc/testandclean.) ... Last year, the EPA’s expert technical review panel had recommended that a “signature dust” be identified and used for sampling in a wide geographic area in order to determine if there is in fact still World Trade Center dust in homes and workplaces. The EPA rejected that idea after a peer review group said it was impossible to conclusively identify contaminants as having come from the World Trade Center collapse. At the urging of panel members, the EPA said, they have spent the past year reexamining the possibility of a signature dust and again concluded that it was not feasible. .... Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, a consistent critic of the EPA’s handling of the environmental impact from the towers’ collapse, said she will use her chairmanship of the Senate Subcommittee on Superfund and Environmental Health to pursue a more expansive testing plan. "The EPA has now acknowledged that additional testing is necessary, but the program announced today is totally inadequate,” she said in a Dec. 6 statement. ... (Tribeca Trib, by Etta Sanders, Dec. 18, 2006)
  
• Clinton demands federal funding for 9/11 health woes ... Senator Hillary Clinton is putting new pressure on the White House to address health concerns of ground zero workers. Senator Clinton says the program that monitors and treats 9/11 first responders and workers could run out of money by this summer. She wants President Bush to put more money into the program when he presents his next budget. "We are worried that the medical treatment that has begun, finally, after years of effort and many obstacles along the way will run out of money starting this summer," Clinton said, "so that the people who are finally being treated for the many symptoms of their chronic conditions due to 9/11 exposures will once again be left out in the cold." With Democrats controlling Congress, Senator Clinton says there will be hearings into how the administration has responded to 9/11 health concerns. (WABC, Dec. 28, 2006)
  
• Monday For 9/11 First responder Health Care Running Out ... Local lawmakers say the federal money used to pay the medical bills for September 11th first responders is running out. Legislators met with federal health officials today, who told them that government funding will run dry as early as this spring. The legislators are calling for the president to add short term funds to this year's budget to keep the program going. "I am very disappointed with the progress," said Senator Hillary Clinton. "I've been to numerous meetings like the one we just attended. I've heard all of the assurances from the administration time and time again. It is time for action." "We don't ask for anything above board," said sick first responder John Sferazo. "All we're asking for is just give us what you promised; that's all we want." Lawmakers have also introduced legislation that calls for $1.9 billion of long-term federal aid to address the on-going health concerns. (NY1, Dec. 18, 2006)
  
• After labor dispute, all workers back on job at WTC skyscraper ... Workers resumed removing the facade of a contaminated skyscraper near the World Trade Center site on Monday after a contract dispute that stopped the dismantling almost as soon as it began.Workers for the John Galt Co. left the former Deutsche Bank AG building at midday Dec. 11 after one full day of taking the glass and metal facade off the skyscraper's top floors. The building's main contractor, Bovis Lend Lease, said the company needed to negotiate ongoing contract issues with the Lower Manhattan Development Corp. rebuilding agency.... (NYMetro/AP, Dec. 18, 2006)
  
• Workers walk at Deutsche ... The delay-plagued removal of the former Deutsche Bank building at 130 Liberty St. hit yet another bizarre snag this week as a subcontractor pulled its workers off the site just days after deconstruction had begun. On Dec. 8, with final permits in place, workers began removing windows and exterior facades from the building in a process the Lower Manhattan Construction Command Center called a “prelude” to structural deconstruction. On Dec. 11, however, workers from the John Galt Co., hired by primary contractor Bovis Lend Lease to assist in the deconstruction, walked off the site. Though the Construction Center would not comment on the reasons for the walk-out, the New York Daily News reported Wednesday that Galt is asking for $30 million in additional funding to complete the job. Bob Harvey of the L.M.C.C.C. did say that the parties were currently negotiating and that Bovis, as lead contractor, was ultimately responsible for bringing its subcontractors back to the site. ... Based on the current schedule, the window and façade removal would continue until early January, when the floor-by-floor deconstruction of the building would begin. The deconstruction is slated for completion in December 2007. The cost estimate for the purchase of the building and demolition is $207 million. ... (Downtown Express, by Skye H. McFarlane, Dec. 15-21, 2006)
  
• OP-ED: A Fair Deal for 9/11's Injured ... FIVE years have passed since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, but the flood of litigation continues unabated in federal court in Manhattan. Some 6,000 people are suing New York City, the Port Authority and more than 100 private contractors for negligence in exposing workers to toxic dust and fumes after the collapse of the World Trade Center. Thousands of additional claims are expected in the next few months. Waiting in the wings are approximately 40,000 workers who cleaned up the site after Sept. 11, as well as residents of Lower Manhattan, observers of the cleanup effort and people who simply breathed the harmful air on their way to work — all potential litigants. Some will probably eventually suffer the same ailments that have led to the current lawsuits. The federal judge presiding over the lawsuits has urged settlement, warning that continuing the litigation is inefficient, expensive and risky to all parties. The mere existence of thousands of lawsuits fuels uncertainty and delays the payment of compensation to eligible victims. ... The federal Sept. 11 Victim Compensation Fund, which I oversaw, paid more than $7 billion in public compensation to the families of those who died in the World Trade Center attacks and to injured survivors. Of that, about $500 million went to more than 1,300 recovery workers and others suffering from the same respiratory injuries that now plague those in the courtroom. Since none of these 6,000 people who have filed lawsuits received diagnoses of 9/11-related injuries until after the fund’s filing deadline of Dec. 22, 2003, they were ineligible for compensation. So, reluctantly, they have turned to the courts. There is a better way: use the principles of the 9/11 fund as a blueprint to resolve the current litigation and get money into the hands of recovery workers and others quickly. More than $1 billion in public funds is currently available for distribution as part of the initial federal appropriation earmarked for New York City’s 9/11 recovery. If you add financial contributions from those contractors and others involved in the litigation, and supplement that with funds from various city charities, a total of at least $1.5 billion is available to settle the pending lawsuits — more than sufficient to pay all eligible claims, as well as lawyers’ fees and costs. Eligibility for compensation under the settlement would require proof that the victim was in the general proximity of the World Trade Center during the cleanup period. Each claimant would also supply medical documentation of an illness caused by exposure to harmful air at the site (the medical criteria would be negotiated as part of the settlement to avoid a rush of spurious claims). .... New York City and the other defendants would not admit they were at fault for these injuries; they would merely agree to use available funds to pay all documented claims. (It remains an open question whether the defendants are legally responsible for such injuries.) Up to half of this money should be set aside to pay for claims stemming from future diagnoses of injuries caused by breathing the toxic air. As with the 9/11 fund, the neediest victims, those without a financial safety net, should be the priority. Firefighters, police officers and other uniformed responders at the World Trade Center already receive benefits from pension and health insurance policies, and these amounts should be subtracted from any payments made as a result of the settlement. Funds received by eligible claimants would be used primarily for medical monitoring and other health-related services. And, just as the 9/11 fund should be viewed as a unique public policy response to an unprecedented national calamity, so, too, would this settlement be considered a one-time solution to all remaining physical injury claims occurring at the World Trade Center. It is unlikely that such a settlement would expose New York City and others to future demands for similar compensation. The defendants and the court could make clear that the settlement was achieved only because of the existence of available funds and the unparalleled nature of the attack. In any event, concern about future legal liability is no excuse for refusing to act now in compensating victims in distress. ... (NYTimes, by Kenneth R. Feinberg, Dec. 14, 2006)
  
• Talks end on bank demolition ... The obstacle-prone effort to demolish the damaged former Deutsche Bank tower at Ground Zero remained stalled yesterday as negotiations over a contract dispute were cut off. The teardown effort, deemed critical to rebuilding the former World Trade Center site, came to a virtual standstill Monday when most of the demolition and cleanup crew working for subcontractor John Galt Co. walked off the job. "Right now there are no negotiations," said Kori-Anne Taylor, a spokeswoman for the state Lower Manhattan Development Corp., the agency overseeing the project. Sources told the Daily News that Galt and the prime contractor on the job, Bovis Lend-Lease, want to increase their contract from $33 million to $63 million. ... (Daily News, by Greg B. Smith, Dec. 14, 2006)
  
• 13,000 Have Finished Follow-Up to WTC Health Registry ... The city health department says 13,000 people have finished a follow-up survey for the World Trade Center health registry, but officials are hoping even more people will come forward. A total of 71,000 people are enrolled in the program, which tracks the mental and physical health of different groups affected by the attacks. The registry will continue to compile information for the next few months before the findings are released to the public. Officials have stressed that information on specific survivors will be kept confidential. To find out more about the study, or to add your updated information call (866) 692-9827 or log onto WTCHealthRegistry.org. (NY1, Dec. 14, 2006)
  
• Feinberg Recommends 2nd Fund For 9/11 Toxin Victims ... The man who helped dole out federal money to September 11, 2001 victims' families said Thursday he has a similar plan to give out money for people who were exposed to toxins after the attacks. In an op-ed to the New York Times, former Victims Compensation Fund Special Master Kenneth Feinberg says a second fund is needed to save the courts from tens of thousands of lawsuits. Feinberg suggests a second victims’ account might settle lawsuits and pay victims more quickly. He says much of the money could come from $1 billion in public funds already set aside for New York's recovery. Most of the current plaintiffs were not eligible for payouts from the first fund because they were not diagnosed with health problems by the 2003 deadline. (NY1, Dec. 14, 2006)
  
• More than 13,000 World Trade Center Health Registry Enrollees have completed their follow-up survery in the past three weeks ... (NYCDOHMH News Release, Dec. 14, 2006)
• Crews Resume Demolition Work On Deutsche Bank Building ... A company hired to tear down the contaminated Deutsche Bank building returned to work on the site today after walking off the job Monday. The Lower Manhattan Development Corporation calls the job action by subcontractor John Galt Company, a "minor work stoppage." The agency says it was in contract negotiations with contractor Bovis Lend Lease when Galt workers walked off the job. Demolition on the 40 story tower began last Thursday. (NY1, 12/13/06)
  
• Bank tower work's halted in pay dispute ...The company hired to demolish the former Deutsche Bank tower at Ground Zero walked off the job this week after demanding its $33 million contract be nearly doubled, the Daily News has learned. The job shutdown by subcontractor John Galt Co., which began Monday and continued yesterday, is yet another hitch in the long-delayed removal of the tower. Officials fear the move could have a domino effect and slow rebuilding at the site. Galt is claiming it greatly underestimated the cost of the job, according to three sources familiar with the matter. The 40-story tower at 130 Liberty St. was badly damaged on 9/11 and is contaminated with toxic dust. In the past two weeks, Galt and the job's prime contractor, Bovis Lend Lease, have been trying to get millions more to tear down the building by fall of next year as scheduled, the sources said. Yesterday, for the first time, the Lower Manhattan Development Corp. acknowledged it was discussing amending the contract but declined to discuss dollar figures. The sources said Bovis, acting on behalf of Galt, has asked for $30 million more than the $33million contract for the demolition work. The LMDC already spent $90 million to buy the ruined building from Deutsche Bank in 2004. In response to an inquiry by The News, the LMDC called the walkoff a "work stoppage" that was "impairing progress at the 130 Liberty site which is essential to the redevelopment of the World Trade Center site." ... (NYDaily News, by Paul D. COlford and Greg B. Smith, Dec. 13, 2006)
  
• Many WTC Workers Stop Work Over Dispute ... Most of the workers cleaning and taking down a vacant damaged skyscraper near the World Trade Center site walked off the job this week in a contract dispute, one day after the long-awaited dismantling of the building began, officials overseeing the project said.Some of the John Galt Co. employees left work at the former Deutsche Bank AG building at noon on Monday, said Kori-Ann Taylor, spokeswoman for the Lower Manhattan Development Corp., the rebuilding agency that owns the building. "We are not continuing negotiations until all the workers are back on the job," said Taylor. The workers had been cleaning toxic materials from the 41-story building's lower floors and helping to remove the metal and glass facade on the top floors. ... But Mary Costello, a spokeswoman for Bovis Lend Lease LMB Inc., said Wednesday that the Bovis team managing the job remained at the building and said 15 to 20 Galt workers have remained at the building since Monday. "The job has not been shut down," Costello said. Costello said the company wants "to resolve open issues concerning claims for additional compensation for extra work." Taylor wasn't sure how much work was accomplished on Wednesday but said about 200 people are normally on the job. A John Galt Co. executive didn't return a telephone message seeking comment Wednesday. (Newsday/AP, Dec. 13, 2006)
  
• 85 Percent of Highway Diesel Fuel Meets EPA Standards ...  New, cleaner diesel fuel is producing cleaner air, according to preliminary surveys and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).  Surveys of retail stations since mid-October show that about 85 percent of highway diesel fuel meets Ultra Low Sulfur Diesel (ULSD) standards, exceeding the 80 percent regulatory mandate. 100 percent of highway diesel fuel must meet the ULSD standards by 2010. ... EPA is working with the Clean Diesel Fuel Alliance to help provide additional public information and raise awareness of the importance of proper labeling. For more information on the Alliance go to:  http://www.clean-diesel.org/
  More information on EPA's clean diesel programs: 
  http://www.epa.gov/otaq/highway-diesel/regs/420f06064.htm#overview
  (EPA News Release, 12/08/06)
  
• Work to start on facade at former Deutsche Bank ... Workers are set to begin removing metal and glass from the outside of the former Deutsche Bank tower next to Ground Zero today, officials said. Buildings Department officials approved permits earlier this week allowing removal of the facade on the top floors of the 40-story tower. The state still does not have permission to begin demolition of the interior steel structure and cement floors. The facade of the tower was ripped open when the south tower collapsed Sept. 11, filling the interior with toxic dust, which has complicated the building's demolition. ... (NY Daily News, by Greg B. Smith, Dec. 8, 2006)
  
• Former Deutsche Bank Building Finally Coming Down ... Demolition finally began Friday on the Deutsche Bank building, which was severely damaged when the Twin Towers came down on September 11th, 2001. The 41-story tower has been vacant since that day. Workers have started removing the windows and metal column covers that make up the facade of the building's top four floors. After that, the steel and concrete skeleton of those floors will come down. ... The Environmental Protection Agency is monitoring the site to make sure no harmful dust is released. Demolition prep work was stopped several months ago when human remains were found on the roof. A search eventually turned up more than 700 bone fragments. That search is still moving forward on the lower floors. (NY1, Dec. 8, 2006)
  
• Deutsche Bank Demolition To Begin ... Workers will start dismantling the facade of the former Deutsche Bank building today as a prelude to its demolition, which is to begin in January, the Lower Manhattan Construction Command Center said yesterday. The building stands opposite ground zero at 130 Liberty Street, and was badly damaged and contaminated on Sept. 11, 2001. The command center said workers would dismantle aluminum column covers and windows at the top of the building, moving down from the 39th floor to the 35th. They will cut up the material and wrap it in plastic for removal from the site. (NYTimes, by David Dunlap, Dec. 8, 2006)
  
• From new infamy must come honor... Dorothy Hall, 70, a Red Cross volunteer from Burns, Tenn., worked for six weeks at Ground Zero and now suffers from interstitial lung disease - the same type of ailment that killed Trade Center responders Detective James Zadroga, Officer James Godbee, Firefighter Stephen Johnson and AT&T Wireless technician Mark DeBiase. Nancy Hachmeister, 50, a search-and-rescue dog handler from Bountiful, Utah, spent 10 days with her German shepherd Ivey scouring The Pile for signs of life and human remains. Ever since, Hachmeister has been plagued by sinus infections and a persistent cough, sometimes hacking so violently that she vomits. Ivey died last year of cancer at the age of 9. Hachmeister wants Washington, including Health and Human Services Secretary Michael Leavitt, a former Utah governor, to dedicate research dollars toward 9/11-related diseases. "He needs to know there is a definite problem, and not just for the New Yorkers who were there," Hachmeister said. "They need to be aware and do what they can as far as putting money into research to figure out what's going on here." The focus on Leavitt is spot-on. It has been three months since the secretary - caught in the glare of the fifth anniversary of the terror attack - assigned his "A-team" to formulate what, if anything, his agency would do for the forgotten victims of 9/11. Since then, Leavitt and his aides have relapsed into the torpor that has become a hallmark of their record.Slow to recognize that debilitating asthmas, potentially fatal lung-scarring diseases, chronic coughs and other respiratory illnesses are prevalent among Trade Center responders, they have provided only piecemeal aid - and only under determined prodding by Sen. Hillary Clinton and Reps. Carolyn Maloney and Vito Fossella. It was only in October that HHS finally delivered federal funding to actually provide care to stricken rescue and recovery workers - $40 million that will allow specialists at the Fire Department and Mount Sinai Medical Center's World Trade Center clinics to treat, rather than simply screen and monitor, the ill. The money was, of course, appreciated, but at present rates of spending it will likely run out next summer. ... (NYDaily News:  Editorial, Dec. 7, 2006)
• Cleanup of 9/11 Dust to Resume, EPA Says, Despite Widespread Criticism ... More than five years after contaminated dust from the World Trade Center seeped into apartments and offices throughout Lower Manhattan, the federal Environmental Protection Agency announced plans yesterday to start a final indoor cleanup program next month, despite widespread criticism that the program is seriously flawed. ... The new program is almost identical to one that was rejected in November 2005 as inadequate by the agency’s advisory panel of experts as well as by community groups, labor unions and the city’s Congressional delegation. The City Council passed a resolution condemning that program, calling it “technically and scientifically flawed.” Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton, who in 2004 forced the environmental agency to test indoor spaces for contamination, called the program announced yesterday “totally inadequate.” In a statement, she said she would use her chairmanship of the Senate Subcommittee on Superfund and Environmental Health in the new Congress to press for a more comprehensive testing and cleaning program.In early 2005, the agency considered creating a far broader program that would have used statistically based mapping to learn the extent of the contamination, following it outside Manhattan if needed. Under that program, if any dust could be conclusively linked to the trade center collapse, entire buildings, not individual apartments or offices, were to be vacuumed and wiped down to prevent recontamination from spaces that had not been cleaned. The agency abandoned that program late last year when it could not devise a reliable way to identify trade center dust. It substituted a pared down program that would only test individual apartments in Lower Manhattan and clean only those where contamination was found. However, when community residents objected to the program as insufficient, the agency agreed to continue looking for a method of identifying dust from the twin towers. ... Catherine McVay Hughes, a downtown resident who was community liaison on the agency’s advisory panel, said she was disturbed that the agency had not notified residents of this latest version before announcing it. She said it was still so limited that it was unlikely to accomplish Mr. Steinberg’s goal of providing “peace of mind to people who live and work in Lower Manhattan.” “Because the plan continues to be inadequate, I can’t imagine that there will be much of a response,” she said. ... It is not clear how many apartments and commercial spaces can be cleaned under the new program. Mr. Steinberg said only $7 million was left from a Federal Emergency Management Agency grant to pay for the new cleanup. A previous effort in 2002 and 2003 that cleaned or tested 4,200 of more than 23,000 apartments in Lower Manhattan cost $30 million. Mr. Steinberg said testing for the four contaminants would cost about $3 a square foot, or $3,000 for an average apartment, while cleaning that same space will add an additional $1 per square foot.But officials said they expected the testing to show that most apartments do not need to be cleaned. ... (NYTimes, by Anthony DePalma, December 7, 2007)
  
• EPA slammed over 'final' 9/11 dust testing ... A new $7 million federal plan to test for World Trade Center dust in lower Manhattan was roundly criticized Wednesday as too little too late. ... (AM NY/Newsday, by Grahma Rayman, Dec. 7, 2006)
  
• New air tests at WTC: Feds will probe for toxins but politicians slam plan ... The EPA's decision to go forward, three years after the agency finished testing and cleaning 4,167 downtown apartments, was part of a long-running debate over how extensive its next effort should be. "The program announced today is totally inadequate," Sen. Hillary Clinton said. Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-Manhattan), whose district includes the World Trade Center area, said the EPA should randomly select several hundred apartments in concentric circles out from the WTC site and inspect them thoroughly. "There might be reason to clean buildings three blocks in one direction and 3 miles in another," he said. "It is immoral for the federal government to be complicit in the poisoning of thousands of people." ... (NYDaily News, by Paul De. Colford, Dec. 7, 2006)
  
• Nadler Blasts EPA Sham WTC Testing & Cleanup Program: Calls plan a "slap in the face" to the people of Lower Manhattan Vows a Democratic Congress will "hold EPA accountable" ... According to the EPA’s official announcement, the plan was based on the assumption that the "vast majority of residential and commercial spaces in Lower Manhattan have been repeatedly cleaned" and that the potential for exposure related to dust "is low." But in the immediate aftermath of 9/11, the EPA told people to clean up WTC dust on their own with a wet mop or hire their own cleaning crews. No interior space has ever been cleaned by the Federal government in a manner consistent with federal environmental laws, and many buildings outside the arbitrary geographic boundary set by EPA may be contaminated. .... (News Release, Dec. 6, 2006)
  
• EPA begins final WTC health dust testing in 2007 ... The Environmental Protection Agency said Wednesday it will launch its final Sept. 11 contamination cleanup program next month, more than five years after the attacks and following years of criticism the agency still has not done enough. The $7 million cleanup will test indoor spaces below Canal Street, west of Allen and Pike streets, and will allow residents and building owners to have the air and dust in their living spaces tested for four contaminants linked to debris from the collapse of the World Trade Center towers. The four contaminants are asbestos, man-made fibers like fiberglass, lead, and polycyclic armoatic hydrocarbons. The testing program's two-month registration period will begin in January, officials said. "It is time to begin this final phase in EPA's response to the terrorist attacks of September 11," the agency's regional administrator, Alan Steinberg, said in a statement. "The vast majority of occupied residential and commercial spaces in lower Manhattan have been repeatedly cleaned, and we believe the potential for exposure related to dust that may remain from the collapse of the World Trade Center building is low," said EPA official Dr. George Gray. The announcement comes a day after the incoming head of the Senate Environment Committee, Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., said she would push for full health coverage for ground zero workers sickened by their time at the disaster site. Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton and Rep. Jerrold Nadler, both Democrats, have led a chorus of New York lawmakers complaining that the EPA did not live up to its responsibilities to protect public health in the hours, days, and months after Sept. 11. The issue has also spawned an ongoing federal lawsuit against the EPA and then-administrator Christie Todd Whitman. Nadler angrily dismissed the testing plan announced Wednesday. "It's the same crap, the same phony cleanup, like the phony cleanup they did back in 2002," fumed Nadler, whose district includes the ground zero site. He has long argued that the testing area in lower Manhattan is arbitrary and doesn't reflect how far the dust traveled. "We now have a Democratic majority in the Congress, and we will be holding hearings about this," Nadler said. Clinton has called the EPA's new testing plan "incredibly frustrating and disappointing" because it does not expand the area tested. She charges that the agency "is essentially throwing up its hands and washing them of this problem." The lawmakers' fight with the administration on 9/11 health matters began after the EPA asserted within days of the terrorist attacks that the dust from 1.8 million tons of World Trade Center debris posed no public health threat.An inspector general's investigation concluded those assurances were issued after the agency was pressured by White House officials. (AP, by Devlin Barrett, 12/6/06)
  
• EPA Begins Final Lower manhattan Testing Program ... Lower Mnhattan Indoor Test and Clean Program Plan ... (EPA Press Release, 12/06/06)
  
• EPA To Begin New $7 Million Cleanup On Buildings Around WTC ... While many sites around the World Trade Center have been previously tested for toxins, the Environmental Protection Agency said Wednesday that it is once again offering its services. Beginning in the spring, the EPA will begin a new $7 million cleanup program open to buildings south of Canal Street and West of Allen and Pike Streets. They will be testing indoor spaces for the presence of toxins. Scientists have said the dust around the Trade Center site was full of toxins, which may have spread to nearby areas. The EPA says any buildings found with contaminated air will be cleaned up. But, Congressman Jerold Nadler said Wednesday that the EPA's plan to clean around the site is a "slap in the face" to the people of Lower Manhattan. "The new plan does not reflect the recommendations of the EPA Inspector General issued in August 2003, or the "World Trade Center Expert Technical Review Panel" established by the EPA specifically to develop a scientifically sound plan for indoor contamination," said Nadler. Senator Hillary Clinton also responded to the EPA's decision. "The program announced Wednesday is totally inadequate," said Clinton in a written statement. Registration for testing will begin in January. For more information, visit www.EPA.gov/ WTC. (NY1, 12/06/06)
  
• Statement of Senator Clinton on the Environmental Protection Agency's Announcement on 9/11 Contamination Clean-Up Program ... Washington, DC - Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton today released the following statement on the Environmental Protection Agency's announcement to launch its final 9/11 contamination clean-up program next month. "The EPA has now acknowledged that additional testing is necessary, but the program announced today is totally inadequate. I plan to use my chairmanship of the Subcommittee on Superfund and Environmental Health to continue to press for a more expansive test and clean program in the new Congress." (News Release, Dec. 6, 2006)
• EPA announces dust sampling plan in NYC ... A testing and cleanup plan was originally developed and released by the EPA's World Trade Center Expert Technical Review Panel in November of 2005, but was delayed for a year due to the need to address public and panel member concerns over its utility. "The original plan has been modified," said Dr. George Gray, assistant administrator for the EPA's Office of Research and Development. The modifications include now testing for four contaminants of particular concern: lead, asbestos, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), and vitreous fibers, such as fiberglass. This modified plan also allows those residents who had their homes tested in the 2002-2003 program to be retested and cleaned if they choose, said Gray. ... (Disaster News Netweork, by Health Moyer, 12/06/06)
• EPA to Begin Final WTC Health Dust Testing in 2007 ... Nadler angrily dismissed the testing plan announced Wednesday. "It's the same crap, the same phony cleanup, like the phony cleanup they did back in 2002," fumed Nadler, whose district includes the ground zero site. He has long argued that the testing area in lower Manhattan is arbitrary and doesn't reflect how far the dust traveled. "We now have a Democratic majority in the Congress, and we will be holding hearings about this," Nadler said (WNBC, Dec. 6, 2006)
  
• EPA announces new WTC testing program ... "It is time to begin this final phase in EPA's response to the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11," said Alan Steinberg, EPA regional administrator. "We hope that the program will provide peace of mind to people who live and work in lower Manhattan." EPA scientists said the vast majority of occupied residential and commercial spaces in lower Manhattan have been repeatedly cleaned and it's believed the potential for exposure related to dust remaining from the collapse of the World Trade Center buildings is low. ... (UPI, 12/06/06)
  
• NY Pans Another EPA 9-11 Plan ... It seems the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has done it again, offering yet another false assurance to New Yorkers about fallout from the 9/11 terrorist attacks. At least, that's how many people who live and work in downtown Manhattan have come to view the agency's latest announcement. This afternoon, the EPA unveiled what it is calling the "final phase" in its response to the 9/11 environmental fallout—a new plan to test for toxic dust from the World Trade Center disaster. The plan isn't exactly new, however. Indeed, it mirrors a proposal the EPA had first announced in November 2005, one that residents, office workers, and activists had panned as inadequate. ... (Village Voice, by Kristen Lombardi, Dec. 6, 2006)
  
• Incoming Senate chair pledges care for WTC workers ... the government should provide health care for sick 9/11 workers, the incoming head of the Senate's environment committee said Tuesday, vigorously endorsing presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton's plan for a long-term ground zero care program. Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., told The Associated Press that sick ground zero workers deserve long-term care. "We are taking care of the families who lost loved ones and nobody complains about that," Boxer told the AP. "Why wouldn't we take care of the people who are surviving and coughing and sick - and dying, I might add - as a result of their work? To me it's clear. I don't have any hesitation about what our obligation is." Boxer will become chairwoman of the Environment and Public Works Committee next month, when the Democrats assume their 51-seat majority of the Senate. Her declaration is a big boost to sick workers and also to New York lawmakers, including Clinton and Sen. Charles Schumer, who have cajoled the Republican Congress and the Bush administration for years to do more for those who toiled on the toxic debris pile. (AP, by Devlin Barrett, Dec. 5, 2006)
  
• Federal Probe of City 41B 9/11 Fund ... The federal Department of Homeland Security has launched an investigation into the city's $1 billion World Trade Center insurance company, which has spent more than $50 million fighting claims by ailing 9/11 responders. The probe will look into charges by Rep. Jerrold Nadler, spurred by reports in The Post, that the company has violated congressional intent and misspent federal money to dispute more than 6,400 claims. "I can confirm we are looking into the issues raised by Rep. Nadler," said Tamara Faulkner, a spokeswoman for the department's inspector general, Richard Skinner.Faulkner said a team of inspectors with subpoena power will scrutinize the WTC Captive Insurance Co, which manages $1 billion Congress approved to pay claims against the city and its contractors from the WTC cleanup. A report is expected in six to eight months. The company, governed by five Bloomberg administration officials, would not comment last week, but has argued it has a "duty to defend" against the claims. Records obtained by The Post show the company has spent more than $50 million on overhead, consultants and fees as of Sept. 30, including $32.9 million on law firms. ... (NYPost, by Susan Edelman, Dec. 3, 2006)
  
• State Lawmakers Ask President for 9/11 Health Care Funding ... Senator Hillary Clinton, Chuck Schumer, and Edward Kennedy wrote a letter to President George W. Bush Friday, to make sure those suffering 9/11 related health problems get adequate funding in the president's 2008 budget proposal. Studies show that 70 percent of World Trade Center responders have new or worsened respiratory problems caused by their work at the site. The letter also requests money from the Department of Health to cover a funding gap until federal legislation is passed. (NY1, Dec. 2, 2006)
  
• Mayor's aides get more tme on WTC health plan ... Mayor Bloomberg has granted top city officials a 60-day extension to craft recommendations regarding how the city can better help ailing Ground Zero workers. Bloomberg asked two deputy mayors, Ed Skyler and Linda Gibbs, in September to review the resources available to workers who say they became sick after toiling amid the burning rubble of the World Trade Center. Bloomberg instructed Skyler and Gibbs to recommend strategies to ensure the workers can get assistance on an ongoing basis. "Due to the enormous amount of fact-finding that needs to be done before recommendations can be made, the deputy mayors have asked for and received a 60-day extension," Bloomberg spokesman Stu Loeser said. (Daily News, by Michael Saul, Dec. 2, 2006)
  
• Doctor responds to kids' health post-9/11 story ... I thought I had made it clear that I strongly believe that there will surely be health repurcussions for children in the downtown area secondary to the dust and debris created by the 9/11 tragedy. I am not as comfortable as Dr. Michael Cohen in stating that since we have not seen a dramatic increase in asthma or respitory illness that there will not be in the near future. It is unfortunate that the message given out by your newspaper's article, "Doc's: Kids' Post 9/11 Health is Good" was mostly aimed at inappropriately placating parental fears. This is really upsetting. Until studies are done, we do not know about the health issues we will ave to address. .... (Tribeca Trib: Letter to the Editor by Lisa Kaufman, M.D., December 2006)
  

NOVEMBER

• Fiterman Will Symbolize the Rebirth of Ground Zero and of the BMCC Campus ... Fiterman Hall, the 15-story building badly damaged in the September 11, 2001, attacks on the World Trade Center, is set to be transformed into a state-of-the-art vertical campus, under the direction of Pei Cobb Freed & Partners Architects. ... Funding for the remediation, deconstruction and rebuilding of the new structure is coming from the state and city, the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation, the September 11 Fund and a property insurance settlement. The project budget from the city and state is $202 million. ... (City Universtiy of New York e-news, Nov. 29, 2006)
• Death by Dust: The frightening link between the 9-11 toxic cloud and cancer ... To date, 75 recovery workers at ground zero have been diagnosed with blood cell cancers that a half-dozen top doctors and epidemiologists have confirmed as having been likely caused by that exposure. Ernie Vallabuona is one of them. .... It would take a month to reach a definitive diagnosis of non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, a cancer of the lymphoid tissue. Evidently, Vallebuona had developed a golf-ball-sized mass in his abdomen that had grown so fast and so quick that pieces of it were dying and depositing into his blood, causing gout-like symptoms. ... Seventy-five clients suffer from lymphoma, leukemia, multiple myeloma, and other blood cell cancers; most are men, aged 30 to 60, who appeared in perfect health just five years ago. .... But six prominent specialists on cancer and the link to toxins—on the faculty of the nation's top medical schools and public health institutions—all come to the same conclusions when told these statistics. They are Richard Clapp and David Ozonoff, professors of environmental health at Boston University School of Public Health; Michael Thun, director of epidemiological research at the American Cancer Society; Francine Laden, assistant professor of environmental epidemiology at Harvard School of Public Health; Jonathan Samet, chairman of the epidemiology department at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health; and Charles Hesdorffer, associate professor of oncology at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. These doctors and epidemiologists agree that the incidence of cancer among this subset of workers sounds shockingly high, that they cannot and should not be dismissed as coincidence, and that the toxic dust cloud that hung over downtown Manhattan, and particularly the Pile, likely caused or promoted the diseases. Some even went so far as to say that the blood cancer cases, especially, indicate what could become a wave of cancer cases stemming from 9-11 over the next decades. .... It's also possible that the carcinogens in the Trade Center dust accelerated cancers already dormant or developing in the recovery workers, epidemiologists say. According to Richard Clapp, who directed the Massachusetts Cancer Registry from 1980 to 1989, toxins can not only instigate the genes that cause cancerous cells to divide, but also hasten their dividing. That means that a person with an undetected cancer will develop it faster and in a more virulent manner. He calls this the "promotional effect" and says some toxins associated with 9-11 have been known to speed up lymphomas and leukemias. "The promotional effect could have happened already," he says. .... (Village Voice, by Kristen Lombardi, Nov. 28, 2006)
• Firefighters Are More Prone To Develop Cancer; Drs. Cite Exposure To Toxins Under Extreme Heat ... A new health analysis conducted by doctors at the University of Cincinnati found that on-the-job exposure to soot and toxins creates an increased risk for certain types of cancer among firefighters. The analysis used data from 32 health studies conducted among firefighters over the past 50 years, and then quantitatively assessed the probable, possible and unlikely risk of 21 cancers among that work force. Prime Risks: According to its results, firefighters are significantly more likely than the regular population to develop multiple myelomas, and are at elevated risk for non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, prostate and testicular cancers. Firefighters face "possible" increased risk for many other types of cancers, including melanoma and other skin malignancies, cancer of the brain, rectum, stomach, oral pharynx and colon. Dr. Grace LeMasters and Dr. James Lockey published their findings in this month's Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine. The results weren't a shock, they said, since it was known that firefighters were routinely exposed to potentially cancer-causing agents. But they were surprised in some cases by the rates of increased risk for particular malignancies. Can't Keep Soot Out ... "I think we have underappreciated the exposures that may occur through the skin. We know when there is a hot environment, the skin dilates, becoming more porous," said Dr. LeMasters. "I talked to many firefighters who said even though they were wearing all their protective clothing, they still were covered with soot at the end of a fire." Dr. Lockey commented that an elevated rate of cancer occurrence among a group of extremely fit people is a medical anomaly, but "when you factor in the acute exposures that firefighters suffer long-term, over 25 to 30 years, it's not at all surprising." The substances identified as the most potentially harmful to firefighters included particulates, gases, mists and fumes of an organic and/or inorganic nature. They are also routinely exposed to heavy metals, carcinogenic chemicals, volatile gases, minerals like asbestos and other toxic matter, and building debris that can contain pulverized cement, glass, fiberglass, silica, soot and combustion products. ... (The Chief-Leader, by Ginger Adams Otis, Nov. 24, 2006)
  
• Tighter pollution restrictions for many construction projects ... Starting Feb. 12, 2007, all heavy-duty (8,500 pounds or more) diesel vehicles owned, operated, leased or contracted by any New York State agency or public authority will be required to gas up with ultra low sulfur diesel. The low sulfur fuel emits considerably fewer nitrogen oxides — the nasty tailpipe pollutants that can cause both asthma and acid rain — than standard diesel. The new statute, which officially became a law on Aug. 16 (Gov. Pataki signed it publicly on Nov. 2), will also require most heavy-duty state vehicles to install advanced exhaust filters by 2010. For Lower Manhattan, that means any project under the purview of the Port Authority, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, the Battery Park City Authority, the Hudson River Park Trust or the state Department of Transportation, would be subject to the revamped regulations. The upcoming Route 9A Project along West St. will likely be one of the first projects to enter contract using the new rules. As with any legislation, however, the law has its loopholes. The law will not apply to contracts signed before the Feb. 12 effective date. City and private projects also fall outside the scope of the law. Additionally, affected projects that deem the low sulfur fuel too expensive or too hard to find will have the option to ask the state to waive the regulations on a case-by-case basis. Because of voluntary commitments from developer Larry Silverstein and the Port Authority, vehicles on the World Trade Center site already use the cleaner fuel. Community leaders have long been pushing for other heavy-duty vehicles in the area, particularly the W.T.C. site’s “moving vehicles” (the trucks that bring equipment to and from the development), to go low sulfur as well. Silverstein has already committed to using the low sulfur diesel for his off-site vehicles, but the Port and M.T.A. have not. The law does not affect the W.T.C. work underway but is likely to apply to the Port’s plans to build a tower and an underground vehicle security center at the former Deutsche Bank building site at 130 Liberty St. Catherine McVay Hughes, who chairs Community Board 1’s World Trade Center Committee and has spearheaded the local fight for cleaner fuel, said that the new legislation was a positive development but that it was not comprehensive enough. “It’s a great step, but I wish it was more inclusive,” Hughes said. “The law leaves gaps in the private sector and I can’t wait until those gaps are closed.” Law or no law, C.B. 1 and neighborhood environmental groups will continue urging Lower Manhattan developers of all types to switch to ultra low sulfur diesel of their own accord. (Downtown Express, by Skye H. McFarlane, Nov. 17-23, 2006)
  
• Extended Interview: Researcher Discusses Health of 9/11 First responders ... TOM BEARDEN: Mt. Sinai has just completed a major study of the people who responded to the World Trade Center. What did you find? PHILIP LANDRIGAN: Well, we reported on about 9,200 workers: firefighters, police, construction workers, other responders at the World Trade Center site. The major finding that we recorded was that approximately 60 percent of these people had developed new respiratory symptoms since starting work at Ground Zero. TOM BEARDEN: Sixty percent is significant? PHILIP LANDRIGAN: Sixty percent is very significant and it's much higher than we would expect in the general American population. And our assessment of the severity of the situation was heightened by the finding that in roughly two-thirds of these people the signs and symptoms were so persistent two or three years later. TOM BEARDEN: What kind of problems did you find? PHILIP LANDRIGAN: Well, first of all we found upper respiratory problems. Very ... nasty, very acute sinusitis in a lot of these folks. And then also lower respiratory problems -- cough, wheeze. And then objectively going beyond just symptoms, we actually did what are called pulmonary function tests where people are asked to blow hard and fast into a tube and measure how much air they move in a given period of time. And we found lots of evidence in that test for pulmonary restriction, which is to say shrinkage in the volume of the lungs. And in one particular test the frequency for evidence of restriction was five times what we would expect in the general population of the U.S. TOM BEARDEN: We spoke with two police detectives -- one who has cancer, has leukemia, and the other who has lost 50 percent of his kidney function. Is it possible to attribute those sorts of problems to Ground Zero? PHILIP LANDRIGAN: Up until now we've been focusing on two things -- respiratory problems and mental health problems. Because it was clear to all of us that those were the two categories of disease that were going to be most important in the first five years after the attacks. Now that we've gotten past the five-year point and we're moving into the period of time when you would begin to expect to see diseases that have a long [incubation] period, we're actually engaged in a process right now to develop criteria for which other diseases such as cancer, such as chronic lung disease, such as kidney disease, such as other diseases like he included on that list. ... We think that the likely cause ... of all the respiratory problems lies in the chemical nature of the dust. The major component of the World Trade Center dust was pulverized concrete. Cement. Which was very, very alkaline. Had a pH of 10 or 11, which means that the alkalinity of this material is equivalent to that of Drano. And moreover it was in finely particulate form, so that when people inhaled this stuff it actually had the capacity to adhere to the lining of the trachea, the bronchi, and even -- because it was small -- moved on into the depths of these people's lungs. And we think that's why the material was so incredibly toxic per unit weight. Then, of course, in addition to the pulverized cement, there were billions and billions of microscopic shards of glass from all the blown out windows and various chemical contaminants. ... (PBS, Nov. 21, 2006)
  
• Dust, Debris at World Trade Center Site May Have Made Workers Sick ... (PBS, Nov. 21, 2006)
  
• Congressmen Renew Calls for More Money to Help Sick 9/11 Workers... Members of Congress are again calling for more money to help those who fell ill after working at or near the World Trade Center site. New York Congresswoman Carolyn Maloney and Congressman Vito Fossella were among those leading the calls Tuesday. More than $50 million was released by the federal government last month to treat those suffering from 9/11 related illnesses. But leaders say more money is needed. They say the effects of toxic dust at the trade center site will persist for decades. ... (NY1, Nov. 21, 2006)
  
• Silent Toll: Health Resources ... The World Trade Center Health Care Program at Bellevue Medical Center  is designed to help those suffering from problems that may be linked to chemicals and hazardous materials in the air. following the attacks.  They are the unknown victims, victims of the silent toll from 9/11. ... For more information on Bellevue's center: call 212-562-1705.  Click here for the New York City Health Department's guidelines about possible post-9/11 exposure.  Blog about this important issue in our community section. E-mail story ideas to silenttoll@fox5ny.com. ... (Fox 5, 21 Nov. 2006)
  
• No to Planned Guidelines on 9/11-Related Autopsies ... The federal government has abandoned efforts to create standardized autopsy guidelines to help determine whether deaths of people who worked at ground zero during recovery operations in 2001 and 2002 can be conclusively connected to the hazardous smoke and dust they breathed there. The guidelines were supposed to be sent to doctors nationwide to avoid the kind of confusion that resulted earlier this year after a New Jersey coroner concluded that the death of James Zadroga, a New York City police detective, had been caused by exposure to the hazardous air at ground zero, the first such official finding for anyone who worked at the site. ... The proposed federal guidelines would have laid out methods for taking and analyzing tissue samples from workers in the New York area and across the country. The draft document also established a process for reaching a conclusion about the cause of death. Autopsy reports often are presented as evidence in civil suits seeking to establish liability. But medical experts outside the federal government asked to review the proposal expressed concern that guidelines could be seen as an attempt to assess liability for diseases linked to the dust rather than an effort to find answers that could lead to improved diagnosis and treatment. They said the proposed autopsy procedures would not provide conclusive results and could be subject to inappropriate use in the thousands of lawsuits filed against the city and its contractors by injured workers. ... In place of the proposed autopsy protocols, the federal government intends to have the New York State Departmentcupational Safety and Healthf the long-term health effects of exposure to the contaminants in the air at ground zero. ... (NYTimes, by Anthony DePalma, Nov. 18, 2006)
• Queens College Helps WTC Workers ... The Center for the Biology of Natural Systems at Queens College announced a major expansion of its medical monitoring program for emergency responders and recovery workers at the World Trade Center disaster site. The program, the Queens World Trade Center Medical Monitoring and Treatment Program, will now offer diagnostic evaluation and treatment of World Trade Center-related health conditions at its clinical facility at 163-03 Horace Harding Expy. in Flushing. It has already provided health monitoring examinations for more than 1,000 former WTC workers since 2004. The college’s expanded program is made possible by a $1.1 million award from the National Institute For Occupational Safety and Health of the Department of Health and Human Service – one of a series of NIOSH grants totaling $40 million for this purpose. Other recipients include the Fire Department of New York, Mount Sinai School of Medicine, and other medical institutions in the New York/New Jersey area. ... (Queens Tribune, Nov. 18, 2006)
  
• The World Trade Center Aftermath and Its Effects on Health: Understanding and Learning Through Human-Exposure Science ... Although still in its infancy, human-exposure science is a key to understanding environmental and health consequences of disastrous events such as the 9/11 terroist attacks... In the case of the attack on the WTC, duration of contact and health issues were complex. They still need more global understanding if the U.S. intends to establish a credible path forward for addressing exposures from such events in the future. Negative acute health outcomes have already been documented for responders, and concerns have been raised about their long-term health outcomes. These findings have prevented WTC-exposed populations from achieving closure, thereby prolonging the recovery (3). If the nation is to minimize the potential for this happening in a future disaster, it must evaluate past inadequacies; establish credible, realistic exposure–response evaluations for the future; and develop effective prevention strategies, including when and where avoidance or respirator use is mandatory for the local community as well as responders. ... The opportunity to characterize the gaseous component after the WTC collapse was lost during the first few hours. The magnitude of the fire and its composition most likely changed in character over this short time. The initial exposures to the complex mixture that irritated the lungs of rescue workers and firefighters would have been high. The question remains: where does the U.S. stand in the development of protocols for real-time, portable personal samplers to reduce this gap in exposure information? In the months after 9/11, dust that settled either indoors or outdoors became the concern. However, the only health-based clearance values available for settled dust were for lead, dioxin, and PAHs, and these were only minor constituents of the deposited dust. The highly alkaline cement and vitreous fibers that composed the vast majority of the mass had no health-based clearance values. Such guidelines need to be established for indoor and outdoor surfaces for multiple substances. The NRC Subcommittee on Acute Exposure Guideline Levels (AEGLs), Committee on Toxicology, has developed AEGLs based on a list of extremely hazardous substances. The 4 volumes that have been released include level 1, 2, and 3 AEGLs, which cover acute community exposures of 10 min to 8 h for ~30 chemicals (41). Guidelines should also be developed for alkaline dusts, or WTC-type dusts, especially the supercoarse particles. ... (Envrionmental Science & Technology, Lio, Pellizzari & Prezant, Nov. 15, 2006; Vol. 40, Iss. 22, pp6876-6885)
• Smaller babies born in 9/11 climate of fear ... THE shock of the 9/11 terrorist attacks in America led to a drop in the weight of babies born in western Europe, according to a study published this week. Researchers discovered that babies born between three and six months later were on average nearly 50 grams (1.7 ounces) lighter than they should have been. They say that the stress and anxiety caused by the attacks led directly to more underweight babies. The study, published in the Journal of Psychosomatic Research, is the latest in a body of work that seeks to quantify the precise effects distant events can have by creating a climate of fear. Instant communications means people thousands of miles away may experience similar symptoms to those actually present. ... Previous research conducted in New York showed that women who were in the World Trade Center on the day of the attacks or near it within the following three weeks had babies that were on average 120g (4.2oz) lighter. Doctors have attributed the difference to stress and the large quantities of dust and debris in the air at the time. The terrorist attacks also led to an unusually high level of stillbirths of male foetuses, a phenomenon noted elsewhere during natural disasters and wartime. ... Babies in the womb on September 11 were 48g (1.7oz) lighter than those in the later group. The scientists believe the difference was caused by high levels of cortisol in the mother, a hormone associated with stress and anxiety. The hormone, which helps break down and burn off fats, can transfer from the mother to the foetus, resulting in weight loss. Stress can also result in loss of appetite and cause the blood vessels to constrict, reducing the flow of blood to the baby and potentially stunting growth. ... (The Sunday Times, by Roger Dobson and Steven Swinford, November 12, 2006)
  
• Ghosts of 9/11 shadow pit: Dust-clogged bldgs. are frozen in time ... Both Fiterman and Deutsche Bank are strictly off-limits to the public. The state, which owns both, has denied journalists entry because the dust inside is considered toxic. ... Inside a thick layer of dust created by the collapse of the twin towers covers floors, walls and furniture. That dust - a mix of asbestos, cadmium, benzene and other toxins - is the reason both buildings have been left frozen in time for years. ... Five years later, Fiterman remains unfit for human habitation. A fight over who would pay for demolition and a replacement building has delayed the cleanup. Next week, the city medical examiner plans a walk-through, with a full-press search for human remains commencing in the spring. The Dormitory Authority will then begin tearing it down. "It's considered a contaminated space," Lewis said, noting that nothing comes in or out of the building that "has not been contaminated." ... The state - which bought the Deutsche Bank tower in 2004 - has begun the difficult process of cleaning and taking down the dust-choked building without releasing dust into the neighborhood. The process - slowed by the discovery of more than 700 human bone fragments on the building's roof - is expected to continue into next fall. ... (NYDaily News, by Greg B. Smith, Nov. 12, 2006)
  
• Gathering of heroes & help at last ... But hundreds of Ground Zero heroes got a helping hand yesterday at a conference that provided one-stop shopping for medical and legal services. The gathering - a block from Ground Zero at the headquarters of DC 37, the city's biggest union - also empowers ailing workers because they realize they are not alone in their suffering, said Dr. Stephen Levin of Mount Sinai Medical Center, which has been monitoring and treating thousands of first responders. ... Among them is Andy Scallo, 45, a heavy equipment operator who worked for three months on the smoldering pile. Scallo now suffers from multiple sclerosis and may soon have to quit his job, he said. ... (NYDaily News, by Paul H.B. Shin, Nov. 12, 2006)
• Firefighters Risk Health Problems Years Later ... New research shows how firefighters also face a higher risk of ten different cancers. Researchers analyzed data on 110,000 firefighters from 32 different studies. They found that compared to workers in other jobs, firefighters are twice as likely to develop testicular cancer, and have significantly higher rates of multiple myeloma, Non-Hodgkins lymphoma, and prostate cancer. The researchers believe there is a direct correlation between the chemical exposures firefighters face on the job and their increased cancer risk. Burning buildings can mean toxic metals, chemicals and gases, along with cancer causing compounds like benzene, chloroform, and formaldehyde. Not to mention diesel engine exhaust from idling diesel fire trucks. ... The lead researcher told CBS 5 her findings raise a red flag. Firefighters need better protective gear. The gear used today is designed to protect against acute dangers -- heat and carbon monoxide poisoning. It is not designed to protect against the residues that get on the skin, and many say they are covered in soot - even the groin area - after fighting fires.The study is called Cancer Risk Among Firefighters: A Review and Meta-analysis of 32 Studies by Grace K. LeMasters, PhD, et al. It is located in the Journal of Occupational and Environmental MedicineVolume 48, Number 11, November 2006. (CBS 5, Kim Mulvihill, M.D., Nov. 12, 2006)
  
• 9/11 responders seek options for care ... Without congressional action, federal funds for the treatment of 9/11 first responders will run out in July. Funds to monitor the ill workers are expected to last less than two
  years. ... Two bills are pending before Congress: The Remember 9/11 Health Act and the James Zadroga Act. The first would provide $1.9 billion over five years for monitoring and research, and would provide Medicare benefits for patients. The James Zadroga Act - named for the New York City police officer who was the first 9/11 responder whose death was directly attributed to Ground Zero toxins - would reopen the September 11th Victims Compensation Fund. Yesterday's event was organized by the World Trade Center Medical Monitoring Program based at The Mount Sinai Medical Center, which published findings in September showing that 60 percent of Ground Zero workers still suffer health effects, including reduced breathing capacity, pulmonary fibrosis and asbestosis. ... (Newsday, by T.W. Farnam, Nov. 12, 2006)
  
• Hopes for 2007 Fiterman demo ... There was much venting Monday night when the Borough of Manhattan Community College held the first of what it said will be a series of public meetings on the deconstruction of Fiterman Hall. While community members expressed concerns over safety and the openness of the public process, B.M.C.C. representatives vowed to learn from and correct the mistakes made in earlier World Trade Center cleanup efforts. When all was said and done, many in the room agreed that the meeting had been a move in the right direction. “I thought it was a really good first step. I’m really glad we were able to have this,” said Catherine McVay Hughes, chairperson of Community Board 1’s World Trade Center Redevelopment Committee. “Obviously, there are some issues that B.M.C.C. and CUNY [City University of New York] will have to look at carefully, but we look forward to hearing from them soon.” ... On Monday, the college made its deconstruction plans public so that community members can comment on them before they are submitted to a host of World Trade Center regulatory agencies, a group headed up by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. The documents, as well as future updates on the project can be found at www.lowermanhattan.info and questions and comments can be directed to fitermanhallinfo@bmcc.cuny.edu. The college hopes to submit its final plans in mid-December. Once plans are approved, the cleaning and deconstruction process is expected to take 10 to 12 months and cost $16,313,000. ... Benn Lewis, the vice president of Airtek Evironmental and chief consultant on the project, headed up Monday night’s presentation. He said that the college and its contractors, PAL Environmental Safety Corporation, are working under the assumption that the entirety of Fiterman Hall is contaminated with toxins from the World Trade Center collapse. Therefore, the current plan calls for the deconstruction of the hall to occur in several stages. First, the post-911 scaffolding and netting would be replaced. The building exterior would be retested for contaminants and re-cleaned where necessary. The interior of the building would be sealed off, then cleaned and emptied in three-floor segments. The roof would be left for last, giving the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner time to search for possible human remains. Last, the building would be taken apart and trucked away. ... Anderson said that B.M.C.C. would give the community more advance notice of future meetings and make sure that faculty, staff and students are informed, probably through an email listserv. ... However, some of the most contentious details at the site—including the method for searching for human remains, the protocols for emergency responders, and the specifics of air monitoring—will not be determined by Airtek’s plan, but rather by regulatory agencies, particularly the Medical Examiner, the N.Y.P.D. and the E.P.A. For this reason, some community members called for agency representatives to be present at future public meetings. Del Valle said he would work with the Community Board to try to make that happen. ... No dates have been set for future public meetings, but students, staff and environmental activists alike seemed eager to read the college’s plans and continue the dialogue. ... (Downtown Express, by Skye H. McFarlane, November 3-9, 2006)
  
• New consdtruction equipment helps clean didrty jobs ... At sites from Ground Zero to a Chicago expressway to a California airport, the notoriously dirty construction industry is starting to clean up its act. Instead of belching black smoke, the bucket loaders, cranes and other diesel-powered behemoths at these construction projects are part of a new generation of relatively clean heavy equipment meant to mitigate the environmental effects of often-controversial building projects. By using pollution-scrubbing exhaust filters and cleaner-burning fuel, officials in charge of getting such massive projects approved are finding it easier to win community support. In some places, local leaders are insisting on their use as a condition of backing noisy projects that can disrupt traffic, kick up dirt and foul the air. ... (The Wall Street Journal, by Alex Frangos, Nov. 8, 2006)
• NIOSH HEALTH HAZARD EVALUATION REPORT: HETA #2002-0090; 2002-0096; 2002-0101-3028, Buildings in the Vicinity of the World Trade Center, New York City, New York ... (November 2006)
• JUDGE: NYC Liable Up to $1 Billion for WTC Lawsuits ... A federal judge Friday said he believes New York City's limit on health claims liability stops at  $1 billion. Judge Alvin Hellerstein said thousands of emergency workers expected to claim they were harmed by World Trade Center dust after the September 11th attack may have to share up to $1 billion. Hellerstein indicated he may make a formal finding that the liability has a limit soon and appoint a special master to speed claims. More than 6,000 lawsuits have been filed by emergency workers. Hellerstein expects as many as 11,000 workers total will file lawsuits. The judge said he did not believe the workers can recover additional money from 150 private contractors who worked at the site because the city is ultimately responsible for the work conditions. Hellerstein told more than 100 lawyers in his courtroom that the cap on damages will lessen legal fees and speed payouts to those who need them.  The judge last month ruled that the city, its contractors and the Port Authority are only partly immune from health claim lawsuits.   (1010wins, Nov. 3, 2006)
  
• Nun Dies of Respiratory Disease After Serving At Ground Zero ... A nun who spent six months working at the World Trade Center site has died, while a district judge said Saturday there maybe a limit on liability compensation. While the official cause of death has not yet been determined, Sister Cynthia Mahoney believed her lungs were damaged from the six months she spent working as a chaplain and EMT downtown. The 54-year-old nun died Wednesday at her home in South Carolina. In interviews, she said she developed asthma, along with respiratory, digestive and lung problems from working at the site. At her request, her autopsy results will be included in a class action lawsuit filed by first responders. Meanwhile, a judge said Friday he thinks the city might be limited to $1 billion in liability to workers injured at the World Trade Center site. U.S. District Judge Alvin Hellerstein said that workers who fell sick from dust at the site may have to share up to $1 billion from the city. Hellerstein indicated that he may soon make a formal finding that the liability has a limit, and that he might appoint a special master to speed claims so workers can get money they need to cover medical costs. The judge also said he did not believe workers can recover money from private contractors who worked at the site, since the city was ultimately responsible for the work conditions. More than 6,000 lawsuits have been filed by workers suffering from respiratory ailments sustained from dust and toxins at the trade center site, and thousands more are expected to file suits. (NY1, Nov. 3, 2006)
  
• GROUND ZERO'S 'ANGEL' NUN DIES AUTOPSY WILL EYE 9/11 DUST ... An Episcopal nun who spent five months blessing remains at the World Trade Center died this week and has been granted her dying wish - to be autopsied to prove her lung disease was caused by toxins she inhaled. Sister Cindy Mahoney, 54 - who became known as the "Angel of Ground Zero" - arranged for the autopsy from her deathbed months ago, hoping to help the cause of 9/11 rescue and recovery workers seeking financial aid and medical care. "This can't happen over and over and over again," she told David Worby, a lawyer for 8,000 recovery workers in a videotaped statement in August ... The autopsy was performed by Dr. Janice Ross, a pathologist in South Carolina, where she moved in 2002. The findings will be reviewed by Dr. Michael Baden, the city's former chief medical examiner. They are waiting for lab results from tissue samples, which are expected in the next two weeks. The autopsy could prove that WTC dust was deadly - because Mahoney had been a healthy, active, non-smoker. "She came to 9/11 with clean lungs," Worby said. ... Worby said 81 of the workers he represents in a class-action suit against the city have died, but none was autopsied.... Mahoney suffered chronic obstructive lung disease, asthma, and other respiratory and gastrointestinal diseases common to Ground Zero workers, Worby and relatives said.... (NYPost, by Susan Edelman, Nov. 3, 2006)
  
• Deutsche delays continue ... The 40-story, former Deutsche Bank tower at 130 Liberty St. will stay 40 stories tall for a few more weeks. Damaged on 9/11, the building has long been scheduled for a floor-by-floor demolition to make way for the new World Trade Center’s Tower 5 and an underground bus garage and truck ramps. The demo process has been delayed for years by insurance disputes, environmental questions, the discovery of human remains on the building’s roof and concerns about worker safety. Finally set to commence in late October, the demolition has now been pushed back another three to four weeks, according to a spokesperson at the Lower Manhattan Construction Command Center, who would only discuss the delay on the condition of anonymity. The source said that this latest delay was not caused by the discovery of more remains near the World Trade Center. Rather, the need to clean and dismantle heavy machinery on the 38th and 39th floors has set the project back. (Downtown Express, Oct. 27 - Nov. 2, 2006)
  
• Docs: Kids' Post-9/11 Health is Good .... Lower Manhattan parents, especially, wonder what all the bad news means for their children. The answer, for now at least, may be much more encouraging than the headlines suggest. .... Perhaps no one sees more Downtown kids than Dr. Michel Cohen at Tribeca Pediatrics on Harrison Street in Tribeca. Cohen started his popular practice in the neighborhood 12 years ago. His conclusion, five years after the disaster, is that so far there have been no adverse affects in his many young patients. .... Dr. Bonita Franklin opened her first pediatric office in Tribeca in 1988 and moved to her current Reade Street office in 1995. Shortly after the attacks she did see patients with coughs and other symptoms, but those soon subsided. “I’ve seen no increase in respiratory problems in that group that went beyond that first month or two,” she said. ... Dr. Steven J. Simonte, an asthma and allergy specialist, who opened an office on Duane Street last year, said he has not seen a higher rate of respiratory problems in lower Manhattan children. But recent reports in the medical literature showing an increase in the respiratory symptoms reported by Downtown residents, “are concerning as to the long term health effects,” he said. ... Simonte agrees that more study of the children exposed to the dust is needed over time. Exposure to environmental irritants and pollutants typically make asthma symptoms worse, he said, and the developing lungs of children may be particularly susceptible. “In my professional opinion it would seem to make sense that that they would have a greater risk,” he said. “The jury is still out.” ... (Tribeca Trib, by Etta Sanders, Nov. 1, 2006)
• Governor Signs Legislation to Reduce Harmful Emissons from Heavy-Duty Diesel Vehicles .... Governor George E. Pataki today announced that he has signed legislation that will require the use of ultra low sulfur diesel fuel and emissions control technologies in heavy-duty diesel vehicles owned, operated or leased by the State. This new law will help to improve air quality and protect the health of New Yorkers. ... Assemblyman Pete Grannis said, “Nearly 90 percent of New Yorkers live in areas that fail to meet federal health standards for ozone and nearly 65 percent live in areas out of attainment for the fine particle federal health standard. This law, when applied to all state heavy duty diesel vehicles, as well as those owned by private contractors employed by the state, will significantly reduce these pollutants ... Under this new law, on- and off-road heavy-duty diesel vehicles – those weighing 8,500 pounds or more – that are owned, operated, or leased by a State agency or public authority will be required to be powered by ultra low sulfur diesel fuel. In addition, many of these vehicles also will be required to use the Best Available Retrofit Technology (BART) to reduce the emissions of pollutants. The use of ultra low sulfur fuel will be required once this new law becomes effective on February 12, 2007. BART will be phased-in beginning in 2008, and all vehicles subject to this provision will be required to utilize this technology by December 31, 2010. .... (News Release, November 1, 2006)
  

OCTOBER

• Deutsche delays continue ... The 40-story, former Deutsche Bank tower at 130 Liberty St. will stay 40 stories tall for a few more weeks. Damaged on 9/11, the building has long been scheduled for a floor-by-floor demolition to make way for the new World Trade Center’s Tower 5 and an underground bus garage and truck ramps. The demo process has been delayed for years by insurance disputes, environmental questions, the discovery of human remains on the building’s roof and concerns about worker safety. Finally set to commence in late October, the demolition has now been pushed back another three to four weeks, according to a spokesperson at the Lower Manhattan Construction Command Center, who would only discuss the delay on the condition of anonymity. The source said that this latest delay was not caused by the discovery of more remains near the World Trade Center. Rather, the need to clean and dismantle heavy machinery on the 38th and 39th floors has set the project back. ... (Downtown Express, Oct. 27- Nov. 2, 2006)
  
• A Public Fiterman Hall Update ... (Borough of Manhattan Community College, October 31, 2006)
  
• Public Hears Fiterman Hall Deconstruction Update ... (LowerManhattan.info, Oct., 31, 2006)
  
• Post -9/11 Cleanup To Begin At Fiterman Hall ... Cleanup work is scheduled to begin in November on a building that has not been cleaned thoroughly since the attacks on Sept. 11, 2001.... At a public hearing Monday night, the City University of New York -- the owner of Fiterman Hall, which is part of the Borough of Manhattan Community College campus -- detailed its plan to clean and then demolish the office-style building, previously used for classrooms and offices. Unlike the Deutsche Bank building, project leaders said Fiterman Hall will be inspected and cleaned first and then brought down. Although details for the recovery of remains were scarce, CUNY said much of the process is headed by the medical examiner's office... Another serious issue at the hearing was air quality and worker safety. Project leaders said they understand the concerns and that they would address them. ... (WNBC, Oct. 30-31, 2006)
  
• Mike vows full search: Concedes some areas were overlooked in previous efforts to find WTC remains ... Residents and local environmental and worker-safety groups have demanded "a full, open public process" as cleanup and, ultimately, demolition of Fiterman begins in the coming weeks. Officials revealed that the city medical examiner is expected to begin searching for human remains in Fiterman Hall by mid-November. ... (NY Daily News, by Michael Saul and Greg B. Smith, October 31, 2006)
  
• Focus on Ailments: Conference on Assisting Trade Center Personnel ... The World Trade Center Medical Monitoring Program will hold a free all-day conference for World Trade Center emergency and service responders who are enrolled in the WTC Medical Monitoring Program on Saturday, Nov. 11. "9/11: Living With The Aftermath," will run from 8:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. in the first-floor auditorium of District Council 37 headquarters at 125 Barclay St. Details Treatment Sites With more than 400 emergency rescue and recovery, service restoration and clean-up workers and volunteers expected to attend, the event will provide valuable information on World Trade Center medical and mental health-related exposures and available treatment and benefit programs for those in need. Responders currently enrolled in the Federally-funded WTC Medical Monitoring Program are invited to attend. Pre-registration is required and may be made by calling 212-241-7830, or by visiting the program Web site at www.wtcexams.org . Eligible WTC worker and volunteer responders not yet enrolled in any Federal program are urged to take this opportunity to enroll in existing free confidential medical screening and monitoring efforts and mention the conference by calling the Federal program's toll-free hotline at 888-702-0630. Programs currently being offered for WTC-responders in the New York metro area and nationwide offer free and no-out-of-pocket-cost medical services such as comprehensive medical screening and monitoring examinations, coordinated under the auspices of the Mount Sinai Center for Occupational & Environmental Medicine, as well as medical and mental health treatment services. To date such programs have provided free medical screening exams to some 32,000 WTC responders of an estimated population of over 40,000 responders potentially affected by exposures. (The Chief-Leader, by Ginger Adams Otis, Oct. 31, 2006)
  
• WTC Update: Bloomberg Gets Report, Orders Comprehensive Search, Construction to Continue ... In the wake of the shocking discovery of more remains from the tragic destruction of the World Trade Center, New York City's Mayor Michael Bloomberg accepted the recommendations in a report from design and construction commissioner David J. Burney and Lower Manhattan construction command center executive director Charles J. Maikish that the current search be continued and expanded. But redevelopment will continue. "This work will continue to be coordinated with the Port Authority and no construction delays are anticipated as a result," according to a statement released Friday by the city. Some have urged a halt and more extensive search of the site. The mayor has stated that redevelopment will continue while the search goes on. "Last week's discovery caused every New Yorker pain, especially those who lost someone close to them during the 9/11 attacks,” Mayor Bloomberg said. "I hope that the actions we are taking will assure everyone that we are doing everything in our power to find their friends, colleagues and loved ones." Although the report found that most of the site was searched free of human remains, it targeted the haul road--where the latest human remains were found--and several other sites that may have also been rushed over during the initial efforts. These include the 140 Liberty Street parcel, the former site of the St. Nicholas Greek Orthodox Church and more searches of "selected subterranean structures in neighboring streets," such as Con Edison, Verizon, and DEP manholes. At the Mayor's request, these searches will "exceed the report's recommendations," according to a release from the City, "because all the material from these locations will be removed and sifted. Protocols for future construction on the site will include having the City's Medical Examiner on site to observe all future construction in areas that have not been excavated since 9/11. ... (CPNonline, by Tom Dworetzky, Oct. 30, 2006)
  
• Concerns over demolition of building near ground zero: Some say Fiterman Hall may contain human remains ... There are serious concerns about the demolition of a building near ground zero. Some 9/11 families believe more human remains may be in the building, after hundreds were discovered in the last week and a half. The building is located right across from 7 World Trade on West Broadway between Barclay and Murray Streets. Fiterman Hall is owned by Manhattan Community College and they say they have a plan to deal with the toxins and to look for human remains. However, people down here don't have much faith in that plan. ... Fiterman Hall is on the periphery of ground zero but it was blanketed by the same toxic dust that most observers believe has caused so many health problems in Lower Manhattan and it was damaged with 7 World Trade Center collapsed. Everyone agrees that the building needs to be demolished, but not everyone agrees how. Jenna Orkin, community activist: "This is a highly astronomically contaminated building ... they've been exposed already by 9/11, they were lied to, they were reassured and patronized ... seems to be happening all over again." You can add to the toxicity the fact that no one has ever searched the building really for human remains. 9/11 family members say current plans for that search are inadequate. ... (abclocal, Oct. 30, 2006)
  
• A Study Links Trucks’ Exhaust to Bronx Schoolchildren’s Asthma ... A group of schoolchildren carried the monitors everywhere they went. The instruments, attached to the backpacks of children with asthma, allowed researchers at New York University to measure the pollution the children were exposed to, morning to night.The South Bronx is home to miles of expressways, more than a dozen waste-transfer stations, a sewage-treatment plant and truck traffic from some of the busiest wholesale produce, meat and fish markets in the world. It is also home to some of the highest asthma hospitalization rates for children in the city. The N.Y.U. study found that the students were exposed to high levels of air pollutants in their neighborhoods and that children in the South Bronx were twice as likely to attend a school near a highway as were children in other parts of the city. ... The findings paint a bleak picture of the air quality in one of the poorest sections of the city and have focused renewed attention from community groups and elected officials on curbing pollution from truck exhaust. .... Airborne particles like dust, soot and smoke that are less than 2.5 micrometers in diameter are small enough to lodge themselves deep in the lungs. Studies have linked pollution of this sort to respiratory problems, decreased lung function, nonfatal heart attacks and aggravated asthma, according to the United States Environmental Protection Agency. E.P.A. officials said these fine particles, a significant portion of which are produced by diesel engine emissions, lead to 15,000 premature deaths a year nationwide. ... “I think it’s an indicator that these kids are being exposed to very high fine-particle concentrations on a fairly regular basis,” said George Thurston, associate professor of environmental medicine at the N.Y.U. School of Medicine, who was one of the study’s principal researchers. ... (NYTimes, by Manny Fenandex, Oct. 29, 2006)
• DOCS RIP NEW AUTOPSY RULES ... Two star forensic pathologists have ripped the proposed guidelines on how to autopsy Ground Zero workers - saying the rules could hinder families from learning if the toxic aftermath of 9/11 killed their loved ones. Dr. Michael Baden, the city's former chief medical examiner, also fears that some will see the plan as "politically motivated." Baden calls the rules "unnecessary, redundant and unwise" in a letter to the National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health. And Cyril Wecht, who performed the autopsy on Anna Nicole Smith's 20-year-old son, wrote NIOSH that the requirements may be too costly and cumbersome. The guidelines set strict rules on whether a death can be blamed on the poisonous smoke and dust, requiring epidemiological studies and saying "it will be years before definitive studies can be performed." .... (NYPost, by Susan Edelman, Oct. 29, 2006)
• More allegations from EPA whistleblower ... Jenkins' latest sixty-page document, addressed to the acting Inspector General of the EPA, is in large part a compilation of her previous allegations, but also claims to offer new evidence that criminal fraud is to blame. In the latest report, Jenkins contends that by failing to report that some of the particulates in the air constituted a severe health hazard--and by suppressing the results of tests for the presence of other toxic chemicals--the EPA misled the public about the dire health consequences of remaining near ground zero or participating in the clean-up effort in the days following the attack. ... (RawStory, by Brian Beutler, Oct. 26, 2006)
• Enzyme tied to WTC ills: May explain cough, study sez ... Doctors unveiled a tantalizing glimpse yesterday into why some firefighters may suffer from the "World Trade Center cough" while others who endured the toxic dust and fumes at Ground Zero are relatively healthy. Firefighters whose lung capacity deteriorated faster in the wake of 9/11 were more likely to be deficient in a key natural enzyme that protects against lung damage, according to a study of 90 of the 12,000 Bravest who responded to the attacks at Ground Zero. But Dr. David Prezant, the study's lead researcher and the FDNY's co-chief medical officer, cautioned against drawing too broad a conclusion from the report. "This is very, very preliminary information that cannot in any shape or form be translated into a diagnosis or treatment initiative," Prezant told the Daily News from Salt Lake City, where he presented his findings at a gathering of the American College of Chest Physicians. ... Using a blood test normally used to screen people at risk of early-onset emphysema, Prezant found that 11 of the 90 firefighters had low levels of an enzyme called alpha-1 antitrypsin, or A1AT. Of the 11, four had a significant deficiency of A1AT while seven had a moderate deficiency, the blood tests showed.But none had the most severe kind of genetic deficiency. All have the WTC cough. "What this enzyme does is it protects the lungs from damage," said Dr. Mark Rosen, a pulmonologist at North Shore-Long Island Jewish Medical Center and president of American College of Chest Physicians. "It prevents the destruction of lung tissue by a variety of mechanisms," he said. About 150,000 Americans have a severe shortage of A1AT, but many are undiagnosed. "Many more have a partial deficiency, and most of those people are not diagnosed for their whole lives because most of those people don't get sick" unless they are exposed to toxins such as cigarette smoke, Rosen said. Prezant stressed that trying to determine whether a particular disease - whether it's WTC cough or breast cancer - is due to genetic or environmental factors is a science that's still in its infancy. "It's not going to be one genetic trait" that is responsible for WTC cough, Prezant said. .... (NYDaily News, by Paul H.B. Shin, October 25, 2006)
  
• Medical Views of 9/11's Dust Show Big Gaps ... In 2004, Kenneth R. Feinberg, special master of the federal Sept. 11 Victim Compensation Fund, awarded $2.6 million to the family of a downtown office worker who died from a rare lung disease five months after fleeing from the dust cloud released when the twin towers fell. That decision made the worker, Felicia Dunn-Jones, a 42-year-old lawyer, the first official fatality of the dust, and one of only two deaths to be formally linked to the toxic air at ground zero. The New York City medical examiner’s office, however, has refused to put her on its official list of 9/11 victims, saying that by its standards there was insufficient medical evidence to link her death to the dust. Mrs. Dunn-Jones’s case shows how difficult it can be to prove a causal connection with any scientific certainty — and how even government agencies can disagree. With thousands of people now seeking compensation and treatment for dust exposure, the debate about the relationship between the toxic particles and disease will be a central issue in the flood of Sept. 11-related lawsuits. Health experts are starting to document the connections, but any firm conclusion is still years away. ... For the next few months, life returned to normal, until Mrs. Dunn-Jones developed a cough. In January 2002, the cough grew worse. On Feb. 10, she suddenly stopped breathing and died. Mr. Jones, 54, an assistant manager at a Brooklyn pharmacy, was stunned. Then, when he received the official death certificate months later, he was shocked to see an unfamiliar word — sarcoidosis. ... sarcoidosis, which produces microscopic lumps called granulomas, on vital organs, is often associated with exposure to environmental hazards. ... Dr. Prezant, who declined to be interviewed for this article, was one of two experts who testified at a hearing conducted by Mr. Feinberg. In the first four years after 9/11, he found 20 cases of sarcoidosis in the Fire Department, a rate of 80 per 100,000 in the first year (with treatment, all are now stable), compared with a national rate of fewer than 6 per 100,000, according to the American Thoracic Society. The other expert was Dr. Alan M. Fein, a clinical professor of medicine at the New York University School of Medicine. He, too, was skeptical at first, but he said he changed his mind after reviewing Mrs. Dunn-Jones’s medical record, including the autopsy report. “I’m comfortable saying her death was caused by exposure to the dust,” Dr. Fein said in an interview. ... (NYTimes, by Anthony DePalma, October 24, 2006)
• Genetic Disorder Linked to Rapid Lung Function Decline in Some World Trade Center Rescue Workers Finger-Stick Test in Development for Alpha-1 Antitrypsin Deficiency Could Provide Immediate Screening Results ... (American College of Chest Physicians, Oct. 23, 2006)
  
• Ground Zero Worker Lung Damage Affected by Protein, Study Says ... World Trade Center rescue workers with lower levels of a certain protein suffered worse lung damage than their peers following the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, according to a study. Researchers from New York's Montefiore Medical Center following 90 World Trade Center rescue workers through 2005 found 11 with moderate to severe deficiencies of the protein, a genetic disorder called alpha-1 antitrypsin deficiency. They were more prone to lung and liver damage than those with normal levels, the study said. Before the attacks, workers with the protein deficiency showed no heightened lung decline. Alpha-1 antitrypsin deficiency, estimated to affect 150,000 North Americans, inhibits the lung and liver's ability to control natural healing. That hinders the body from reversing inflammation in organs exposed to environmental irritants, said the study's co-authors, Dr. Gisela Banauch and Dr. David Prezant. ``The more we learn about genetics, the more we understand there are genetic links to environmental interaction that can lead to disease,'' Prezant, who is also the deputy chief medical officer to the New York City Fire Department, said in a telephone interview from Salt Lake City. He said the study, which he said produced preliminary data, is an ``attempt to work at mechanisms'' that with further study may ``help people understand the risk of their exposure.'' Being able to screen people with the deficiency may help minimize lung damage, the study said. An estimated 5 percent of people in North America with alpha-1 antitrypsin deficiency have been diagnosed. The authors said a so-called finger-stick test measuring proteins from one drop of blood taken from a patient is promising. ... (Bloomberg, by Todd Zeranski, Oct. 23, 2006)
  
• More 9/11 pain unearthed ... The recent find of a "mother lode" of bones beneath a service road next to West St. gives hope to families who never recovered any remains, but also calls into question just how thorough the government-supervised search for human remains at Ground Zero was. The search began the day after the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks on the World Trade Center and continued through mid-October 2002. Multiple agencies were involved, although the Fire Department handled most of the task. After the first week, the FDNY began using GPS devices to record where remains were found, enabling it to track where had been searched and what needed to be searched. The scope of the task was overwhelming. There were 2,749 dead, and more than 20,000 human remains were ultimately recovered. To date, 1,150 of those killed have not been identified. And it's now apparent that remains were somehow missed. This first became clear with the former Deutsche Bank at 130 Liberty St., a 40-story skyscraper ripped open by the collapsing south tower that was declared searched and clean in 2002. ... FDNY spokesman James Long said for 10 days that June, two search teams went through 130 Liberty from the roof to the ground. "We didn't dismantle; we didn't sift through. We didn't look in air ducts, that kind of thing," he said. "Nothing was discovered. We never went back in there." More than three years later, in September last year, construction crews found bones on the roof. A thorough search then discovered more than 700 bone fragments on the roof. A state official recently predicted no more human remains would be found there, but a source familiar with its ongoing deconstruction says two spots - the fifth-floor mechanical room and the lobby - are expected to yield more. ... However, Con Ed spokesman Mike Clendenin said there's no indication the utility was ever asked to search the vaults underneath the manholes. Verizon officials said they were looking into whether their manhole vaults were searched. Meanwhile, two other buildings - Fiterman Hall on the north side of The Pit and 130 Cedar St. on the south side - have never been thoroughly searched for human remains, records show. Both received a visual inspection from the Fire Department, but remain off-limits five years later because they still contain toxic dust from the collapse of the towers. Both buildings are bizarre testaments to the disaster, frozen in time, their facades ripped by the collapsing towers, their interiors clogged with Trade Center dust. Fiterman, which is owned by the state Dormitory Authority, has been off-limits because of a fight over how much insurance firms would pay for the cleanup. "We have no knowledge of anyone ever searching the interior of Fiterman Hall for human remains," said Claudia Hutton, spokeswoman for the Dormitory Authority. She said a search involving the city medical examiner is expected to begin in the spring before the state begins taking the building down. ... Then there's 130 Cedar St. The collapsing south tower chopped a huge hole in the top of the building, showering its roof and interior with debris. The building was given a visual search by the Fire Department shortly after the attacks, then revisited by a team supervised by the Federal Emergency Management Agency. On its Albany St. side, FEMA spray-painted in orange an "X" with the word "plane" because parts of a plane were found inside. The eerie sign remains. An official familiar with the search of 130 Cedar St. said the building was clogged with debris during the Sept. 16, 2001, search. But when the city and federal regulators entered the building in August, much of the debris was gone, leaving only the toxic dust. ... A shroud covers the building from top to bottom. The owner, Cedar & Washington Assoc., LLC, recently met with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to draft a plan to demolish part of the building. ... (NYDaily News, by Greg B. Smith, Oct. 22, 2006)
  
• Ground Zero K-9's AOK: vet ... Scientists studying the health of search dogs at Ground Zero are baffled by their findings - while thousands of responders have fallen ill, dogs who prowled the toxic World Trade Center site have emerged unscarred. While many Ground Zero dogs have died - some of rare cancers - researchers say many others have lived beyond the average life span for dogs and are not getting any sicker than average.There are no signs of major illness in the animals, declared Cynthia Otto, a veterinarian at the University of Pennsylvania, where researchers studied 97 dogs starting five years ago. "They didn't have any airway protection," she said. "They didn't have any skin protection. They were sort of in the worst of it."Owners of the dogs dispute the findings, however, saying there is a definite link between the toxic air and their pets' health. ... As of last month, the veterinarian said, 30% of the dogs deployed after Sept. 11 had died, compared with 22% of those in a comparison group of dogs who were not pressed into service. The difference was not considered statistically significant, she said. ... (NYDaily News, by Owen Mortiz, Oct. 21, 2006)
• Scientists: Dogs Not Injured by WTC Work ... They dug in the toxic World Trade Center dust for survivors, and later for the dead. Their feet were burned by white-hot debris. But unlike thousands of others who toiled at ground zero after Sept. 11, these rescue workers aren't sick. Scientists have spent years studying the health of search-and-rescue dogs that nosed through the debris at ground zero, and to their surprise, they have found no sign of major illness in the animals. They are trying to figure out why this is so. "They didn't have any airway protection, they didn't have any skin protection. They were sort of in the worst of it," said Cynthia Otto, a veterinarian at the University of Pennsylvania, where researchers launched a study of 97 dogs five years ago. Although many ground zero dogs have died - some of rare cancers - researchers say many have lived beyond the average life span for dogs and are not getting any sicker than average. Owners of the dogs dispute the findings, saying there is a definite link between the toxic air and their pets' health. Otto has tracked dogs that spent an average of 10 days after the 2001 terrorist attacks at either the trade center site, the landfill in New York where most of the debris was taken, or the heavily damaged Pentagon. As of last month, she said, 30 percent of the dogs deployed after Sept. 11 had died, compared with 22 percent of those in a comparison group of dogs who were not pressed into service. The difference was not considered statistically significant, Otto said. ... A separate study, to be published soon by a doctor at New York's Animal Medical Center, focused on about two dozen New York police dogs, and comes to similar conclusions. The results have baffled doctors.... The dogs' owners and scientists have many theories why dogs aren't showing the same level of illness as people. Their noses are longer, possibly serving as a filter to protect their lungs from toxic dust and other debris, they say. The dogs were at the site an average of several days, while many people who report lung disease and cancer spent months cleaning up after the attacks. The research isn't persuasive to many owners of dogs that died after working at the trade center site. ... Joaquin Guerrero, a police officer in Saginaw, Mich., took two dogs, Felony and Rookie, to ground zero for 10 days after the attacks. While Felony remains healthy, Rookie died at age 9 in 2004 of cancer of the mouth. Guerrero believes his death was caused by exposure to ground zero. ... Scott Shields' golden retriever, Bear, located the body of a fire chief and many other victims at ground zero. The 11-year-old dog died a year after the attacks of several types of cancer. "He had never been sick a day in his life" before going to the site, where he sustained a wound to his back from steel debris, Shields said. Shields, who heads a search-and-rescue dog foundation named after Bear, said Bear "died from bad government" and the toxic air at ground zero. He said that studies under way should have included every dog that worked at the site, and that the Penn study is flawed because it tries to compare dogs that worked at the Pentagon as well as in New York. Otto said that some of the dogs that worked at the sites could not be found and other dogs' owners were not willing to subject their pets to annual blood tests and X-rays. Mary Flood, whose 11 1/2-year-old black Labrador, Jake, is completely healthy five years after working at ground zero, said that dogs' much shorter life span may also make it harder to track long-term illness. ... (Washington Post, by Amy Westfeldt, October 20, 2006)
  
• Ruling Opens a Door for Thousands of Ground Zero Lawsuits ... A federal judge has rejected the city's claim that it is protected by law from being sued over the way it handled rescue and recovery operations at ground zero. The ruling opens the way for lawsuits by thousands of workers who say they were made sick by exposure to toxic substances during the 10-month cleanup. Judge Alvin K. Hellerstein of United States District Court in Manhattan rejected the city's motion to dismiss the lawsuits. In a 99-page decision released yesterday afternoon, he stated that state and federal statutes do provide some immunity for the city, its private contractors and the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey for actions undertaken in response to an enemy attack. However, the judge said that protection is not universal and varies by time and place, making it necessary to hear the details of individual cases. ''The fact-intensive nature of the issue makes its resolution unsuitable for resolution by motion,'' Judge Hellerstein concluded. ''Discovery, additional proceedings and a more extensive factual record, and perhaps a trial, will be required.'' Michael A. Cardozo, the corporation counsel for the city, said in a statement that although the judge ruled that the legal case can proceed, he made it clear that the issue of immunity would be determined on a case-by-case basis. ''We believe that as the facts fully emerge, the complex decisions that were carefully and thoughtfully made during the months after 9/11 will demonstrate the enormous good work done by the city and its contractors, and the absence of any legal liabilities,'' Mr. Cardozo said. ... (NYTimes, by Anthony DePalma, Oct. 18, 2006)
• Campaign Aims to Help First Responders Claim Compensation For 9/11 Illnesses ... Thousands of people who labored at the World Trade Center site in the days after 9/11 are in danger of missing out on a chance to claim benefits in the event they become sick as a result of their work there. But a new drive is underway to ensure that doesn't happen ... With a growing number of 9/11 responders falling seriously ill, union representatives, health care providers, and other leaders launched a ten-month campaign Wednesday to publicize a state law that gives many of those who were exposed after 9/11 the right to workers' compensation benefits if they become sick. "This will allow thousands of individuals who have been denied claims on procedural grounds the opportunity to get the worker's compensation benefits they deserve," said Manhattan Assemblyman Jonathan Bing. The bill was signed into law back in August and is aimed at giving workers and volunteers who worked south of Canal and Pike Streets, on the barge operation between Lower Manhattan and Staten Island, and at Fresh Kills, an opportunity to file claims for current or future illnesses. To give a sense of how massive this outreach campaign needs to be – so far, only 176 workers have registered, out of a possible 300,000 estimated to have worked below Canal Street in the year following 9/11. ... This push comes a day after affected workers won a victory in court with a federal judge ruling that the city is not automatically protected from lawsuits by emergency workers who say they got sick after working at the Trade Center site. The lawsuits – and there could be thousands – claim the city and its contractors did not meet their responsibility to monitor the air at the site and provide adequate respiratory equipment.... For more information about how to register for Trade Center-related medical benefits, log onto www.nycosh.org or call 1-866-WTC-2556. The deadline is August 14, 2007. ... (NY1, Amanda Farinacci, Oct. 18, 2006)
  
• Companies Must pay BIllions To Rebuild WTC, Said Court ... Meanwhile, a federal judge ruled Tuesday that thousands of emergency workers made sick by contaminated air at the World Trade Center site can move forward with their lawsuits against the city. The judge rejected a motion to dismiss the lawsuits, which say the city and its contractors are responsible for the monitoring of the air and for providing responders with the proper respiratory equipment. ... A lawyer for the city says the facts of the claims will reveal no legal liabilities by the city and its contractors. The judge dismissed claims against companies like Con Edison and companies controlled by developer Larry Silverstein, saying they had no legal control over the site and are not liable for damages. (NY1, Oct. 18, 2006)
  
• NY must answer September 11 cleanup damage claims: judge ... Claims brought by 3,000 emergency workers who sued New York City over health damages caused from the cleanup after the Sept. 11 attacks can move forward, a U.S. federal judge ruled on Tuesday. The World Trade Center recovery workers sued the city, the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey and hundreds of city contractors in 2003. They claimed they lacked proper breathing equipment to combat the toxic air during the 10-month cleanup, and that their lungs were permanently damaged as a result. The city and the Port Authority have argued that they are immune from negligence suits when responding to terror attacks and filed motions to have the suit dismissed. In his opinion, U.S. District Judge Alvin Hellerstein said that while the city and the agency are provided immunity under U.S. state and federal law, the degree varied "according to date, place and activity" and more information was needed to determine their level of responsibility. ... Hellerstein dismissed claims against power company Con Edison and developer Silverstein Properties, which were named as defendants because they were leaseholders on the Ground Zero site. There was "no credible evidence" they had access to the site in the weeks after the attacks and were "barred from re-entry without express approval by the city," Hellerstein said. Michael Cardozo, a lawyer for the city, said the workers' claims were unfounded. ... (by Matthew Verrinder, Oct. 17, 2006)
• Judge refuses to grant immunity from Sept. 11 lawsuits ... A judge Tuesday refused to toss out the claims thousands of emergency workers who were sickened by World Trade Center dust brought against New York City and about 150 private contractors. U.S. District Judge Alvin K. Hellerstein, however, dismissed claims against the Consolidated Edison Co. and companies controlled by developer Larry Silverstein, saying they did not have legal control over the area and therefore weren't liable for damages. But Hellerstein said the city, its contractors, and the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey were only partially immune from lawsuits, with the precise scope and extent of the immunity varying according to date, place and activity. Andrew J. Carboy, a lawyer for plaintiffs, called it "an important decision, a first step forward in the legal system for these other victims of 9-11." Carboy, who represents 210  individuals, mostly firefighters, said Hellerstein's decision comes as the number of people making claims reaches as high as 8,000. Michael A. Cardozo, the city's top lawyer, said a close study of the facts surrounding the claims will show an absence of any legal liabilities by the city and its contractors. Hellerstein said he will appoint a special master to help eliminate claims that should not be pressed and to otherwise manage a case that is "likely to become unmanageable." "If even a minority of the plaintiffs suffered serious injuries to their respiratory tracts arising from the acrid air of September 11, their claims deserve to be heard when a recovery could make a difference in their lives," the judge wrote. He said the defendants also are entitled to resolution at the earliest possible point. "The scar to the public interest needs to be cleansed, speedily, in good time," he said. The city and its contractors are trying to avoid damages in lawsuits filed on behalf of workers who cleaned up the World Trade Center site for months after the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. ... (AP, by Larry Neumeister, Oct. 17, 2006)
  
• 350G PAYCHECK FOR CITY'S 9/11 SCROOGE ... The woman in charge of the $1 billion fund that's fighting claims by sickened World Trade Center rescue and recovery workers is collecting $350,000 a year plus benefits from the federal fund - a pay package that has stunned and angered advocates for the 9/11 responders. Christine LaSala, president and CEO of the city-controlled WTC Captive Insurance Co., which is managing the 9/11 fund created by Congress, gets the entity's top salary - which has never before been publicly revealed - plus $20,000 in health benefits for herself and her family, documents obtained by The Post show. Meanwhile, teams of lawyers hired by the fund to dispute and deny more than 5,000 claims for illnesses blamed on toxic exposure at Ground Zero earn up to $550 an hour for "senior partners," the records show. Other top lawyers working for the entity earn higher rates, sources said. The Post has reported that Captive, a self-insurance fund set up by the city in 2004 to cover claims from the WTC cleanup, had spent more than $40 million as of four months ago on overhead and lawyers. The company has refused to pay a single ill Ground Zero responder. LaSala, 56, a former partner at insurance brokerage Johnson & Higgins, took the helm of the captive in mid-2004. "It's amazing that Ms. LaSala gets $20,000 for health insurance while the 9/11 heroes she's fighting often have no health coverage at all," said Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-N.Y.). ... (NYPost, by Susan Edelman, Oct. 15, 2006)
• Lost in the Dust of 9/11: From society's margins, janitors were drafted for an epic cleanup around ground zero. Then 'the cough' racked their lives ... There is no voice left in Manuel Checo's voice. He speaks in a granular rasp that fades, occasionally, to whispery puffs of air. Sometimes, for periods as long as two days, he is unable to speak at all. .... Checo, a janitor, spent six months cleaning dust from office buildings around ground zero after the World Trade Center attack. Five years later, the lining of his lungs is pocked with scars and densities that do not belong there — possibly a sign of a disease that can cause lung tissue to become so stiff that it can no longer carry oxygen, wrote a radiologist who examined a scan of his lungs last year. ... The dust around ground zero, we now know, contained caustic, finely pulverized concrete, trillions of microscopic fibers of glass, and particles of lead, mercury and arsenic, as well as carcinogens like asbestos and dioxin. Five years out, the "World Trade Center cough" has started to look like a persistent — and in some cases disabling — respiratory condition. ... The day they went in for appointments, everything changed. Checo was diagnosed with rhinitis, sinusitis, asthma, chronic post-traumatic stress disorder, major depression, delusional disorder, and schizophrenia, paranoid type. Sanchez was diagnosed with asthma, sinusitis, gastroesophageal reflux, various musculoskeletal injuries and post-traumatic stress disorder. Each now takes fistfuls of medications. ... Both now receive regular workers' compensation payments — Sanchez receives $243 a week, Checo about $350 — and free healthcare at Mount Sinai. They are among 75 plaintiffs who have filed a $30-million lawsuit against the owners of dozens of office towers in Lower Manhattan. But that case is not likely to go to trial for at least two years, said their attorney, Robert Grochow. ... (latimes.com, by Ellen Barry, Oct. 14, 2006)
  
• Senator Clinton Addresses Student 9/11 related health Concerns ... Senator Hillary Clinton is asking the EPA to address the health concerns of some students whose school is near the World Trade Center site. Stuyvesant High School in Battery Park reopened less than a month after September 11th. In a letter to the EPA, Clinton says students are now coming forward with a variety of ailments linked to 9/11, such as increased asthma and even lymphoma. Just after the attacks, the EPA deemed the air quality in Lower Manhattan safe, an assertion that is now widely rejected. Clinton says it's time for the agency to "reverse course" and conduct new testing and cleanup in New York. She and other lawmakers are also calling on the federal government to provide funding for medical screening and health insurance to help children who suffer from 9/11 related illnesses. The measure is similar to what lawmakers also want for first responders and Lower Manhattan residents. ... (NY1, Oct. 13, 2006)
  
• Low-Sulfur Diesel Fuel Is Reaching Market ... The biggest revolution in highway fuels since lead was removed from gasoline will be nearly complete on Sunday as a vast majority of trucks and buses will be able to fill their tanks with diesel fuel with just 3 percent of the sulfur content in the older fuel. Like lead, sulfur generates air pollution that leads to severe health consequences. Like lead, it also gums up the works of fine-tuned pollution control devices, making it exceedingly difficult to produce cleaner-burning engines. So the new fuel will pave the way for new generations of diesel engines that experts say will eventually cut lethal particulate pollution from diesel tailpipes an estimated 95 percent. ... The new fuel contains 15 parts per million of sulfur, down from the standard of 500 parts per million, thanks to changes in the refining process. As of Sunday, at least 80 percent of the diesel available for trucks and buses has to meet the new standard. Officials of the environmental agency said Tuesday that the changeover was occurring so swiftly that 90 percent of the fuel would be compatible. Old diesel engines burning the cleaner fuel will reduce dangerous particulate emissions by 10 percent, experts say. New engines with improved controls, which have to be available by Jan. 1, will cut this particulate pollution by more than 95 percent. The rule mandates more improved engines in 2010. It is unclear how soon existing trucks and buses, which often are in use for more than 10 years, will be turned in for newer models. The new fuel is expected to cost 3 cents to 5 cents more per gallon. Like many regulations that took effect in the twilight of the Clinton administration, the diesel rule, covering fuel and the seven million trucks and buses on the roads, was temporarily stayed by the Bush administration. Then the Environmental Protection Agency allowed it to proceed and in 2004 supplemented it with a similar rule requiring tight controls on engines in off-road equipment like cranes, tractors and construction equipment. ... The diesel vehicles emitted 43 percent of the smog- and particulate-forming nitrogen oxides and more than two-thirds of the soot. Even though the diesel-produced particulates were 3 percent of the total particulate matter in the air, most of which was from industrial sources, Mr. Kassel added, ''tailpipe particulates are coming out right where we breathe.'' ... (NYTimes, by Relicity Barringer, October 11, 2006)
  
• Advocates Say Illegal Workers Suffer After 9/11 Cleanup: But a Recent N.Y. Program Offers Help to Many With Lung, Other Diseases ... Jose Moncada watched the World Trade Center towers tumble, and, like so many Americans, felt a patriotic urge to help rescue survivors and rebuild after Sept. 11. "It was my time to put my hand on my heart," he said. "It was my time to help somebody." It did not matter to him that he was an illegal immigrant from Honduras. And that did not seem to matter to supervisors who oversaw the retrieval of human remains and the removal of toxic debris at Ground Zero. They welcomed Moncada and thousands of other illegal immigrants, no questions asked. Working on the pile for 10 days, Moncada breathed in thick dust, grainy asbestos and foul-smelling gases driven by an angry downtown wind. Now, five years later, he suffers from a hacking cough, nosebleeds, wheezing breath and life-threatening respiratory illnesses that also trouble thousands of legal U.S. residents who worked there. No one knows how many illegal immigrants worked at Ground Zero in the days after Sept. 11. Immigration advocates claim it was thousands. And now, as the workers have become sick, partisans on both sides cast their plight in moral terms. "After 9/11, everybody responded with their heart," said Carmen Calderón, coordinator of Sept. 11 immigrant outreach for the New York Committee for Occupational Safety and Health. "Immigrants died in those towers. They wanted to be part of the recovery of this nation." ... Workers were paid about $19 an hour, toiling for up to 16 hours a day. They were given buckets, mops, rags and little protective equipment as they cleared away glass, metal, dust and waste from downtown buildings that were not destroyed, advocates said. "The ladies were smaller, so they put them in the air ducts, huge pipes," Calderón said. "They crawled in to wipe down the pipes with no masks, no gloves, nothing, not even a change of clothes." Two years later, Moncada started to feel tired. Then he felt pain. "My nose hurts every time I breathe," he said. "My vision is very bad. My breathing is very bad. A doctor gave me Tylenol and Advil. "I don't want to speak to anybody. I want to stay home. I feel depressed. I can't sleep very well at night. Every day I wake up and I do nothing. I don't know what is happening to my system, my body." Andrzej said he felt even worse. He went to an emergency room when he could not move his arms. He was admitted for a week and released with medication to control blood clotting. ... (Washington Post, by Darryl Fears, Oct. 8, 2006)
  
• MBP STRINGER CALLS FOR FEDERAL MONITORING OF STUDENTS WITH 9/11 HEALTH ISSUES ... On Sunday, October 1, Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer held a press conference to call attention to yet another group that is beginning to show signs of ill-health that may have been caused by airborne contaminants released in the collapse of the World Trade Center five years ago -- the students of Lower Manhattan.     Tom Goodkind, who spoke at the event, says he is concerned that children have not been properly monitored for arising health issues. "From all accounts, they seem to be the most vulnerable group," said Mr. Goodkind.  "They were very young and thy've got a long way to go, but there only seems to be plans for everyone else," he said referring to the attention that first-responders have recently received. Mr. Goodkind, along with Mr. Stringer, called upon the federal government to take action. "A society has to take care of its children," he said. (BPC Broadsheet, October 6 - October 22, 2006)
  
• Top Doctors Say Trade Center Dust Could Cause Cancer... Top New York doctors are concerned that the dust cloud that fell on the city after the World Trade Center attack could have contained cancer-causing agents and say individuals who breathed it should be tracked more closely for medical problems, including cancer. A Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center oncologist, Dr. Larry Norton, said there is "every reason to expect" that the debris could have been carcinogenic. While he stopped short of predicting higher cancer rates among those who breathed in the air, saying there was no evidence to rely on at this point, the doctor said there is enough concern about ailments, including cancers of the esophagus, head, and neck, to ramp up studies, screenings, and treatments. "What I'm basically saying is that this requires very serious study and I don't see the funds being made available to really do the proper studies," said Dr. Norton, the physician-in-chief for the breast cancer program at the hospital. "What I'm basically saying is that this requires very serious study and I don't see the funds being made available to really do the proper studies," said Dr. Norton, the physician-in-chief for the breast cancer program at the hospital. "I don't have the answers, but it bothers me a lot that I may never have the answers," he added. "The whole nation mobilized to handle the acute health consequences of this disaster. Why isn't the whole nation mobilizing to take care of the chronic health impact of this disaster?" An associate professor of public health and medicine at Weill Cornell Medical College, Dr. Nathaniel Hupert, who has lived in Battery Park City since before the World Trade Center attacks, said he is also concerned about the health risks people were exposed to. He said his dog, an Australian shepherd, developed intestinal cancer and died about two years after the attacks and that he knows several neighborhood dogs that also died seemingly prematurely. ... (NY Sun, by Jill Gardiner, Oct. 4, 2006)
  
• Green Construction ... When Paul Stein pushed for thick windows and fancy air filters for his new office in lower Manhattan soon after 9/11, it was mainly because he was worried about lingering contaminants from the collapse of the Twin Towers. But these measures have also wound up protecting him against a different kind of pollution -- pollution that Stein, who works on safety issues for his union, says his office at 90 Church Street is "surrounded by": pollution from construction. It is a problem that goes far beyond lower Manhattan. ... The construction downtown is unique in that the contaminants from Ground Zero are still an issue. In late September, the Environmental Protection Agency finally approved a plan to demolish the Deutsche Bank Building adjacent to the site, after a long debate over how best to ensure that the asbestos and other dangerous chemicals in the building are not released into the air; the building will come down over the next year. Similar issues must be resolved for other buildings that are either known or suspected to be contaminated. The huge scale of the development downtown also ensures that there will be more pollution than in a project of conventional size. ... The Lower Manhattan Construction Command Center has established a set of environmental guidelines, which include limiting the amount of time a truck can stand with its motor running, and requiring on-site construction vehicles to use ultra-low sulfur diesel fuel. "The largest fleet of retrofitted diesel construction machinery in the US is now in lower Manhattan. And it's really serving as a model for other places," said Andy Darrell of Environmental Defense, which advocates nationwide for the use of cleaner diesel fuel. City Hall and Albany have also both passed legislation requiring both trucks and construction equipment to use such fuel while working downtown. But the laws currently only apply to construction vehicles working on the site – not the trucks that deliver materials. Critics say this undermines the laws' stated intention of addressing the post 9/11 rebuilding process in lower Manhattan. "The peak construction years are the next four years," said Julie Menin, chair of Community Board One. "We don't want to wait." Developer Larry Silverstein, who suffers from asthma himself, is trying to step up during that time. The trucks he used to build Seven World Trade Center used ultra-low sulfur fuel. Silverstein announced in early September that trucks for his construction projects – which include all four towers planned for Ground Zero – would also use this fuel. Praising the move, Community Board One recently passed a resolution calling on the public agencies and other private developers working downtown to make similar commitments. The construction command center signed its support onto the resolution. ... (Gotham Gazette, by Joshau Brustein, October 4, 2006)
  
• Green Construciton ... When Paul Stein pushed for thick windows and fancy air filters for his new office in lower Manhattan soon after 9/11, it was mainly because he was worried about lingering contaminants from the collapse of the Twin Towers. But these measures have also wound up protecting him against a different kind of pollution -- pollution that Stein, who works on safety issues for his union, says his office at 90 Church Street is "surrounded by": pollution from construction. ... Cleaner Diesel Fuel ... Much of the attention on green construction is focused on the fuel needed to run the machinery and vehicles involved. Trucks, bulldozers, and backhoes all run on diesel fuel, which has been linked to asthma and other health problems. Fitting these vehicles with filters, and running them with fuel that has low levels of sulfur, can drastically reduce the amount of pollution they cause. The Lower Manhattan Construction Command Center has established a set of environmental guidelines, which include limiting the amount of time a truck can stand with its motor running, and requiring on-site construction vehicles to use ultra-low sulfur diesel fuel. "The largest fleet of retrofitted diesel construction machinery in the US is now in lower Manhattan. And it's really serving as a model for other places," said Andy Darrell of Environmental Defense, which advocates nationwide for the use of cleaner diesel fuel. City Hall and Albany have also both passed legislation requiring both trucks and construction equipment to use such fuel while working downtown. But the laws currently only apply to construction vehicles working on the site – not the trucks that deliver materials. Critics say this undermines the laws' stated intention of addressing the post 9/11 rebuilding process in lower Manhattan. "The peak construction years are the next four years," said Julie Menin, chair of Community Board One. "We don't want to wait." Developer Larry Silverstein, who suffers from asthma himself, is trying to step up during that time. The trucks he used to build Seven World Trade Center used ultra-low sulfur fuel. Silverstein announced in early September that trucks for his construction projects – which include all four towers planned for Ground Zero – would also use this fuel. Praising the move, Community Board One recently passed a resolution calling on the public agencies and other private developers working downtown to make similar commitments. The construction command center signed its support onto the resolution. .... For Stein, the man working at 90 Church, this atmosphere has led to a feeling of distrust that leaves him wary of the nearby construction. He worries about the cumulative effect of construction pollution, since many projects will likely be built simultaneously over the next five to six years. Even if it is green, so much construction is bound to be dirty. ... (Gotham Gazette,by Joshua Brustein, October 4, 2006)
• 9/11 hero battling cancer, money woes ... Now Roy Chelsen is fighting for his own survival: He's been diagnosed with the same incurable cancer that recently struck an FDNY comrade who also spent weeks digging through the rubble at Ground Zero. "Nobody will admit it, but I feel I got this from 9/11," Chelsen, 46, said yesterday. "We were there when the towers fell and we sucked all those toxins in." Yesterday, Chelsen's family organized a blood and bone-marrow donation drive at his Engine 28/Ladder 11 firehouse in the East Village. ... Fellow Bravest Lee Ielpi, who lost his firefighter son Jonathan, 29, in the terrorist attack and spent nine months working at The Pile, was diagnosed with Waldenstrom's macroglobulinemia about four months ago after suffering shortness of breath and swelling in his ankles. ... (NYDaily News, by Nancy Dillon, (Oct. 3, 2006)
  
• Manhattan: Care for Students Near Ground Zero ... Representative Jerrold L. Nadler, Borough President Scott M. Stringer and Councilman Alan J. Gerson, all Manhattan Democrats, held a news conference yesterday at Stuyvesant High School to urge the federal government to pay for research, medical screenings and health insurance for students who attended school in Lower Manhattan after the 9/11 terrorist attack. They were joined by Amit Friedlander, who graduated from Stuyvesant in 2002. Mr. Friedlander, a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania, recently received a diagnosis of Hodgkin’s lymphoma and suspects toxic dust from ground zero was a cause. Federal officials have acknowledged delays in helping responders and recovery workers who were sickened at ground zero, but the effect on students in Lower Manhattan has only recently received public attention. (NYTimes, by Sewell Chan, Oct. 2, 2006)
  
• Students Sick With 9/11-Related Illnesses Want Federal Help ... In addition to the emotional trauma they faced after the World Trade Center attacks, students who went to schools in Lower Manhattan say they are also facing respiratory problems, and now they also want the federal government's help. Current and former students were told it was safe to return to class after September 11th, and they did, exposing themselves to the same toxic air inhaled by first responders. "They were minors during 9/11; they had no options. They were ordered back to school because the EPA said that the air was safe, and they had no ability to say yes or no," said Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer. "And now we're finding out that it may be that some of these children are going to come down with very serious illnesses." "A major driver of lymphoma is being exposed to excessive amounts of toxins pollutants, which is exactly what we inhaled when we were down here after September 11," said former Stuyvesant High School student Amit Friedlander, who was recently diagnosed with Hodgkin's Lymphoma. "So I think, whether or not my cancer came from September 11, there definitely will be a lot of people who will be getting sick." The families are calling on the federal government to provide money for medical screening and health insurance for the students. Olivia Goodkind is celebrating her birthday but not the typical way a ten- year- old celebrates. She is front and center at a news conference addressing 9/11 health concerns facing students who attended school near the World Trade Center at the time of the attacks. "I really think we should do something,” said Goodkind. “Do something really fast, really soon, because something worse will happen." Olivia’s worry is that one out of three of her classmates at P.S. 89 carries an inhaler, according to Olivia and her father. "It's like at my school everyone shows them off,” said Goodkind. “It’s like the latest thing, like a style in a way." ... Even though Friedlander is not sure his illness is 9/11 related he hopes his story can help others. "I used to never get sick,” said Friedlander. “Once I started to go to college, I was, and still am, sick all the time. And if I had known at the time that it was symptoms of cancer maybe I'd been able to stop it early. I wasn't able but, if other people can, I'd be happy." (NY1, October 02, 2006)
  
• The next generation of Sept. 11 victims Pol, Stuy High grads want health screen for downtown alums ... The Stuyvesant High School students may be the new face of a health crisis linked to the toxic dust from the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks. They joined Borough President Scott Stringer at a press conference yesterday to demand the federal government admits it misled minors in the immediate aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks by telling them the air was safe and allowing the Stuy High students to return to school on Oct. 9, 2001, even though fires at the site were still smoldering and workers in hazmat suits were carting off debris. “They were practically babies when this happened,” Stringer said. “Now they’re in their 20s and should be in prime health.” He wants the federal government to provide funding for research, medical screenings and health insurance to address the concerns of those who attended that school, as well the area’s PS/IS 89 and PS 234, in 2001. Stringer was flanked by Stuyvesant grads Lila Nordstrom and Amit Friedlander, who were both in their senior year in 2001 and who are both trying to raise awareness among their peers about potential health risks. ... (Metro NY, by Amy Zimmer, Oct. 2, 2006)
  
• Families "Walk to Rember" 9/11 Victims Downtown ... Families made their way from Battery Park to the World Trade Center site Saturday to pay tribute to their loved ones who died on Flight 93, at the Pentagon and in the World Trade Center. Five years after 9/11, organizers say the focus of the walk is shifting to survivors and first responders who need support battling their illnesses. "Now of course with these sick workers, this is the continuation of the 9/11 attacks," said organizer Reverend Bill Minson. "And we need people to remember that the same care and support that they provided for all those after the September 11th attacks, these workers are in need of now." ... (NY1, Oct. 1, 2006)
  

SEPTEMBER

• 9/11 Health Resolution Pulled From Consideration: New York delegation opinions differ, Fossella-Maloney resolution will not be considered today ... A Congressional resolution on the 9/11 health crisis that was scheduled for a vote today in the House of Representatives has been pulled (text of resolution). The New York delegation could not agree on language regarding the “responsibilities” of the federal government, New York City and New York State to address the crisis that would be accepted by the Energy and Commerce Committee. Reps. Vito Fossella (R-NY) and Carolyn Maloney (D-NY), sponsors of the resolution, expressed their disappointment that the resolution did not pass but also expressed the hope that there will be movement on this issue later in the year. “We believe that this resolution represented an important step forward in forcing the federal government to finally develop a plan to address the growing 9/11 health crisis. It would have requested a plan for monitoring and treatment of absolutely everyone who inhaled the toxic air, including responders, volunteers, residents, workers and students. “The members of the New York delegation had a wide range of opinions on the issues. Unfortunately, we could not come to an agreement on language that satisfied the delegation as a whole as well as the Energy and Commerce Committee. Therefore, we felt it was in the best interests of the 9/11 responders to withdraw the resolution at this time. We will continue working with our colleagues to require the federal government to develop a comprehensive plan to help those who are sick meet their health challenges. “We are disappointed that we not only lack a federal plan to help the sick, but that we also still don’t have a directive for HHS to make a plan. Some members of the delegation were worried about shared responsibilities. ... (News Release, Sept. 29, 2006)
  
• No remains in bank building, 9/11 kin told ... "The opinion of the experts is there is no likelihood of finding human remains," said Charles Maikish, of the Lower Manhattan Construction Command Center. ... More than 700 human bone fragments were found on the roof of the former Deutsche Bank building on Liberty St. But other parts of the building have never been thoroughly searched and some relatives accused officials of ignoring their concerns. ... (NYDaily News, by Greg. B. Smith, Sept. 29, 2006)
  
• Health Omission .... On September 7, 2006, St. Paul’s Chapel was packed with over 300 people who were concerned about the environmental impact of 9/11 on their health. These included residents, office workers, students and concerned parents. Science and medical experts from the New York Committee for Occupational Safety and Health, Bellevue and Mount Sinai treatment centers presented their findings. Elected officials spoke out. Dr. John Howard, the new 9/11 health commissioner, was there to listen to them and to hear comments from the audience. I was disappointed that there was no article about this town hall forum in the Downtown Express. This was an important local event and I don’t understand why it wasn’t covered here. While I appreciate your coverage of this subject in the past I consider this omission a serious lapse. (scroll down, Downtown Express: Letter to the Editor, by Diane Stein, Sept. 29 - Oct. 5, 2006)
  
• EPA AND BACK-DOOR POLITICS JEOPARDIZE PUBLIC HEALTH AND IGNORE HUMAN REMAINS AT THE WTC SITE ... Our Family Groups have asked to sit in on  meetings to monitor the proper treatment of the human remains, which still remain at WTC perimeter five years after the deaths on September 11, 2001.  Our request has not been answered.  We can only surmise that the same back-room tactics used to get the OK for the demolition at 130 Liberty Street will be used as precedent for Fiterman Hall and all the other contaminated buildings. We reiterate our right to be part of the ongoing process which deals with the reclamation of human remains at and near the WTC site, and we once again request that an expert liaison, chosen by the families, be permitted to remain on site during this painful process. We expect something more from the City of New York than the deadly silence we have consistently received regarding the entire human remains issue at the WTC site. And so, to the health concerns of workers and residents and to the concerns about the proper treatment of human remains, the response seems to be, perennially,  "no comment."  The EPA should remember what happened to the health of so many first responders, volunteers and downtown residents the last time expediency was put ahead of health concerns, and the last time a dollar amount was put ahead of human decency. We insist that the EPA reconsider its over-ride of local concerns and protect the population as it is mandated to do. We insist that our elected officials and those running for City and State public office intervene in this matter immediately. This is further evidence of the need for a Congressional Hearing into such issues as toxic air, public health and the retrieval of human remains in the areas surrounding the World Trade Center site. ... (News Release, 09/26/06)
• Rice Reportedly Signed Off On 9/11 "Safe To Breather" Documents ... Former EPA head Christie Whitman has come under fire from city leaders who accuse her of deceiving the public about the air quality after September 11th, but according to the New York Post, Condoleezza Rice also approved documents declaring the air around the World Trade Center site "safe to breathe." The paper says Rice – then head of the National Security council – gave final approval to those infamous EPA press releases days after 9/11. ... (NY1, Sept. 24, 2006)
  
• Pataki pushed EPA ... Gov. Pataki privately pressured regulators enforcing safe demolition of the toxic former Deutsche Bank tower to make sure the Ground Zero building comes down as soon as possible, the Daily News has learned. Pataki chief of staff John Cahill and two other top aides had a closed-door sitdown in Washington last Monday with the No.2 official at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, a regional EPA spokeswoman confirmed. Pataki's aides requested the meeting to let EPA know "about the need for the project to move forward quickly," according to EPA spokeswoman Mary Mears. By going to the top, Pataki went over the heads of the local EPA inspectors, who have repeatedly questioned the safety of the state's proposed methods for taking down the ruined ... Asked whether Pataki officials had requested the EPA to lower standards as it oversees demolition of 130 Liberty St., Mears said, "No comment." The private meeting highlights the conflict between Pataki's desire to bring down what he calls "a blight on downtown" and neighborhood fears that dust from the fallen twin towers will be released during demolition. Pataki's pressure on the EPA comes as the agency has found itself in a crossfire for not doing enough to protect World Trade Center rescue workers after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.Critics of the state's handling of the tower at 130 Liberty St. question why Pataki's aides bypassed local regulators in their push for an accelerated schedule. "These kind of back-room meetings out of the public eye are not reassuring," said Dave Newman of the New York Commission on Occupational Safety and Health, a nonprofit group pressing for a safe demolition. "The large question is quite apparent," he said. "It seems to me it's unlikely they went down there for any other reason than to get the EPA to back off." EPA officials and a Pataki spokeswoman refused to discuss the meeting. Mears did confirm that EPA Deputy Administrator Marcus Peacock met in Peacock's Washington office with Cahill, the governor's point man on Ground Zero rebuilding; Charles Fox, Pataki's deputy secretary on environmental issues, and Charles Maikish, head of the Lower Manhattan Construction Command Center. Peacock "heard them out and reiterated the need to make sure this is done right," Mears said. "We reminded them to do the project in a way that's protective to human health." Mears said the EPA agreed the agency "would get comments back to them as expeditiously as possible." By Thursday, the EPA had approved the state's demolition plan - a plan that had been bogged down in negotiations with the EPA's local office for months. ... (NYDaily News, by Greg B. Smith, September 24, 2006)
  
• Cancer Shock At Ground Zero HS ... When the towers tumbled, the kids were engulfed in a "huge cloud of dust," and Friedlander, the senior-class president, ran for his life. Less than a month later, on Oct. 9, while the WTC fires still smoldered, spitting acrid smoke into the air, Stuyvesant students were called back to the school. Now Friedlander, 22, has been diagnosed with Hodgkin's disease, and fears that his cancer may be linked to that toxic soup. He is one of more than 170 other Stuyvesant grads who have joined a petition calling for a government-sponsored study, screening and health care for kids who went to Stuyvesant in the year after the terror strikes. When the towers tumbled, the kids were engulfed in a "huge cloud of dust," and Friedlander, the senior-class president, ran for his life. Less than a month later, on Oct. 9, while the WTC fires still smoldered, spitting acrid smoke into the air, Stuyvesant students were called back to the school. Now Friedlander, 22, has been diagnosed with Hodgkin's disease, and fears that his cancer may be linked to that toxic soup. He is one of more than 170 other Stuyvesant grads who have joined a petition calling for a government-sponsored study, screening and health care for kids who went to Stuyvesant in the year after the terror strikes. ... He was diagnosed with Hodgkin's lymphoma, a white-blood-cell cancer. .... Friedlander is undergoing six months of chemotherapy and staying at his parents' Upper West Side apartment. His mother, Edna Golandsky, is worried. "When he was diagnosed, the air quality at his school was the first thing I thought about," she said. For his part, Friedlander is outraged. "I'm angry that I'm sick . . . and I think of how my Hodgkin's could be linked to going to school at Ground Zero," he said. (NYPost, Sept. 24, 2006)
  
• Rice OK'D Claim of 'Safe Air' After 9/11 ... Condoleezza Rice's office gave final approval to the infamous Environmental Protection Agency press releases days after 9/11 claiming the air around Ground Zero was "safe to breathe," internal documents show. Now Secretary of State, Rice was then head of the National Security Council - "the final decision maker" on EPA statements about lower Manhattan air quality, the documents say. Scientists and lawmakers have since deemed the air rife with toxins. Early tests known to the EPA at the time had already found high asbestos levels, the notes say. But those results were omitted from the press releases because of "competing priorities" such as national security and "opening Wall Street," according to a report by the EPA's inspector general. The chief of staff for then-EPA head Christie Todd Whitman, Eileen McGinnis, told the inspector general of heated discussions, including "screaming telephone calls," about what to put in the press releases. The notes come from a 2003 probe into public assurances made on Sept. 16, five days after the 9/11 attacks. They tell how a White House staffer "worked with Dr. Condoleezza Rice's press secretary" on reviewing the press releases for weeks. Whitman said through a spokeswoman Friday that she never discussed her press releases directly with Rice. She also defended her collaboration with the White House. ... (NY Post, by Susan Edelman, Heather Gilmore and Brad Hamilton, Sept. 24, 2006)
  
• Shaw announces lung program for South Floriday 911 rescuers ... The District 22 congressman was in Palm Beach County Monday to announce a new program for Florida hospitals to provide lung screenings to the hundreds of firefighters and paramedics from Florida who went to New York in the aftermath of 9-11 to assist in the recovery efforts at Ground Zero. ... Typically, an adult loses 31 milliliters in FEV per year. But Ground Zero workers lost 372 milliliters - a rate of decline 12 times the normal annual rate, the report said. ... (Boca Raton news, Sept. 24, 2006)
  
• Spano bill would help Ground Zero workers ... State Sen. Nicholas Spano says he will introduce a bill to help clear the way for Ground Zero recovery workers to sue government agencies over illnesses they suffered in the aftermath of the World Trade Center collapse. State law ordinarily imposes a 90-day deadline from the date of injury on anyone filing a claim against a government agency. Spano said that given the urgency of the recovery work, the nature of the illnesses and the misinformation about health risks involved, workers deserve another year to file a claim. "Their rights should not be taken away from them because of technicalities in the law," said Spano, R-Yonkers. ... (The Journal News, Sept. 23, 2006)
  
• Clinton, Kennedy call for health hearings ... Democratic Senators Hillary Rodham Clinton and Edward Kennedy are calling on the Republican chairperson of the Senate’s health committee to set up hearings on Clinton’s bill to provide health money for workers and residents suffering from the 9/11 recovery and cleanup operation. The New York and Massachusetts senators wrote to Sen. Mike Enzi of Wyoming asking him to schedule the hearings. Clinton introduced a bill on Sept. 13 that would set aside $1.9 billion for World Trade Center emergency responders and clean-up workers. The money would go toward health care for those who are suffering from both mental and physical health problems resulting from the disaster. U.S. Rep. Jerrold Nadler, who represents the Downtown district, has a comparable bill in the House. ... (Downtown Exress, September 22-29, 2006)
  
• E.P.A.: Shroud will come down! Agency approves Deutsche demolition .... The Deutsche Bank building, a 40-story cauldron of toxic debris that has lorded over the World Trade Center site for half a decade, will soon be a thing of the past. ... The roof passed a final inspection this week and regulators hashed out final demolition details with the command center and the Lower Manhattan Development Corp., the state-city agency that purchased the building from Deutsche Bank in order to demolish it. “Everything's okay on our end,” Mary Mears, an Environmental Protection Agency spokesperson, told Downtown Express on Thursday. “Now it's a question of Department of Buildings issuing permits.” E.P.A. sent a letter to the Buildings Dept. on Thursday telling them they had approved L.M.D.C.'s demolition plan, allowing the corporation to apply for the necessary demolition permits. Mears indicated that the L.M.D.C. might need to work out concerns about the possability of a building collapse during the demolition with the Buildings Dept. ... (Downtown Exress, by Ronda Kaysen, September 22-29, 2006)
  
• Long-delayed shroud removal ... We fully understand any of you who are thinking “I’ll believe it when I see it,” but it looks like the shrouded and damaged Deutsche Bank building that has haunted the World Trade Center site for five years may finally begin to come down next month. The Environmental Protection Agency’s spokesperson told us Wednesday the agency likes the adjusted demolition plan Downtown rebuilding officials presented and the E.P.A. expects to give the final okay this week. ... (Downtown Express Editorial, September 22-29, 2006)
  
• Demo of Broadway building, now contaminated, to resume ... If the building wasn’t contaminated before officials demanded demolition work stop, it sure is now. Last April, demolition work at 189 Broadway ground to a halt when U.S. Rep. Jerrold Nadler and Community Board 1 vice chairperson Catherine McVay Hughes raised concerns about possible asbestos and 9/11 contamination in the building. ... “All buildings [facing demolition] that are in Lower Manhattan need to have a characterization report, like 189 Broadway,” said Gottheim. “These buildings are near the [W.T.C.] site, they had tons of dust and debris from the burning site. We have to ensure that a demolition is done properly so that it doesn’t cause any health problems.” Concerns about construction delays should be secondary, said Gottheim. Not everyone was confident that a building that appeared clean might actually be clean. “I’m a little perplexed by your reliance on photographs,” Jo Polett, a Tribeca resident whose apartment was eventually cleaned by the E.P.A. after lingering contaminants were found there, said at the public meeting. “A place can be contaminated and you can’t see it.” ... (Downtown Express, by Ronda Kaysen, September 22-29, 2006)
  
• Air quality controllers: participants check for pollutants in public art project .... With the help of Eyebeam, Singer made analyzing air quality easy by creating color-coded visuals that pop up on the devices’ screens when you point one downward. A sensor within the AIR device detects carbon monoxide and nitrogen oxides in the surrounding air, and then a sphere of color starts to appear on the screen: polluted air is terror-alert red, clean air is blue, and shades of orange and yellow fall somewhere in between. ... There were a few other bugs in the rollout of AIR, like defective batteries. But Singer was quick to point out that AIR was created by tech-savvy artists ­— not Hewlett-Packard. “We’re not a major corporation that takes three years and spends millions of dollars to develop a product,” she said. “Though this project is definitely in its beta phase.” She expects the kinks will be worked out by this Monday, September 25, at which point all ten devices should be ready to be distributed to the 100 people who signed up to be part of AIR online. Watch for the results at www.pm-air.net. ... (Downtown Express, by Ronda Kaysen, September 22-29, 2006)
  
• Devastating Health Fallout: World Trade Center Cleanup Leaves Woman Suffering ... Connie Joyce was still nearly killed by the worst terrorist attack on U.S. soil - even though she didn't go to ground-zero until a month after the 9/11 attack. Joyce, 55, worries that rising medical expenses and severely reduced income will combine to toss her out of her house. More than anything, the Iowa Park woman wants others to know that the disaster that struck five years ago remains a source of pain for many who were not at ground zero. "There are so many people like me, and they're not all in New York," she said. "Now we're sick, but we don't have any help." ... Plenty of irritants could have been inhaled, according to The World Trade Center Worker and Volunteer Medical Screening Program. Concrete dust, residue of burning plastics and fiberglass were just a few of the things in the air after the World trade Center towers collapsed. Asbestos was also in the dust and debris. According to the screening program, workers might have been exposed to hazards stirred up during site cleanup efforts, and the exposure could have lasted for months. Her problems started not long after arriving at the devastation, Joyce said. She had been working for BelforUSA, a disaster restoration company. A project manager with 10 years experience, Joyce was helping with the cleanup of buildings. She arrived at the scene Oct. 1, 2001. By early January, problems were obvious. "On Jan. 5, I got really sick. I couldn't breath," she said. "Both lungs went down at once." Joyce recovered, but became ill again three days later, she said. "I couldn't breathe at all," she said. Eventually, doctors at a downtown New York center had to perform an open lung biopsy, which showed some material had clumped inside of the organs. "They couldn't identify what it was because there was so much of it," she said. "They simply told me I wouldn't live to get down here." At the end of January, Joyce was able to leave the New York hospital. She returned to Iowa Park in February of that year. ...She's required to have breathing treatments and to use the steroid Prednisone. She said her stay at the New York hospital led to contracting a staph infection. It ultimately meant losing the use of the left side of her face. ... (Wichita Falls (Texas) Times Record News, By Michael Hines, September 22, 2006)
• Gov't Defends Whitman's 9/11 Environmental Reassurances ... The U.S. government asked a federal appeals court Thursday to find that former Environmental Protection Agency chief Christine Todd Whitman cannot be blamed for telling residents near the World Trade Center site that the environment was safe after the 2001 terrorist attacks. The government told the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals that a judge was wrong to force Whitman to face a 2004 lawsuit by residents, students and workers in lower Manhattan and Brooklyn who said they were exposed to hazardous dust and debris from the fallen twin towers. "It is difficult to fathom a pull as strong as the need to calm public fears in the wake of the worst terrorist attack in our nation's history," government lawyers wrote in papers submitted to the court. The government lawyers rejected claims that Whitman should be held personally liable for the environmental consequences of the Sept. 11 attacks and made to pay damages to properly clean homes, schools and businesses and forced to create a fund for medical monitoring of victims. "No decision of any court remotely suggests that a public statement, even a misleading public statement, could violate the substantive due process rights of thousands of individuals," the papers filed by Department of Justice lawyers in Washington said. ... (NBC, September 21, 2006)
  
• Linking 9/11-Related Illness To Toxic Air May Be Tough ... Proving that 9/11 responders are being killed by poisons inhaled at the World Trade Center site will be extremely tough under a draft of guidelines being written by the federal government. Earlier this week, Washington announced it wanted to draft guidelines to determine if any deaths were caused by exposure to toxins at the site. The draft of the guidelines, published by the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, indicates that there are not enough scientific studies or autopsies of first responders to link their deaths to the toxic site. However, the guidelines lay out a methodology for conducting autopsies going forward. The guidelines propose the creation of a "tissue banking" storage system, enabling medical experts to retest old specimens years after the fact to more authoritatively rule on whether a patient's death was WTC-related if new testing methods emerge. Coroners will be required to check for asbestos, metals and pulverized glass. A spokesman stresses that the guidelines are preliminary and the draft is still undergoing review by outside experts. ... (NY1, Sept. 22, 2006)
  
• Gov't Defends Whitman's 9/11 Environmental Reassurances ... The government lawyers rejected claims that Whitman should be held personally liable for the environmental consequences of the Sept. 11 attacks and made to pay damages to properly clean homes, schools and businesses and forced to create a fund for medical monitoring of victims. "No decision of any court remotely suggests that a public statement, even a misleading public statement, could violate the substantive due process rights of thousands of individuals," the papers filed by Department of Justice lawyers in Washington said. Earlier this year, U.S. District Judge Deborah A. Batts in Manhattan refused to dismiss Whitman as a defendant, calling her actions "conscience-shocking." ... (WNBC, Sept. 21, 2006)
• Pressure Still on Feds to Address 9/11 Health Crisis: Reps. Maloney and Fossella want Congress to send a message to HHS ... The fifth anniversary of 9/11 has passed, but the federal government still has no long-term plan to care for those made sick by the toxic air of Ground Zero, and New York-area Members of Congress are not letting them forget it. Today, Reps. Carolyn Maloney (D-NY) and Vito Fossella (R-NY) introduced two pieces of legislation related to the 9/11 Health Crisis as they hosted sick 9/11 responders and leading 9/11-illness doctors on Capitol Hill to brief other Members. Fossella and Maloney are introducing a resolution (H. Res. 1031 - text below) under which Congress would request that the Department of Health and Human Services develop a long-term plan to deal with the health crisis. Maloney, along with Fossella, also introduced broad medical monitoring and treatment legislation (H.R. 6124 - http://maloney.house.gov/documents/911recovery/200609Remember911HealthAct.pdf), which is similar to the Remember 9/11 Health Act (H.R. 566), but also includes $1.9 billion in federal funds. This amount is the same that Senator Hillary Clinton (D-NY) proposed on the Senate floor last week. ... (Maloney News Release, Sept. 20, 2006)
  
• EPA: 9/11 Toxic Air Drifted Away From Ground Zero: Experts Say Contamination Stretched At Least 1 Mile ... "As late as the end of 2001 and the beginning of 2002 the experts were measuring unhealthy air a mile north of the pile at levels higher than the Kuwaiti oil field fires," said Hugh Kaufman, a senior policy analyst for the EPA. That means that people living and working 20 blocks north of Liberty Street could have been breathing contaminated air for months. ... (WCBS, by Marcia Kramer, Sept. 19, 2006)
  
• Guidelines Sought For 9/11 Deaths ... Experts are drafting medical guidelines to help determine whether a person's death was caused by exposure to toxic pollutants from 9/11. John Howard, the Bush administration's medical director of World Trade Center health issues, is working with city agencies to gather data on all deaths possibly linked to 9/11. They will then "determine the existence of patterns of disease and any possible linkages with exposure to WTC toxic agents," Howard said. n a letter to Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-Manhattan), he wrote that the feds plan to fund medical institutions' drafting and implementing of guidelines for examining human remains. It's still unclear how many WTC-cleanup or other workers have died from inhaling asbestos, benzene, pulverized glass and other hazardous materials. While a New Jersey coroner found that exposure to Ground Zero contaminants caused NYPD detective James Zadroga's death by lung disease, city health officials have not linked the death of any Ground Zero worker to WTC exposure. (NYPost, by Carl Campanile, Sept. 18, 2006)
  
• Pryor, L.M.D.C.'s first hire, reflects on final days ... During Pryor’s tenure, the Environmental Protection Agency approved a demolition plan for the Deutsche Bank building on Liberty St., allowing the L.M.D.C. to finally begin cleaning the 9/11-contaminated building that it has wanted to demolish since it bought it in the summer of 2004. Scaffolding now scales the 40-story façade and a crane nearly reaches the top. Nevertheless, the cleanup has been hampered by setbacks. The cost of buying, cleaning and demolishing the building has soared from $135 million to $207 million. A floor-by-floor demolition was supposed to begin in June, but the E.P.A. has still not approved details for the demolition phase, and it is not clear when that will begin. Even the cleanup phase — so far the top five floors have been cleaned of toxins from the collapsing Trade Towers — has had its share of problems. Human remains found on the rooftop delayed the process and the E.P.A. temporarily halted work when asbestos was found in areas considered asbestos-free. ... The L.M.D.C. purchased the building in 2004 from Deutsche Bank, which was bogged down in litigation with its insurers. “The fact that it’s not physically coming down this instant isn’t a statement that work isn’t happening. There’s a lot of work happening.” (Downtown Express, by Ronda Kaysen, Sept. 15-21, 2006)
  
• L.M.D.C. shakes budget, finds $200 million ... When the corporation bought the damaged, contaminated Deutsche Bank building two years ago, it committed to spending $135 million on acquisition and demolition costs and the bank’s insurers assumed responsibility if the dismantlement cost more. Estimated costs of pollution insurance, environmental testing and meeting Environmental Protection Agency requirements – which the L.M.D.C. still has not done – has since brought the project’s total cost up to $207 million, and the corporation hopes to get the additional money back from the insurance companies. (Downtown Express, by Josh Rogers, September 15-21, 2006)
  
• Rudy's Black Cloud: WTC health risks may hurt Prex bid .... Since he appeared in Americans' living room as a figure of reassurance and grief five years ago, Rudy Giuliani's public image has been defined by his performance on Sept. 11, 2001. The day has made him one of the country's most popular men, rich and the front-runner, according to some polls, for the GOP nomination for President. But now his 9/11 aura is facing a challenge from critics who say he wasn't prepared for the attacks and downplayed health risks in the aftermath. His allies dispute the claims. But within his circle, some are worried that a political opponent could hit Giuliani where he's strongest. "The term being used within Giuliani's circle is 'swift boat,'" said a Republican insider familiar with conversations among Giuliani's aides. .... There's no "9/11 Families for Truth," no organized effort to damage [Rudy Giuliani]'s national reputation. But the seeds of it may be sprouting. Sally Regenhard, whose firefighter son, Christian, died on 9/11, told the Daily News' Errol Louis that she intends to "Swift boat" Giuliani. 9/11," said Regenhard, who, citing a recent book by Wayne Barrett and Dan Collins, blames Giuliani for 9/11 communications breakdowns. ... (NYDaily News, by Ben Smith, Sept. 18, 2006)

• WTC Bombshell-Internal EPA Papers Fuel Christie Crictics ... Christie Todd Whitman, while head of the federal EPA, "conspired" to falsely reassure the public that the air around Ground Zero was safe to breath, according to critics and bombshell new documents. Hugh Kaufman, an EPA senior policy analyst, told The Post yesterday, that [Tina Kreisher] "blew the whistle not just on the White House, but on Whitman as well,"Kreisher's comment was included in the investigator's notes made during the interview with her. But her quote was not released in the EPA inspector general's final report in 2003, which blamed the White House - not Whitman - for telling the EPA to publicly play up reassuring information and downplay concerns about air around Ground Zero. ... Meanwhile, Whitman's newly released financial-disclosure forms show that she said seven months before 9/11 that she would not get involved in any issue related to the finances of the Port Authority - which owns the WTC site - because she or her family owned PA bonds. Its finances could be impacted by lawsuits growing of the cleanup. "I understand the following interests that belong to me, my spouse or my children present a conflict of interest," Whitman wrote at the time. She then listed various investments, including the bistate agency. But Whitman was involved at Ground Zero despite that recusal, although she or her family also owned shares of Citigroup, whose insurance-company subsidiary, The Travelers, paid out hundred of millions of dollars in claims to downtown residents displaced by the attacks. Critics said the documents indicate Whitman encouraged people to move back to near Ground Zero and work on the cleanup despite a health threat, which could have bolstered the bottom line of both the PA and Travelers. That's because both the PA and Travelers now can argue in civil suits that they believed there was little or no danger from the air around the Trade Center based on statements made by the EPA. David Worby, who represents 8,000 workers at and around Ground Zero, said, "The fact that the head of the EPA had a financial conflict defies imagination." ... (NYPost, by Susan Edelman & Dan Manigan, Sept. 18, 2006)
  
• Residents Hear Reports on 9/11 Health Impacts ... They are called the living victims. They are the rescue workers and Downtown residents who suffer respiratory and other health problems from the air they breathed in the months after the attack. “It is abundantly clear that thousands of people are already sick. Eventually, thousands more will be afflicted with late-onset, chronic illnesses.  Every day, every hour, more people begin to develop symptoms or become sicker,” said Congressman Jerold Nadler at a Sept. 7 press conference. That same day, at a well-attended town hall meeting at St. Paul’s Church on Sept. 7, federal 9/11 health coordinator John Howard listened for more than two hours to the results of scientific studies and the testimony of neighborhood residents. Following the meeting he said he believes Downtown residents have suffered ill health as a result of their exposure to the dust from the collapse of the towers. “I don’t think there is any doubt in my mind that there’s an association,” Howard said. ... “The federal, state and city governments are clearly culpable for recklessly allowing thousands of people to be exposed to environmental toxins in the days following 9/11,” he said. On Sept. 5 Mayor Michael Bloomberg announced the city would provide $16 million over the next five years to fund a WTC Environmental Health Center at Bellevue Hospital/NYU, which will enable it to assess and treat up to 6,000 additional patients. The Center is scheduled to open in January 2007. There were concerns about having the city’s Department of Health (DOH) as the oversight agency. “When the DOH issued ill-advised guidelines, advising residents to clean up indoor spaces contaminated with WTC dust with wet rags and mops in the early days of the recovery process, it became directly responsible for countless unnecessary exposures. Residents are concerned that this same agency will play a major role in the implementation of the Mayor’s program,” said Nadler. ... (Tribeca Trib, by Etta Sanders, Sept. 18, 2006)
• Officials accused of 9/11 lies: EPA, White House deceived public about Ground Zero air quality, says ex-investigator of Sept. 11 response ... Hugh Kaufman, a former chief investigator for the EPA's inquiry into the response to Sept. 11, criticized government officials yesterday, accusing them of lying to the public about New York's air quality after the terrorist attacks. "Until we fix the broken government, none of us is safe," he said at the Cinema Arts Centre in Huntington at the screening of a documentary about Sept. 11-related illnesses. ... Before the screening, Kaufman released an EPA document showing that both the White House and Whitman, urged an EPA spokeswoman to "reassure the public" in the aftermath of the attacks. The document summarizes an August 2002 conference in which public affairs officials were interviewed about their department's response to Sept. 11. It quotes Tina Kreisher, a former associate administrator for the Office of Communications, Education and Media Relations. The document says: "When asked whether there was a conscious effort to reassure the public, Ms. Kreisher said there was such an effort. This emphasis 'came from the Administrator and the White House.'" Kaufman also released a February 2001 memo in which Whitman recused herself from dealing with matters affecting her investments, including Port Authority bonds. The Port Authority owns the World Trade Center site. ... Paramedic Marvin Bethea was buried twice in debris on Sept. 11 while escorting people to safety. Five weeks later, he suffered a stroke attributed to Sept. 11 stress and later was diagnosed with adult-onset asthma, post-traumatic stress disorder and chronic rhinitis. He was not awarded workers compensation until this year. ... (Newsday, by Jennifer Maloney, Sept. 18, 2006)
  
• Clear the air on 9/11 health issue ... Toward noon on Sept. 12, 2001, Westfield, some 20 miles from Manhattan, was enveloped in a stinking miasma. I was forced to take down the clothes I had hung outside to dry and place them back in my washing machine to rewash. Outdoor sports activities were canceled by the schools. ... (The Star Ledger; letter to the editor Eric Boehlert/Montclair, Sept. 17, 2006)
• Senate Kills Clinton's 2 Billion 9/11 Health Proposal ... Senator Hillary Clinton says she will keep pushing her $2 billion plan to address 9/11 health problems, even after Senate Republicans killed the measure. Senate leaders refused to allow a vote on Clinton's proposal, which would have set aside nearly $2 billion in grants for the treatment of workers and residents in Lower Manhattan. The money would have been doled out over five years, starting next year. Clinton drew up the plan in the wake of a recent report that said 70 percent of 9/11 first responders developed lung problems. Mayor Michael Bloomberg says he supports her proposal, though he has disputed the report. (NY1, Sept. 15, 2006)
  
• In a Way, She Never left the Twin Towers ... Lynn Teirney ... It was Mr. Giuliani who appointed her deputy commissioner for intergovernmental affairs for the Fire Department in 1996. A dream job. ... Her red-rimmed eyes are a symptom not of chronic tears but of chronic sinusitis spawned, along with acid reflux, by exposure to the collapse and the recovery effort. ... (NYTimes, by Robin Finn, September 15, 2006)
  
• No $2 Billion for 9/11 Heroes: Senate dumps Hil's bid for med aid ... Senate Republicans killed a bid for nearly $2 billion to help sick 9/11 responders yesterday - blocking the measure without letting it come up for a vote. Senate leaders invoked parliamentary rules, saying Sen. Hillary Clinton's (D-N.Y.) amendment to a measure funding port security was not "germane." People suffering the effects from 9/11's toxic dust were outraged by the move. "How could they just throw this out?" said Laura Picurro, of Toms River, N.J., whose husband, Joe, became disabled after doing volunteer iron work at Ground Zero. "Maybe they should talk to these sick and dying workers," she said. "I find it absurd they didn't even consider it." Clinton's amendment would have provided $5,800 a year for five years for each person sickened from Ground Zero exposure. She vowed to resubmit the measure or propose other legislation to help responders and nearby residents. "Their country should answer their calls for help," Clinton said. Although Clinton got stiffed on money for the sick, she did obtain passage of a measure to create a national monitoring system to keep tabs on people who suffer from responding to future attacks or disasters. Mayor Bloomberg, who has been reluctant to link the illnesses of 9/11 responders to their service, said he "absolutely" endorsed Clinton's proposal. "This was a national attack on the country, and I think the federal government has a responsibility," he said. "We cannot handle this ourselves. We just don't have enough money." ... (NYDaily News, by Lisa L. Colangelo, Michael Saul & Michael McAuliff, 15 September 2006)
  
• Probe sought of Whitman and WTC site ... Democrats from New York and New Jersey asked yesterday for an investigation that could lead to criminal charges against former Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Christie Whitman for breathing problems suffered by thousands after the Sept. 11 attacks. Whitman told the Associated Press that she and the EPA "agreed then and I reiterate now that the air on the WTC site was not clean -- the consequence of millions of tons of burned debris from the most horrific attack in our nation's history. ... (The Star Ledger, September 14, 2006)
  
• Mayor Bloomberg supports massive Sept. 11 health program ... Mayor Michael Bloomberg said Thursday he supports an effort to get nearly $2 billion in federal aid for sick ground zero workers, even if he still won't concede their exposure to the toxic dust at the World Trade Center site made them sick."People who worked on the site or the closer they were, the more symptoms they have that are very troublesome," Bloomberg told reporters. "In a couple of cases those troublesome symptoms have turned into more than that." .Bloomberg, a Republican, said he supported an effort by Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-N.Y., to get $1.9 billion in federal funds to treat thousands of ground zero workers, office workers and area residents who were exposed to asbestos-laden dust and are sick. Senate Republicans on Thursday used a procedural maneuver to put off a vote on Clinton's proposal. Bloomberg said he was "particularly concerned about people five and 10 years from now that will come down with diseases that may or may not have been caused (by ground zero exposure), and if they were caused, then making sure we have the monies available to take care of them." The city has fought lawsuits by workers seeking compensation for claims of ground zero-related sicknesses, but the mayor recently said the federal government should assume responsibility, since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks were a national crisis. .. (Newsdsay/AP, September 14, 2006)
  
• New Art Project Combins Science, Technology And Sculpture For Practical Purpose ... With the five-year anniversary of September 11th came renewed debate over the health effects of the World Trade Center disaster. The Lower Manhattan Cultural Council is perhaps best know as the collective voice of Downtown arts organizations. Its newest art project, set to start Thursday, could involve hundreds of people in Lower Manhattan joining that discussion. The air quality of Lower Manhattan has been major issue and source of contention for politicians, environmentalists, health officials and now artists are tackling it as well, with the help of the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council. “We have actually commissioned a group called Preemptive Media,” says LMCC president Tom Healy. “And what Preemptive Media has done is they've made a handheld device – a really cool looking artistic device – but that will help people measure the air quality wherever they live Downtown.” Brooke Singer is one of the cofounders of the artist’s collective Preemptive Media. Their "Social Scultpure" project is call AIR or Area's Immediate Reading. And it involves handing out these devices to people in Lower Manhattan. “It’s a small mobile portable air pollution detection device,” says Preemptive Media co-founder Brooke Singer. “And it has a screen and you will see the levels of your air pollution specifically carbon monoxide and nitrogen oxides.” ... (NY1, Stephanie Simon, Sept. 14, 2006)
  
• Senator Clinton Announces New Proposal to Address 9/11 Health Effects: Underscores Need to Expand Monitoring and Treatment for First Responders, Volunteers, Residents and Others ... Emphasizing the need to expand medical and mental health monitoring and treatment of those whose health has been affected by 9/11, Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton today unveiled a new proposal to provide $1.9 billion in medical and mental health monitoring and treatment grants, available from 2007-2011, to firefighters, police officers, EMTs, paramedics, building and construction trades workers, volunteers, residents, and others whose health was directly impacted at Ground Zero and Fresh Kills. This funding would be administered through the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and would expand access to health monitoring and health care to all of those who served, lived and worked in the area in the aftermath of 9/11. Senator Clinton announced her proposal in remarks on the floor of the Senate. ... (News Release, September 13, 2006)
  
• Will Whitman Be Prosecuted for 9/11 Lies? Reps Nadler, Weiner & Pascrell Request Special Counsel to Investigate Whether Criminal Charges Should be Filed ... Congressman Jerrold Nadler (D-NY), Congressman Anthony Weiner (D-NY) and Congressman Bill Pascrell, Jr. (D-NJ) today wrote Attorney General Alberto Gonzalez requesting that a Special Counsel be appointed to investigate whether criminal charges should be brought against former EPA Administrator Christine Todd Whitman, and against other government officials, for taking actions that may have endangered the lives of thousands of people following the September 11, 2001 terrorist attack on the World Trade Center in New York. "Christie Whitman repeatedly declared the air safe, and now thousands of people are sick, and some have died, from World Trade Center Contamination," said Rep. Nadler. "To add insult to injury, she just went on 60 minutes and tried to blame everybody else for her misdeeds. She must be held accountable," hed added. (News Release, Sept. 13, 2006)
  
• 9/11 Health: Help at Last? ... The big news story on the fifth anniversary of 9/11 seems to be the discovery of the "abandoned heroes" and forgotten victims of the attacks. A New York Post reporter wrote about the "shocking truth": many people had gotten seriously ill from the poisonous dust that the collapse of the Twin Towers spread across lower Manhattan. ... There are still more questions than answers. The scientific picture is far from complete. There is, for instance, no firm information about the health of people who live or work near Ground Zero. And while there has been the promise of action on all levels of government, it has yet to be seen whether the words will be followed with action. Skeptics are also withholding their judgment about some of the high- profile pronouncements from government officials that help is on the way. "You probably won't hear so much on September 12," said Catherine McVay Hughes, a member of lower Manhattan's Community Board One who has long pushed for a better response from all levels of government. ... These results are proof, many say, that the dust from 9/11 can be directly linked to serious health problems. Mt. Sinai's study, however, does not tell the whole story. It did not screen for cancer, or psychological problems. And its focus was entirely on rescue workers at Ground Zero – not people who returned to work in offices in lower Manhattan, or those who moved back into apartments nearby. "The lower Manhattan residents are the forgotten of the forgotten," said Yuichi Tamano of Beyond Ground Zero, a group pushing for recognition of the wider health problems related to 9/11.... (Gotham Gazette, Sept. 2006)
  
• U.S. must provide treatment dollars for WTC sick ... Accountability for the health crisis that afflicts Ground Zero rescue and recovery workers rests heavily on the shoulders of federal and New York leaders - and so now does the obligation to provide top-of-the-line, free medical treatment both to the sick and to those who are going to become ill. ... But Giuliani did acknowledge, at least, that "it's everybody's responsibility," while, more importantly, recognizing the need to aid the sick. Said Giuliani yesterday: "I think now the answer is, you've got to take care of these people. The people who were injured, including some of my closest friends and some of my aides who have had serious repercussions, they need medical benefits. They need help. They need assistance, and the city, the state, the federal government shouldn't be shirking the responsibility." ... Helpfully, Eliot Spitzer - New York's presumptive governor in January - takes an aggressive approach, comparing the expense of providing health care for the forgotten victims of 9/11 with the price of redeveloping the Trade Center site. "Of all the costs involved in rebuilding, in making that site what it should be, the cost of taking care of the relief workers isn't even a footnote. So let's just do what's right," Spitzer told the Daily News Editorial Board. "By our dawdling over the last year, in terms of the plan itself, we have seen construction costs go up 30%, which has a dollar impact that so far outweighs anything we are talking about in terms of the health care of these workers. Let's just do what is right and decent." By Spitzer's lights, and ours, the federal government should provide the funding. ... The expenses, when the medical economists finally figure them out, will be considerable. But the burden should not fall on employers and workers who pay for health insurance coverage or on responders who are uninsured. ...In 2003, Clinton & Co. won $90 million to allow Mount Sinai and FDNY doctors to screen responders only through 2009. Then, after another tough push, they secured $75 million for treatment, the first federal dollars so designated. When the feds get around to delivering the money - one lump sum would be best - it will last for at best a couple of years. ... (NYDaily News: Editorial, Sept. 12, 2006)
  
• 9/11 anniversary brings mourning, hope ... Advocacy groups continue to push the city, state and the Environmental Protection Agency on testing these buildings for toxic contaminants left by Ground Zero's cloud of dust and smoke. "We are very much aware of the residents and office workers in the area of the World Trade Center buildings, and their issues have to be addressed in terms of health and contamination of those buildings," said Florence Coppola, coordinator of the UCC Office of National Disaster Ministries. Coppola said the UCC will continue to support health screenings and outreach to impacted people done through NYCOSH and Mt. Sinai Hospital. They will also reach out to people across the country who worked at Ground Zero and are now eligible to file with New York State workers' compensation should health issues arise. "It's good that things are moving forward, but it's bittersweet," she explained. "People are ill and dying." ... (Disaster News, by Heather Moyer, September 11, 2006)
• Guiliani Strikes Back At Whitman ... Former mayor Rudy Giuliani spoke out Sunday for the first time and played the blame game about the air quality at ground zero. CBS 2 obtained documents which allege the government reopened lower Manhattan even though the air was not safe. Former Environmental Protection Agency director Christie Whitman blamed the city. Giuliani on Sunday said not so fast. The true blame rests with her. It's now war. In an exclusive interview with CBS 2, Giuliani slammed Whitman for making people believe the air at ground zero was safe. "The reports we had on air quality from the EPA was the air quality was healthy or at least it wasn't dangerous," Giuliani told CBS 2's Dave Carlin. Whitman fired the first salvo, telling 60 Minutes the Giuliani Administration was responsible for people not knowing the true nature of the air quality at ground zero. When asked by Katie Couric who had ultimate authority over the site, Whitman was quick to point a finger. "Really it was the city who was the primary responder," Whitman said. However, Giuliani maintained Sunday that he was honest and open about air quality issues. "I put out all the reports that existed," Giuliani said. "Of course the reports that I put out were the same thing that Christie Whitman was saying publicly." ... (CBS2, Marcia Kramer, September 11, 2006)
  
• Buildings Rise From Rubble While Health Crumbles ... “Dust to Dust: The Health Effects of 9/11,” a powerful and persuasive one-hour documentary on the Sundance Channel tonight, analyzes that cloud (“a devastating toxic soup containing more than 2,500 contaminants”) and addresses its devastating legacy for the thousands of workers and others who breathed it in. News reports have mentioned some of these contaminants before, but this film is an eye-opener, superimposing the information in large letters on the screen and explaining some of their sources. In addition to more than 400 tons of asbestos, this film counts 90,000 tons of jet fuel containing benzene; mercury from more than a half-million fluorescent lights; 200,000 pounds of lead and cadmium from computers; crystalline silica from 420,000 tons of concrete, plasterboard and glass; and perhaps as much as two million pounds of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons from the diesel-fueled fires. Some of those substances are carcinogens; others can cause kidney, liver, heart and nervous-system damage. ... Every disaster seeks a villain, and “Dust to Dust,” directed by Heidi Dehncke-Fisher, gives that honor to Christine Todd Whitman, then administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency. Ms. Whitman is shown several times reassuring reporters that the air is safe. In all fairness, on at least two of those occasions her reassurances (“There is not a reason for the general public to be concerned”) technically appear to refer to New York as a whole rather than to the affected areas near the twin towers. This is, at best, a sin of omission.Former Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani, New Yorkers’ hero of the day, is seen at a lectern announcing, “The air quality is safe and acceptable.” Michael D. Brown, the erstwhile director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, comes off as relatively harmless, merely promising the federal government’s help. The program’s revelations about the rewriting of E.P.A. publicity releases are particularly damning. A Sept. 16, 2001, statement about one contaminant originally stated that samples “showed levels of asbestos ranging from 2.1 percent to 3.3 percent” and that the agency “views a 1 percent level as a definition for asbestos-containing material.” That wording was changed to say, with an Orwellian touch, that samples “contained small percentages of asbestos” and described those levels as “slightly above the 1 percent trigger for defining asbestos material.” Cautionary information in some releases is deleted altogether.These rewrites are openly, disapprovingly discussed here by Nikki L. Tinsley, the E.P.A.’s former inspector general. Many victims speak on camera for themselves, discussing their early symptoms (like nosebleeds and hacking coughs) and their current battles with an array of serious illnesses ... (NYTImes, by Anita Gates, September 11, 2006)
• Up from Ground Zero ... Jack Saltarella's lungs are black with World Trade Center dust, and coughing interrupts his train of thought. After months spent hauling Ground Zero debris to the Fresh Kills landfill in Staten Island, breathing remains a chore for the burly Brooklyn native. But unlike many diagnosed with 9/11 related health illnesses, Saltarella is making progress. He credits his migration north. "Clean air," the retired New York City sanitation worker said one day recently, sitting at the kitchen table in his son's Ulster County home. "My doctor said that living up here, instead of breathing in all the car stuff in the city, helped me out a great deal." Five years after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, Ground Zero workers have fanned out across the country in search of clean air to filter away their health problems. And like legions of tuberculosis patients who fled New York City in the mid-1800s, these people are moving to the Hudson Valley. "People come up here to recover. I know it's in the hundreds," says Donna Flayhan, who coordinates the Lower Manhattan Public Health Project at SUNY New Paltz, an information clearinghouse for 9/11 victims.... "I have a number of patients who developed respiratory problems after their 9/11 efforts who have told me they feel better when away from New York City," said Dr. Stephen M. Levin, director of environmental monitoring at the Mount Sinai Medical Center. ... (Times Herald-Record, by Greg Bruno, September 11, 2006)
• Help 9/11 workers: The government has a duty to aid those suffering health woes ... There are two interlocking parts, as everyone knows, to the story of what happened five years ago today in lower Manhattan and at the Pentagon in Washington. One is the nightmare of the terrorist attacks. The other is the frenzied attempts at rescue and recovery by thousands of citizens, some of whom traveled from the Rochester region. They risked their lives to save others. ... (Rochester Democrat and Chronicle, Sept. 11, 2006)
  
• MOVIE:  Toxic Legacy: A CLOUD of dust ... (CBC-TV, September 10, 2006)
• Ground Zero Workers Not Protected By Federal Officials ... (Medical News Today, 09/10/06)
  
• Q&A: Anthony DePalma, Environmental and Conservation Reporter ... Anthony DePalma answered reader questions and comments about workers made sick after exposure to toxic materials at ground zero. ... (NYTimes, September 2006)
  
• Some Kids Left Behind: Stuyvesant alums finally join the fight for 9-11 health benefits ... At home, she composed an open letter to her elected officials. She laid out the EPA's false assurances, as well as the city's promise that Stuyvesant had been wiped entirely free of WTC-related pollution—a promise that turned out to be untrue. Noting that 3,000 or so alumni went to the Chambers Street high school during the 2001-2002 academic year, she wrote: "As victims of 9/11, and, especially, victims of the misinformation campaign, we served as ‘draftees' in the media campaign to reassure the American people. At the least, in recognition of the risks we undertook simply by attending school, we should be guaranteed health insurance for the rest of our lives." She urged city and federal lawmakers to back a bill that would give Stuyvesant students the same coverage some first responders already receive: medical monitoring and, for those who develop pollution-related diseases, treatment. Nordstorm e-mailed the letter to friends, who passed it along to their friends. She later sent a mass mailing to all 500 students in the Stuyvesant Class of 2002, asking them to sign and spread the word. Students wrote to fellow alums on Facebook, the networking website. Nordstrom posted the letter on a blog, and the alumni magazine ran a blurb about it. The students are an obvious constituency. "There's a fair amount of enthusiasm for this idea," says Anna Cummings, of the Class of 2003, an active organizer. To date, the letter has drawn 170 signatures and counting. ... Within one month, on October 9, they were ordered back to Stuyvesant High, with official word that the building had been properly cleaned. Education officials assured their parents that the city had spent $1 million on a full asbestos abatement. Four months later, families would discover the vents hadn't been wiped at all. ... That winter parents hired an engineer, who found high levels of asbestos and lead in the building. Education officials stonewalled, until Senator Hillary Clinton forced them to admit the truth about the vents at a hearing in February 2002. When parents filed a lawsuit, the school department agreed to clean the ventilation system—in the summer of 2002. ... (Village Voice, by Kristen Lombardi, September 10, 2006)
  
• Congress Criticizes Federal Response to Illnesses After 9/11 and Seeks More Spending ... After listening to recovery workers at ground zero and downtown residents emotionally describe how they had been ignored and insulted as they sought help for health problems after 9/11, members of a Congressional subcommittee roundly criticized the federal response yesterday and called for sharply increased medical spending. Subcommittee members, joined by Senators Hillary Rodham Clinton and Charles E. Schumer, accused the Bush administration of ignoring the health problems that arose among workers who toiled at ground zero and the claims of downtown residents who say they were also sickened by the dust. The administration has done little to prepare for a similar disaster in the future, they said. ... Lea Geronimo, a resident of the Lower East Side, said it was the assurance from the E.P.A. that led her to return to her home and office three blocks from ground zero a week after the towers collapsed. She said she developed bronchitis and severe rashes a few months later. “Our lives will never be the same, and we will not tolerate half-measures and the whisper of a promise,” she testified. “We need a comprehensive long-term treatment and study program to provide immediate care for residents and workers in Lower Manhattan.” The health of downtown residents has not been as well studied as that of ground zero workers, but limited medical surveys have indicated that many residents developed respiratory problems after 9/11, though the extent to which those problems have persisted is not known. More than 100 residents gathered Thursday night at St. Paul’s Chapel to demand screening and treatment. ... On Thursday, Dr. John O. Agwunobi, the assistant secretary for health of the Department of Health and Human Services, was named by Michael O. Leavitt, the department secretary, to lead a policy task force to develop programs for dealing with the 9/11 health issues. Dr. Howard said he would continue in his current position as coordinator with groups in New York while also helping to shape new policies. (NYTimes, by Anthonty DePalma, September 9, 2006)
• Editorial: Veterans of Sept. 11... One of the worst things about listening to those who rushed to ground zero after the attacks on Sept. 11 is that you can barely hear their stories. For many, the lungs hardly work. The cough, the ragged breathing, the confusion and even the bitterness make it hard for some of those who labored in that toxic cloud to explain how they feel forgotten. Like Steven Centore, a former federal worker from Flanders, N.Y., who became so emotional at a Congressional hearing in Manhattan yesterday that he had to be gently reminded of his own condition. Sick from his time working at ground zero, Mr. Centore was forced to pay for his treatment, and the federal government offered only one thing, he said: a “screening” that determined he was indeed sick. “You mean I’m just a data point for you,” he recalled saying to the nurse filling out his forms. People like Mr. Centore and maybe 40,000 others from across the country must be treated for diseases that become more obvious every week. As Mount Sinai Medical Center reported Tuesday, as many as seven in 10 of those who worked at ground zero and Fresh Kills on Staten Island have felt their lungs deteriorate because of their heroism. What the veterans of Sept. 11 need now is a national response, which is not a strong suit these days in Washington. There are a number of partial efforts to help by city, state, federal and private sources. But somebody has to make sure that those who are suffering don’t fall through the many gaps. Recommendations worth considering include putting those without health care under Medicare. The federal government should also restore the Victims Compensation Fund, which originally focused on victims’ families and was phased out in 2003. This time the fund should pay for health care of these emergency workers. If something drastic is not done soon, there are lawsuits involving as many as 8,000 people that could end up costing taxpayers a lot more in the long run. For some politicians, the message seems to have gotten through — especially as the nation remembers the attack five years ago this Monday. Members of Congress from the New York area have been pressuring to get more federal money for these responders. And Michael Leavitt, the secretary of health and human services, has promised to create a task force to provide some organization and to figure out the best ways to proceed. Creating a task force sounds like a delay rather than an answer, but the politicians from the Northeast who have been trumpeting this cause should now keep pestering Mr. Leavitt to move quickly. ... They came when the nation was attacked. Taking care of them now is a national obligation. (NYTimes, September 9, 2006)
• Lawmakers Say Ground Zero Workers Unsafe ... In a daylong House hearing Friday, lawmakers criticized the government's public assurances about the air around the World Trade Center site. ... City Health Commissioner Thomas Frieden said the federal government was responsible for work safety at the site, and said of Whitman's post-Sept. 11 assurance, "I don't think that was an appropriate way to word the message."Others appearing at the hearing before the House Subcommittee on National Security, Emerging Threats, and International Relations, included Democratic Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, who accused the EPA of lying to New Yorkers and endangering public health. At a separate event Friday, Mayor Michael Bloomberg defended the city's handling of the disaster, saying it did distribute masks. ... (WashingPost, by Devlin Barrett, 09/09/06)
  
• Major Changes in NYC Healthcare Use After 9/11: Study ... There was a sharp decline in healthcare usage in the New York City region during the three weeks after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, but usage then rose above expected levels over the following months, concludes a study in the September issue of the journal Biosecurity and Bioterrorism. Researchers analyzed health insurance claims from January 2000 to March 2002 for more than two million residents of the New York City region. The greatest decline in healthcare usage in the weeks after Sept. 11 was among people who lived closest to the World Trade Center (WTC) site. For example, there was an overall 11 percent decline in visits to doctors' offices in the three weeks after 9/11, but a 15 percent decline in office visits by people who lived within a 10-mile radius of the WTC. The decline in office visits in those first few weeks was likely related to disruptions in access to healthcare services or transportation, the researchers said. In addition, many people may have decided to postpone healthcare visits in order to take care of more immediate issues. ... Between October 2001 and March 2002, the number of visits to doctors' offices was more than 200,000 over expected levels, the study found. In related news, residents living near the World Trade Center site said the U.S. federal government has ignored health problems they have suffered as a result of the 9/11 attacks. At a meeting held Thursday, accountant Tom Goodkind, 52, said that while there are programs for rescue/cleanup workers, little has been done for area residents, the Associated Press reported. "I don't think that any of these groups have looked at the children of our neighborhoods," Goodkind said. "Collateral damage, that's what I feel like," said tenant group leader Diane Lapson. ... (Forbes, September 9, 2006)
  
• Time to stop the toxic lies of 9/11: Federal, city leaders shouldbe owning up to WTC health risks ... The very leaders who failed to protect countless New Yorkers from the toxic pollution after Sept. 11 are now trying to blame each other. What they should be doing is owning up to their lies and deceits. In the weeks after the World Trade Center collapse, this column repeatedly warned that federal, state and city leaders were all hiding the true extent of environmental hazards in lower Manhattan. Instead of admitting the truth, city and federal officials attacked those columns as alarmist and irresponsible - and they exerted enormous pressure on the Daily News to stop publishing them. ... Whitman now wants to blame Giuliani for lack of safety enforcement at the WTC site. The city was in charge of Ground Zero and the EPA "didn't have the authority to do that," she says. Another deceit. Yes, Giuliani and the city failed miserably to enforce federal safety rules at the site. For weeks, the city did not ensure that every worker used proper respirators and decontamination methods - something federal inspectors noted in a highly critical report on Oct. 6, 2001. But Whitman's agency had the legal power to step in at any time and take control, under a 1998 presidential directive that puts the EPA in charge of cleaning up contaminated sites after a terrorist attack. More importantly, the EPA created a false sense of security among rescue workers and the public after 9/11. Whitman herself said the agency's early testing of air and dust showed "no reason for concern." That reassuring message had its roots in the White House. Three years ago, the EPA's inspector general revealed that White House aides rewrote the agency's initial press releases to lull both the public and rescue workers into thinking everything was okay. ... (NYDaily News, by Juan Gonzales, 09/09/06)
  
• I also became sick, sez top Rudy aide ... In the days after 9/11, former Deputy Mayor Joe Lhota was among the highest-ranking city officials at Ground Zero - a place he visited often during eight months of cleanup. But now Lhota, like so many others who responded to the tragedy, is sick with a life-threatening disease that he believes was caused by his time at Ground Zero. "Do I think it was linked? Yeah, I do," Lhota, 52, told the Daily News. "Can I prove it? No, I can't." Lhota declined to offer specifics about his condition, saying only that he has responded well to months of treatment - all of which was paid for by private insurance. ... "It is the responsibility of government - city, state and federal - to work together to take care of the men and women who worked on that Pile," Lhota said. "We shouldn't be fighting on this issue." Lhota also hit back at charges - lobbed by former Environmental Protection Agency head Christie Whitman on this Sunday's "60 Minutes" - that the city knew air quality on the pile was unsafe and should have forced rescuers to wear respirators. "The comments she has made to '60 Minutes' are grossly inconsistent with the comments she made in 2001," said Lhota, referring to Whitman's repeated assurances then that the city's air was safe to breathe. (NYDaily News, by David Saltonstall, 09/09/06)
  
• 9/11 dogs dodge ailments ... Five years after an estimated 350 fearless canines spent 14-hour days with their noses to the ground, searching for signs of life amid the smoldering, toxic rubble, veterinary researchers have found surprising results. Although nearly 70% of World Trade Center human responders suffered lung symptoms during or after the Sept. 11 attacks, surprisingly, researchers say hundreds of the heroic search-and-rescue dogs have suffered few health issues related to the attacks. "We have found no profound patterns of disease," said Dr. Phil Fox, a veterinarian at Manhattan's Animal Medical Center, who conducted a five-year study on 27 NYPD canine and bomb detection unit dogs deployed after 9/11. "It tells us these dogs are more resilient than we thought." Half or more of the heroic NYPD search-and-rescue dogs, whose average age when deployed was between 4 and 5 years old, have since retired or died, most from age-related ailments or diseases common in older dogs, including cancer. Despite working without masks or protective gear, dogs may have had several advantages over humans: Asthma is uncommon in dogs, most dogs arrived after the collapse and a dog's longer nose allows him to filter the air more effectively. A second study at the University of Pennsylvania of 97 dogs that worked at the World Trade Center, Pentagon and Fresh Kills Landfill on Staten Island also found no evidence of adverse health effects. ... Still, some critics question the results. NYPD Capt. Scott Shields, whose 11-year-old golden retriever, Bear, was one of the first dogs to search the rubble at Ground Zero, believes a study of this magnitude should be run by a "viable" agency with a bigger budget, more dogs and a team of expert toxicologists and epidemiologists. Bear was injured while working at the site, and the periphery of his wound became cancerous. The brave dog recovered and continued working but then died one year later, just shy of his 13th birthday, from multiple forms of cancer.Today, Shields remains uncertain whether it was related to 9/11. In the past five years, many of the fearless dogs have died, some have retired and others are still happily at work. ... (NYDailyNews, by Amy Sacks, 09/09/06)
  
• Dad wants Christie locked up ... City Health Commissioner Thomas Frieden also was put on the hot seat.Under intense grilling from Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-Manhattan, Brooklyn), Frieden appeared to contradict Mayor Bloomberg's position on the cause of the illnesses now evident among so many rescue and recovery workers. "There is no doubt from the city's point of view that there are people ill because of their exposure at the World Trade Center," Frieden said. ... The congressional hearing occurred a day after U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Michael Leavitt pledged to release $75 million to treat - and not merely monitor - ailing Ground Zero heroes. (NYDaily News, by Paul H.B. Shin, 09/09/06)
  
• Harmful Legacy of Pollution and Deception at Ground Zero: How Post 9/11 Disaster Policy Endangers America ... The report urges stronger oversight by Congress and advocates major changes in federal disaster response policies, so that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) can carry out their duties to protect health, free from political interference.... (Sierra Club, by Suzanne Mattei, September 8, 2006)
• Residents, politicians point fingers during 9/11 health hearings ... Ex-EPA chief Christie Whitman claims her commetns about air safety were misunderstoof .... Thousands of people affected by the toxic air from 9/11 made a plea for help at health hearings Friday. Officials say there was a lot of finger-pointing, with residents calling for answers and politicians running for cover. ... Retired policeman Joseph Zadroga is now raising his granddaughter because his son died from black lung disease after working at the site for several months. Zadroga says he is now furious with Whitman. ... (abc7, Sept. 8, 2006)
• Hearing in session on growing 9/11 health problems ... Former EPA Chief, Christine Todd Whitman blamed for saying the air was safe, she says she was misunderstood ... Lawmakers are grilling federal attacks today on the growing health problems facing first responders at Ground Zero on September 11th. Former EPA Chief Christie Todd Whitman, who five years ago said the air was safe, now says we all misunderstood her. ... (abc7, Sept. 8, 2006)
• Collapse warning at Deutsche Bank ... Officials have raised concerns about a possible massive floor collapse during the planned demolition of the Deutsche Bank building near Ground Zero, the Daily News has learned. In comments to the state agency overseeing the tearing down of the 40-story tower, federal regulators demanded that workers now removing toxic dust from the interior be evacuated before any demolition starts.Occupational Safety & Health Administration officials warned, "An unexpected collapse could very well pancake the floors quicker than employees below could evacuate." OSHA joined state Department of Labor inspectors, who also demanded a total evacuation in the early stages of the demolition until conditions are deemed safe for workers inside the tower. Both agencies expressed concerns about unforeseen factors, including the possibility that vibrations from equipment used in the demolition could cause a sudden collapse."It could be that there are additional static or dynamic loads or vibrations that have not been considered," OSHA wrote. ... LMDC spokeswoman Kori-Ann Taylor said yesterday the demolition would be overseen by the engineering company of Thornton-Tomasetti, which would "ensure that all deconstruction activities maintain the building's stability throughout the process." The agency had said it would begin demolition in the fall, but other officials say they have no idea when the work at 130 Liberty St. will begin. ... (NYDaily News, by Greg B. Smith, September 8, 2006)
  
• Former EPA Chief Blames Giuliani For Lack of Masks at WTC Site ... Former Environmental Protection Agency chief Christie Whitman says it's the Giuliani administration's fault World Trade Center rescue workers are suffering from September 11th-related illnesses, but Mayor Michael Bloomberg is defending his predecessor’s actions. ... Meanwhile, Downtown residents turned out Thursday night for a meeting with medical experts about their post-September 11th health concerns. "We went on from the very beginning to say that this air is toxic, our kids have asthma, I'm having breathing problems, and the only thing that we were told was go back to work, to stay in our homes, to keep breathing that air and to clean it up ourselves," said one Lower Manhattan resident. ... (NY1, Sept. 8, 2006)
  
• Whitman piles blame on Rudy: Says EPA warned city of health risks at toxic WTC ... Giuliani, in a statement to "60 Minutes," said only that government must work to address "any problems that may have developed" as a result of work at Ground Zero ... Press releases from the week after 9/11 do show the EPA urging workers to take mild precautions. They included wearing "dust masks" and urging rescue workers to "change their clothing." But those notes of caution were all but drowned out by reassuring statements by Whitman, whose words were widely interpreted to mean that the air everywhere in lower Manhattan was safe to breathe.... (NYDaily News, by David Saltonstall, September 8, 2006)
  
• HOW WE HAVE CHANGED ,... At the same time, many continue to worry about air quality. Some - including Olivia's father, Tom Goodkind - suffer from illnesses they believe may have been caused by the toxic dust and the smoke from fires that burned at Ground Zero for months. And despite assurances from rebuilding officials that the former Deutsche Bank building at 130 Liberty St. will be decontaminated floor by floor, many still fear the health impacts of the structure's demolition. Filled with human remains and toxic contaminants, it still stands, shrouded in scaffolding and black netting.The residents wonder aloud, shouldn't the city make sure we're safe before they entice thousands more to live in lower Manhattan? ... City officials had promised that no area in lower Manhattan would be reopened until the dust and debris were cleared and that testing of the air quality had determined it was safe to allow people back. But a recent Newsday investigation found that even as city and federal government were reassuring New Yorkers the air at Ground Zero was safe in the weeks after Sept. 11, some officials were sounding the alarm within their agencies about air quality at the site. "It cost a lot of people their health," Goodkind said. Goodkind now wears a pacemaker and has had two cases of double-pneumonia in the past two years. He doesn't have the energy he used to, and he has trouble breathing. He believes his illness may have been caused by the smoke and dust he inhaled in the months after Sept. 11. ... (Newsday, by Jennifer Maloney, September 8, 2006)
  
• Nation: Our War Zone ... Gerson, 48, is the New York City councilor for District 1, which includes the World Trade Center site, and is a lifelong resident of the city. ... took office on Jan. 1, 2002. After 9/11 the nature of constituent issues drastically changed. Instead of worrying about potholes, I had to worry about whether apartment buildings were safe to live in. Instead of noise and pollution from traffic congestion, it was noise and pollution from debris cleanup. In Lower Manhattan, 9/11 is still a context for virtually all public issues. Of course there's a greater emphasis on preparedness, safety, emergency response. People still worry about the health of the volunteers, the residents, and the workers who were there. As chair of the committee for Lower Manhattan Redevelopment, I do have some frustrations. It's disappointing that we haven't had more progress at the site. Also, in the rush to return to normal, the city and the feds have not always erred on the side of caution with the environmental and health issues, as the recent Mt. Sinai report demonstrates so dramatically. ... (Time, Sep. 8, 2006)
  
• WTC health czar gets a swift kick ... U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Michael Leavitt said he was "bringing in the A-team," headed by his second-in-command, Dr. John Agwunobi, to oversee the task of monitoring and treating 9/11related illnesses. The move puzzled members of the New York congressional delegation, who were meeting with Leavitt and advocates for Ground Zero heroes in Washington to discuss the first batch of federal dollars being released to treat - not just monitor - ailing rescue and recovery workers. Leavitt's surprise announcement came just two days after Howard, the straight-talking director of the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, was quoted in The New York Times saying: "I'm a czar without a budget." "We were lucky enough to get someone as good and straightforward as Dr. Howard," said Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-Manhattan, Queens). "I only hope that he isn't being pushed aside because he told the truth. He certainly isn't the B-team." ... Agwunobi was Jeb Bush's health secretary for four years in Florida before becoming Leavitt's assistant health secretary in December 2005.... (Daily News, by Michael McAuliff & Paul H.B. Shin, September 8, 2006)
  
• Federal 9/11 Health Chief to Speak at Town Hall Meeting ... The federal government’s chief coordinator of 9/11 health programs, faces what promises to be a feisty “town hall meeting” tonight. His visit comes on the heels of a Mount Sinai study that says 7 out of 10 rescuers have health problems that stem from the World Trade Center's collapse. REPORTER: Some residents and people who work or go to school in Lower Manhattan believe their health has been deteriorating since September 11th. They complain the only clinic set up for them – as opposed to firefighters or Ground Zero workers – is small and overwhelmed. ... REPORTER: Community Board One member Kathy McVeigh Hughes says CUNY has been a bad neighbor in the years since the attack. McVeigh: It’s five years and it is an eye sore. It is a constant reminder and it is something that should have been dealt with several years ago. REPORTER: Officials say that by the Fall of 2009 CUNY students will have a brand new state of the art facility that will cost $187 million dollars. College officials concede it took years to get their insurance settlement and to raise the money to rebuild. Winning local public confidence from a neighborhood that has been through so much has been a major challenge for officials. Word that the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation will soon go out of business is not helping. Community activists have locked horns with the Pataki creation but they say it gave them a place to plug in. Hughes, a civil engineer by training, heads the Community Board Number One’s World Trade Center task force. HUGHES: A lot of unknowns are out there now with LMDC being dissolved. We don’t even know what their time frame is for going out of business"..Who will be overseeing the demolition of Deutsche bank?....So who will the community go to when they have questions and for the accountability. Also after the building is taken down who is going to own that property and get the proceeds from that sale? ... (WNYC, by Fred Mogul, Sept. 7, 2006)
  
• Lawmaker Introduces Bill to Aid Sick 9/11 Responders, Residents ... On the heels of the release of a new study on the health problems of rescue and recovery workers at the World Trade Center site, a local Congressman proposed new legislation Thursday that is aimed at helping them, as well as those who lived and worked in Lower Manhattan. Under the 9/11 Comprehensive Health Benefits Act, anyone with related illnesses would get health benefits under Medicare. It would also put together a consortium to monitor and do research on the illnesses, as well as create a federally funded medical center to focus on them. Congressman Jerrold Nadler – who represents Lower Manhattan – introduced the bill. He says the federal government is to blame for telling people the air was safe downtown shortly after the attacks. ... Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton is introducing companion legislation in the U.S. Senate.... Congressman Nadler does not expect the bill to pass in the closing weeks of Congress, but he hopes to hold hearings on the issue, when the new congress starts meeting in January. ... Meanwhile, Governor George Pataki wants the federal government to step up. Speaking with NY1's Rebecca Spitz, the governor says Washington should do more to help first responders and Lower Manhattan residents. ... (NY1, Sept. 7, 2006)
  
• Documents: Feds, City Knew of Ground Zero Toxins:  part II-- Memo: NYC Reopend WTC Area Despite EPA Warning ... has obtained documents revealing that Lower Manhattan was reopened a few weeks following the attack even though the air was not safe. The two devastating memos, written by the U.S. and local governments, show they knew. They knew the toxic soup created at Ground Zero was a deadly health hazard. Yet they sent workers into the pit and people back into their homes. One of the memos, from the New York City health department, dated Oct. 6, 2001, noted: "The mayor's office is under pressure from building owners ... in the Red Zone to open more of the city." The memo said the Department of Environmental Protection was "uncomfortable" with opening the areas but, "The mayor's office was directing the Office of Emergency Management to open the target areas next week." "Not only did they know it was unsafe, they didn't heed the words of more experienced people that worked for the city and E.P.A.," said Joel Kupferman, with the group Environmental Justice Project. Another part of the memo noted: "The E.P.A. has been very slow to make data results available and to date has not sufficiently informed the public of air quality issues arising from this disaster." ... It also doesn't suprise Carmen Flores, who lives in an apartment in the Baruch Houses that was engulfed in the 9/11 toxic plume. Her health has deteriorated and she has multiple medicines. "I feel forgotten," she said. Bruce Sprague, an E.P.A. official in the New York and New Jersey region during 9/11 admited to CBS 2 News the agency was finding alarming air quality readings at Ground Zero and in the surrounding areas. Sprague said the E.P.A. had written much more conservative health assessments, but the memos had to go to Washington. And when the White House got its hands on them, they -- according to Sprague -- softened them. ...(WCBS, Marica Kramer, Sept. 7, 2006)
  
• 9/11 Five Years Later: Questions about health effects remain, Researchers can't explain differences among responders ... Most emblematic among the respiratory illnesses, doctors say, is World Trade Center cough. ... "Basically, this started as a bit of a cough, but it seems to have gotten worse," said Charos, who adds that now, any exposure to airborne irritants produces coughing spasms. "I just don't have the endurance I used to have. ... Picciotto, a resident of Chester, N.Y., was treated for scratches on both corneas, which healed in a couple of months. He also had hearing problems caused by dust that was impacted in each ear canal. He said it took about a year for the debris to exit through his sinuses. Like Charos and others, Picciotto developed the dry, hacking cough, though he has weaned himself from his respiratory medications. ... (Newsday, by Delthia Ricks, Sept. 7, 2006)
  
• 9/11 Five Years Later: At WTC site, a rally for aid ... They swept up toxic dust from offices and sidewalks along Ground Zero, or simply remained in their lower Manhattan neighborhoods, living and working as life came back to normal. They are residents, undocumented immigrant workers and others who for years have said they, too, are sick - but are now bolstered by a conclusive medical study linking World Trade Center dust clouds to debilitating health problems. Scores of those workers and residents rallied across the street from Ground Zero yesterday, demanding that the state and federal government document their illnesses and provide them with long-term medical treatment. "In five years, we haven't seen one dollar," said Ines Belaez, 62, of Jackson Heights, who said she worked seven days a week cleaning offices along Church Street for a month after 9/11, and now has severe bronchitis, neurological dysfunction and depression. "Why did they lie to us and tell us that the air was clean?" Advocates say that the plight of low-income people and the uninsured has been overlooked as Gov. George Pataki and the federal government have focused on police officers, firefighters and construction workers when creating 9/11 health services. ... (Newsday, by Luis Perez, Sept. 7, 2006)
  
• Smoke Plume Dispersal from the World Trade Center Disaster ... While some airborne material circulated within the urban "canyons," much of the material was lifted above the buildings and transported great distances. As a result, surface level exposures were not as frequent and intense as they could have been under different meteorological conditions. To simulate the transport of pollutants in the plume, the researchers had to understand its behavior on scales ranging from tens of meters to several hundred kilometers. They calculated atmospheric motions using a multi-grid regional atmospheric modeling system covering scales from 250 meters to 300 kilometers. ... (Multi-angle Imaging SpectroRadiometer, last updated 06 Sept 2006)
• Letter to the Editor:: Five Years Later ... Thank you for your Sept. 6 editorial “The Other Victims of Sept. 11.” As a physician, shortly after Sept. 11, 2001, I thought it was unconscionable, if not downright immoral, for the White House to put pressure on the Environmental Protection Agency to suppress information on how toxic the fumes around ground zero truly were. Now, five years later, I feel that it is equally unconscionable that the Bush administration and the Republican Congress have allocated just $52 million for medical care for the thousands of brave rescuers and volunteers who were told the air was safe. And so far, not one cent has reached a real patient. I consider this a moral failure on the part of the federal government. (NYTimes, Robert Stuart, Sept. 6, 2006)
  
• Letter to the Editor:: Five Years Later . .. Thousands of downtown residents and office workers also inhaled large quantities of trade center dust on 9/11. Thanks to misleading advisories and superficial cleanups, many faced continuing exposure when they returned to their homes and offices as well. No facility comparable to the dedicated Mount Sinai Medical Center clinic exists to document the problems in this population, but that should not be a license to ignore its needs.Civilians who suffer long-term health effects also deserve federal support for assessment and treatment. (NYTimes, Mark Scherzer , Sept. 6, 2006)
  
• Business Close Out to Clear Way For Transit Hub ... It was Congressman Nadler and community groups that raised concerns when they learned the MTA was planning to take down the building back in April with no environmental oversight. The concern is that the building was never properly cleaned, and that removing it could stir up toxins. "We want to make sure that this dust, particularly if it is World Trade Center-contaminated, that it is mitigated, and that is not released to the surrounding neighborhood," Community Board 1 vice chairperson Catherine McVay Hughes. Unlike large buildings like the old Deutsche Bank building which is also slated to come down, the building at 189 Broadway is just two stories, and was reoccupied after 9/11. Still, the community groups appealed to the Environmental Protection Agency, and the MTA agreed to submit a plan to the EPA, which it did last month. Some might argue this is just the kind of red tape slowing down the entire rebuilding process, a notion Nadler rejects. "I would rather slow down the physical rebuilding of lower Manhattan and save lives," said Nadler. "It’s important that there's proper oversight and there's minimal exposure to people that live and work down here. A lot of children live in the financial district," said McVay Hughes. 189 Broadway can come down as soon as the EPA signs off on the MTA's plan. But that's not the end. To make way for the transit hub, it'll also have to take down all the buildings across the street. (NY1, by Bobby Cuz, September 06, 2006)
  
• The World Trade Center Disaster and the Health of Workers: Five-Year Assessment of a Unique Medical Screening Program ... Background. Approximately 40,000 rescue and recovery workers were exposed to caustic dust and toxic pollutants following the September 11, 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center (WTC). These workers included traditional first responders such as firefighters and police and a diverse population of construction, utility, and public sector workers. Results. Sixty-nine percent of 9,442 responders examined between July 2002 and April 2004 reported new or worsened respiratory symptoms while performing WTC work. Symptoms persisted to the time of examination in 59%. Among those who had been asymptomatic before 9/11, 61% developed respiratory symptoms while performing WTC work. Twenty-eight percent had abnormal spirometry. FVC was low in 21% of our population. Obstruction was present in 5%. Among non-smokers, 27% had abnormal spirometry vs. 13% in the general U.S. population. Prevalence of low FVC among nonsmokers was five-fold greater than in the U.S. population (20% vs. 4%). Respiratory symptoms and spirometry abnormalities were significantly associated with early arrival at the site.Conclusion. WTC responders had exposure-related increases in respiratory symptoms and PFT abnormalities that persisted up to 2.5 years after the attacks. Long-term medical monitoring is required to track persistence of these abnormalities and identify late effects, including possible malignancies. Lessons learned should guide future responses to civil disasters. ... (6 September 2006 online, Environmental Health Perspectives, Herbert et al)
  
• Study: 7 out of 10 WTC rescuers have suffered lung problems ... "There should no longer be any doubt about the health effects of the World Trade Center. Our patients are sick," said Dr. Robin Herbert, co-director of the World Trade Center Worker and Volunteer Medical Screening Program at Mount Sinai.(Newsday, by Luis Perez, Sept. 6, 2006)
  
• Those other 9-11 victims speak out ... As the fifth anniversary of 9-11 approaches, the spotlight has finally trained on all the stories about the fallout from the World Trade Center disaster-all the stories about first responders getting sick from the toxic dust, for example. This week's findings from the Mount Sinai 9-11 study showing that 70 percent of ground zero workers have developed new respiratory illnesses pretty much confirms what activists have long described as a growing health crisis. And that's just the first responders, of course. Residents, office workers, clean-up workers: These people are suffering from the same litany of symptoms, to little recognition. Today, they seized the spotlight. More than 200 of them gathered across the street from ground zero, in lower Manhattan, where they protested the federal government's long-standing silence over the health effects of 9-11. "I'm one of the forgotten victims!" shouted Elaine Guillermo, standing on a makeshift stage, as the 250-strong crowd roared. She launched into a raucous chant-"What do we want? Health care! When do we want it? Now!" ... (Village Voice, by Kristen Lombardi, Sept. 6, 2006)
  Large Study of World trade center Responders Finds Persistent Health Problems in Many: 60 Percent Still Suffer Respiratory Problems from Exposure to Environment at Site ... The findings are based upon medical examinations performed between July 2002 and April 2004 on 9,500 WTC responders. These responders were a highly diverse group and included members of the building trades, law enforcement officers, firefighters, utilities and telecommunications workers, transit workers, and many others. All received a comprehensive examination that included complete physical examination, mental health evaluation, pulmonary function tests, chest x-ray, blood tests and urinalysis. Overall, the monitoring program examined close to 12,000 responders during the 21-month period covered by the study; 9,500 of whom agreed to allow their results to be used in this report. ... The study published today focuses on respiratory health consequences, one of the earliest areas of concern to emerge. The study found that many responders were symptomatic, with high rates of pulmonary function abnormalities as long as two-and-a-half years after the disaster. The findings are particularly striking, in that the workers who served at the World Trade Center tended to be vigorous, healthy workers who held jobs in strenuous professions such as the building and utility trades before September 11. Specific findings included:
  * Almost 70 percent of World Trade Center responders had a new or worsened respiratory symptom that developed during or after their time working at the WTC
  * Among the responders who were asymptomatic before 9/11, 61 percent developed respiratory symptoms while working at the WTC
  * Close to 60 percent still had a new or worsened respiratory symptom at the time of their examination
  * One third had abnormal pulmonary function tests, much higher than expected
  * Severe respiratory conditions including pneumonia were significantly more common in the six months after 9/11 than in six months prior ...(News Release, MSSM, September 5, 2006)
  
• Mayor Bloomberg Announces Comprehensive Citywide Effort to Address 9/11 World Trade Cetner Health-Related Issues ... Establishment of WTC Environmental Health Center Will Expand Medical and Mental Health Screening, Evaluation and Treatment Services to a Greater Number of New Yorkers; Expansion of Health Department’s World Trade Center Unit Will Increase Monitoring, Resources and Communications to Physicians and Affected Individuals; Effort Also Includes Creation of a Mayoral Review Panel to Ensure Maximum Coordination between City Agencies and Assess Sufficiency of City, State and Federal Resources to Address Ongoing Health Needs ... (News Release, September 5, 2006)
  
• Mt. Sinai Releases Health Study Of 9/11 First Responders ... Nearly seven in 10 first responders suffered some sort of lung problem during or after their work at the World Trade Center site, according to a report released Tuesday by Mount Sinai. ... The report suggests that people who responded right after the attacks experience the worst health effects. "I have burnt lungs, I have asthma, reactive airway disease, gastric reflux, post-traumatic stress and a host of other things," said WTC responder John Graham. Senator Hillary Clinton stressed the importance of the study. "I'm underscoring that we look at these numbers and realize the significance," said Clinton. Despite the medical nature of the study, Mayor Michael Bloomberg expressed skepticism at the results. "I haven't seen the Mount Sinai study, but I don't believe that you can say specifically a particular problem came from this particular effect," said Bloomberg. ... (NY1, Sept. 5, 2006)
  
• Many 9/11 Workers Have Lung Issues, Report Says ... In the largest study so far of post-9/11 health problems, almost 70 percent of workers who helped with the cleanup of the World Trade Center site suffered new or worsened respiratory symptoms, researchers at Mount Sinai Medical Center found. The study found that people who worked on the cleanup had pulmonary abnormalities of twice the rate in the comparable United States population and that the abnormalities persisted for many months and, in some cases, years after exposure. The findings are based on medical examinations performed between July 2002 and April 2004 on 9,500 workers and volunteers who took part in the cleanup of the twin towers, doctors from the center said at a news conference today. The report found a high rate of illness among those studied, and also found that the illnesses persisted in high proportion years after the 2001 event. ... Of the group of 12,000 initially examined, 9,500 agreed to allow their results to be used in the report that will be published in Thursday’s edition of Environmental Health Perspectives, the journal of the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences. Among the report’s chief findings: Almost 70 percent of those who responded had a new or worsened respiratory symptom that developed during or after their time working at the World Trade Center site. Among the workers who were showed no such symptoms before 9/11, 61 percent developed respiratory symptoms while working at the site. Almost 60 percent still had a new or worsened respiratory symptom when they were examined for the study. One third had abnormal pulmonary function tests, much higher than expected. Severe respiratory conditions, including pneumonia, were significantly more common in the six months after 9/11 than in the six months before the event. Those who arrived first at the site suffered the heaviest exposures, the report found, which is significant because 70 percent of those screened arrived at the site in the first few days after the disaster, between Sept. 11 and 13. In the past year, the responders seen by doctors involved in the study have suffered from upper respiratory illnesses, like sinusitis, laryngitis, and vocal cord dysfunction; lower respiratory disorders, like asthma and World Trade Center cough; ... (NYTimes, by Maria Newman, 09/05/06)
  
• Q&A:  Anthony DePalma, Environmental and Conservation Reporter ... (NYTimes)
  
• Lung Problems Rife Among WTC Responders ... "There should no longer be any doubt about the health effects of the World Trade Center. Our patients are sick," said Dr. Robin Herbert, co-director of the group that has monitored the health of nearly 16,000 ground zero workers. Herbert said that most of the patients in the study first came to ground zero between Sept. 11 and Sept. 13, 2001, which exposed them to asbestos, pulverized concrete, mercury and toxins that will leave them chronically sick. "Our patients were very, very highly exposed, and are likely to suffer health consequences as a result of that for the rest of their lives," she said. Herbert was joined by lawmakers who accused the federal government of not doing enough to protect the workers' health and not spending enough to treat them. Mayor Michael Bloomberg cast doubt on the study's claims, saying, "I don't believe that you can say specifically a particular problem came from this particular event." ... Ironworker John Sferazo, who spent 30 days on the smoldering debris pile and now takes 26 medications a day to deal with his lung problems, said the White House did too little, too late. "If President Bush wanted this situation to be cleaned up, it would have been cleaned up long before now," he said. He said he was having trouble getting words out at Tuesday's news conference because he is constantly short of breath and has restrictive airway disease. "I'm lucky if I can run a city block without dropping dead," said Sferazo, 51.... The mayor announced that a World Trade Center clinic will open in January at a public hospital. Among those who will be treated there are illegal immigrants and uninsured people. (AP/Washington Post, Sept. 5, 2006)
  
• 'A horrible thing' Poll finds widespread anger over treatment of ill 9/11 workers ... Nearly five years after 9/11, 72% of New Yorkers say not enough is being done to help Ground Zero workers battle their emerging health problems - an issue Mayor Bloomberg is expected to address today with renewed vigor. The sense of anger over the slow-footed government response to workers' health needs is consistent across all ethnic and geographic boundaries in the city, the poll found. ... And while he stopped short of drawing a direct link between 9/11 and specific ailments - saying the effects of that day "are still largely unknown" - the mayor also acknowledged for the first time that some workers "have developed higher rates of both respiratory problems and psychological distress." ... "What I heard people saying is, 'We should be ashamed,'" said Mickey Blum of Blum & Weprin Associates, the firm that conducted the poll for The News. "People are angry about this one, and it's every group - young, old, black, white." Blum added that - much like everyone in the city seemed to know someone killed in the World Trade Center attacks - many now say they know someone who was made sick during the cleanup and is not getting proper attention. "People are taking it personally," said Blum, adding that most of the anger seemed to be directed at the feds, whom many see as less effective at addressing the aftermath of 9/11 than the city. ... NYDailyNews, by David Saltonstall, Sept. 5, 2006)
  
• Our debt to Ground Zero heroes: The city will do more for sick rescue workers, says mayor ...When our nation was attacked on Sept. 11, 2001, thousands of New Yorkers and people from around the country came to our aid by assisting with the difficult and dangerous rescue and recovery work at Ground Zero. Our nation owes them more than an enormous debt of gratitude; we owe them support for their health and well-being. The destruction of the World Trade Center resulted in an unprecedented disaster, and only time will tell what the long-term health effects will be. After 9/11, the only thing we knew for certain was that we had to do everything possible to identify those effects, understand them, and use that knowledge to help people get the best possible treatment, at the earliest possible date. To do that, we immediately began creating a process to systematically monitor the health of those affected by 9/11 and assist them in getting information on the resources and care they would need. The result includes the World Trade Center Health Registry, which monitors health information and provides resources for 71,000 people from New York and around the country - the largest and most ambitious postdisaster health project in the nation. We also immediately initiated a very aggressive screening and treatment program for our firefighters and EMS workers, who receive first-rate health benefits. Quality care is also available to other rescue, recovery and cleanup workers and volunteers - regardless of their insurance status - through screening and treatment programs by a consortium of hospitals around the city and region. In fact, about 30,000 people have already taken advantage of these programs. Our work has been supported by the federal government - but now we need that support to continue. Our administration will continue working to convince the state and federal governments to make a long-term commitment to monitoring and treatment programs for those affected by 9/11. We have also been supporting legislation to reopen the federal Victim Compensation Fund, which was established to provide for individuals who were physically injured in the attacks and the relatives of those who died. The filing deadline was in 2003 - too soon for people who may have become symptomatic later on. ... Today, we will announce a series of new initiatives that build on our track record of supporting those who supported us in the months after 9/11. These initiatives are in response to trends and concerns that we have identified through the WTC Health Registry and other sources, and they build upon the knowledge that medical experts have gained since 9/11. In short, they will reflect our commitment to a health policy that is both responsive and responsible. The effects of 9/11 are still largely unknown, but we now know much more than we did even one year ago. As trends continue to develop, the City will continue to do everything possible to learn about the problems people face and develop effective strategies to deal with them. ... (NYDailyNews, by Michael Bloomberg, Sept. 5, 2006)
  
• 9/11 health problems widen ... Mariama James is neither a firefighter nor an emergency medical technician, and after the World Trade Center attacks, she spent no time working on the pile as a volunteer responder. The 35-year-old mother of three is a bookkeeper who lives at 90 Gold St., four blocks east and one block north of Ground Zero. But right after Sept. 11, when a thick layer of dust from downtown blew in through her windows, James, who was eight months pregnant at the time, said she started feeling pain in the middle of her chest. Then came the cysts that appeared from her face to her groin, and "really horrific" allergies and respiratory problems that she said affect both her and her children, who are now 14, 20 and 4. She said her husband, who was out of town for months before and after 9/11, suffers from none of these ailments. .... "I'm very angry today," said Jonathan Bennett, a spokesman for the New York Committee for Occupational Safety and Health, a private group that works on workplace safety issues. "It's perfectly reasonable for the guidelines to focus a great deal on the people who had the heaviest exposure, but there's no reason to ignore people who had lighter exposure," Bennett told me.He said he doubted that a physician who read the guidelines, and then treated a patient who lives on Duane Street who's having problems breathing, would ever suspect there was a link to Ground Zero.... (Long Island, Newsday, by Sheryl McCarthy, Sept. 4, 2006)
  

AUGUST

• Nested Case–Control Study of Autoimmune Disease in an Asbestos-Exposed Population ... Objective: To explore the potential association between asbestos exposure and risk of autoimmune disease, we conducted a case–control study among a cohort of 7,307 current and former residents of Libby, Montana, a community with historical occupational and environmental exposure to asbestos-contaminated vermiculite. Methods: Cases were defined as those who reported having one of three systemic autoimmune diseases (SAIDs) : systemic lupus erythematosus, scleroderma, or rheumatoid arthritis (RA) . Controls were randomly selected at a 3:1 ratio from among the remaining 6,813 screening participants using frequency-matched age and sex groupings. Results: The odds ratios (ORs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) for SAIDs among those "65 years of age who had worked for the vermiculite mining company were 2.14 (95% CI, 0.90–5.10) for all SAIDs and 3.23 (95% CI, 1.31–7.96) for RA. In this age group, exposure to asbestos while in the military was also an independent risk factor, resulting in a tripling in risk. Other measures of occupational exposure to vermiculite indicated 54% and 65% increased risk for SAIDs and RA, respectively. Those who had reported frequent contact with vermiculite through various exposure pathways also demonstrated elevated risk for SAIDs and RA. We found increasing risk estimates for SAIDs with increasing numbers of reported vermiculite exposure pathways (p < 0.001) . Conclusion: These preliminary findings support the hypothesis that asbestos exposure is associated with autoimmune disease. Refined measurements of asbestos exposure and SAID status among this cohort will help to further clarify the relationship between these variables. ... (Environmental Health Perspectives, August 2006; Curtis W. Noonan, Jean C. Pfau, Theodore C. Larson, and Michael R. Spence)
  

• Stuy grad's 9/11 dsut crusade: Five years later, health coverage concerns linger in the air for elite school alums ... The Environmental Protection Agency told Stuyvesant High School administrators the air was safe less than a month after Sept. 11, 2001. Students like Lila Nordstrom dutifully returned to the elite public school on Oct. 9, 2001, as fires were still smoldering at the World Trade Center site and trucks were still carting debris right outside the building. Nordstrom was a senior then. Now, she’s a Vassar graduate without health insurance and she’s concerned about how toxic dust may have affected her health. “We were minors at the time,” Nordstrom, 22, said. “We had no say in the decision to go back. Our parents didn’t know. I realize now how egregiously messed up the decision was at Stuyvesant. We were like canaries, used by the government to show that downtown was open for business.” Nordstrom — the only member of her family not to outgrow childhood asthma — is fighting to get a government-sponsored health insurance and monitoring program for students attending Stuy High during the 2001-2002 school year. She used Facebook.com to track down roughly 170 former students to sign onto an open letter she sent to several elected officials like Senators Charles Schumer and Hillary Clinton. “A lot of students still don’t want to talk about it or deal with it,” she said, adding many felt the focus should remain on first responders. “There are monitoring programs at city hospitals for emergency workers and there should be, but what about us? If people start getting sick in three years, we may not be able to detect it.” ... (Metro Ny, by Amy Zimmer, Aug. 31, 2006)
• Nadler: NYC 9/11 Health Guideline Still Too Limiting ... Congressman Jerrold Nadler released the following statement in response to the release of the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene Clinical Guidelines for Adults Exposed to the World Trade Center Disaster: "I am pleased that the Department of Health has finally, at long last, released these guidelines. They confirm that New York continues to suffer from a health crisis caused by the World Trade Center disaster. "Recognizing those with health problems should have been a first step taken years ago. Five years later, victims need accessible treatment, not mere guidelines. "Furthermore, I am concerned that the approach here is still too limiting. I am particularly troubled at the inadequate attention given to the issues of contaminated indoor spaces and chronic exposure populations." (News Release, August 31, 2006)
  
• Rep. Maloney React to NYC's Release of 9/11 Health Guidelines .... “These guidelines paint a bleak picture about the health effects of 9/11, but are an meaningful step forward in helping doctors to better treat patients exposed to the toxins of Ground Zero.  This is important because the doctors at the World Trade Center Medical Monitoring Program have testified before Congress that they have seen a number of patients coming into their monitoring program who received the wrong diagnosis and the wrong treatment from their primary care physician – people with pulverized glass in their lungs getting diagnosed with asthma.  Hopefully now with these guidelines released to all doctors, this number can be dramatically reduced.” ... (News Release, August 31, 2006)
  
• Health Officials Release New Guideline to Treat 9/11 Victims ... For the first time in nearly five years, city health officials released guidelines Thursday to help doctors recognize and treat September 11th related illnesses. ... Previously, the city's department of health issued guidelines on how to deal with post-traumatic stress disorder, substance abuse and mental abuse. Now health officials say they have enough information to release advice on how to treat people with respiratory problems. ... (NY1, August 31, 2006)
  
• Critics: EPA Should 'Do its Job' on 3rd Anniversary of Damning Internal Report ... (Homeland Response, By Sandy Smith, August 29, 2006)
• Five Years After 9/11, Lower Manhattan Residents Still Concerned About Health Issues ... For thousands of residents living in Lower Manhattan, there was no escaping the dust, smoke and fumes in the days, weeks and even months following the September 11th attacks. And now, five years later, many still have real concerns over what could be happening with their health as a result. ... Nelson Marty has lived in downtown Manhattan for nearly 30 years. But since the events of 9/11, he says his health just hasn't been the same. “I am a runner. I have done the New York City Marathon twice. After 9/11, in 2002, my asthma re-manufactured itself,” he says. “Up until then I had no medication whatsoever.” Now he's taking Advair, an inhalable steroid meant to prevent asthma attacks, at least twice a day. It may seem like only a mild change, but doctors and community advocates say Marty serves as just one example among hundreds, if not thousands, of Lower Manhattan residents who could be suffering post-9/11 health woes.... (NY1, Kafi Drexel, August 28, 2006)
  
• Early on, dissent over air quality: Public statements after 9/11 under scrutiny in wake of lawsuit, illnesses ... Even as the city and federal government were reassuring New Yorkers that the air at Ground Zero was safe in the weeks after Sept. 11, some officials were sounding the alarm within their agencies about air quality at the site. A series of court documents and internal memos reveals, among other things, a City Hall divided over when to reopen downtown to workers and shoppers, and a failure to enforce regulations aimed at assuring that workers were protected in the sooty, dust-filled air. Five years later, the cost now may be coming due in mysterious illnesses, shortened careers, even lost lives - and a class action lawsuit by 7,000 people. On Oct. 6, 2001, while the city and the Environmental Protection Agency were repeatedly reassuring New Yorkers that the air at Ground Zero was safe, a top city Health Department official wrote a three-page memo raising "critical environmental issues" related to the disaster. Associate Commissioner Kelly McKinney wrote that there were deep disagreements between the city's Office of Emergency Management and the Department of Environmental Protection over whether the air was safe enough to allow people back into the zone. "The mayor's office is under pressure from building owners and business owners in the red zone to open more of the city to occupancy," McKinney wrote. "According to OEM, some city blocks north and south of Ground Zero are suitable for reoccupancy. DEP believes the air quality is not yet suitable for reoccupancy. I was told the mayor's office was directing OEM to open the target areas next week." McKinney, now with OEM, did not respond to a written request for comment. 'Strict standard' In response to Newsday's questions, the city's law department issued a statement saying no area was reopened until testing had found it safe. "Areas were not reopened to the public until they were cleaned of dust and debris and testing demonstrated at least two consecutive days of asbestos levels below the strict standard for reoccupancy of schools," said Kenneth A. Becker, chief of the law department's World Trade Center unit. ... The city's Department of Environmental Protection, which conducted tests for asbestos in the days immediately after Sept. 11 that showed dangerously high levels of the fibers, did not reveal those test results to the public. The results were later disclosed by the state in response to a Freedom of Information request. Within a few weeks of the attacks, the city - aware that it probably would face massive litigation over the environmental hazards - had begun preparing itself. One official expressed concern that environmental claims might "bankrupt" the city. Three weeks after the collapses, in a signal of brewing concern, Fire Department doctors urgently requested $6 million to study health effects of Ground Zero work on firefighters. ... Very early on, city officials were concerned about the potential cost of 9/11-related environmental claims. In September 2001, the city hired the accounting firm Ernst & Young to perform a risk assessment. The firm estimated in an October report that the city faced a potential liability of more than $450 million for environmental claims and needed $2.8 billion in insurance coverage. The long-term health concerns, in part, spurred the city to try to limit its liability starting relatively early on after the attacks. On Oct. 15, a letter written by city lawyers and signed by Holden, the city official in charge of Ground Zero, asked the state to persuade the Federal Emergency Management Agency to pay for claims not covered by insurance. "I am concerned that the construction management firms [CMs] and the city will be open to exposure years after the project based on hazardous materials claims," the letter said. "This type of exposure would bankrupt the CMs and perhaps the city." ... CONTRADICTIONS IN THE AIR: SEPT. 19, 2001 "I am glad to reassure the people of New York and Washington, D.C., that their air is safe to breathe and their water is safe to drink." - Christie Whitman, U.S. EPA administrator. OCT. 6, 2001: The Mayor's Office is under pressure from building owners and business owners in the red zone to open more of the city to occupancy. According to OEM, some city blocks north and south of ground zero are suitable for reoccupancy. DEP believes the air quality at those locations is not yet suitable for reoccupancy. -Memo from Associate Commissioner Kelly McKinny (Newsday, by Graham Rayman, August 27, 2006)
  
• Health of World Trade Center workers questioned early: City documents reveal mounting concerns about health risks and spotty enforcement of regulations ... Even as the city and federal government were reassuring New Yorkers that the air at Ground Zero was safe in the weeks after Sept. 11, some officials were sounding the alarm within their agencies about air quality at the site. A series of court documents and internal memos reveals, among other things, a City Hall divided over when to reopen downtown to workers and shoppers, and a failure to enforce regulations aimed at assuring that workers were protected in the sooty, dust-filled air. Five years later, the cost of those decisions may be now coming due in mysterious illnesses, shortened careers, even lost lives -- and a class action lawsuit by 7,000 people. On Oct. 6, 2001, for example, while the city and the Environmental Protection Agency were repeatedly reassuring New Yorkers that the air at Ground Zero was safe, a top city health department official wrote a three-page memo raising "critical environmental issues" related to the disaster. Associate Commissioner Kelly McKinney wrote that there were deep disagreements between the Office of Emergency Management and the Department of Environmental Protection over whether the air was safe enough to allow people back into the zone. "The mayor's office is under pressure from building owners and business owners in the red zone to open more of the city to occupancy," McKinney wrote. "According to OEM, some city blocks north and south of Ground Zero are suitable for reoccupancy. DEP believes the air quality is not yet suitable for reoccupancy. I was told the mayor's office was directing OEM to open the target areas next week." McKinney, now with OEM, did not respond to a written request for comment. Strict standard' In response to Newsday's questions, the city's law department issued a statement saying no area was reopened until testing had found it safe. "Areas were not reopened to the public until they were cleaned of dust and debris and testing demonstrated at least two consecutive days of asbestos levels below the strict standard for reoccupancy of schools," said Kenneth A. Becker, chief of the law department's World Trade Center unit. ... Within a few weeks of the attacks, the city -- aware that it probably would face massive litigation over the environmental hazards -- had begun preparing itself. One official expressed concern that environmental claims might "bankrupt" the city. ... Very early on, city officials were concerned about the potential cost of 9/11-related environmental claims. In September 2001, the city hired the accounting firm, Ernst and Young, to perform a risk assessment. The firm estimated in an October report that the city faced a potential liability of more than $450 million for environmental claims and needed $2.8 billion in insurance coverage. The long-term health concerns, in part, spurred the city to try to limit its liability starting relatively early on after the attacks. On Oct. 15, a letter written by city lawyers and signed by Holden asked the state to persuade FEMA to pay for claims not covered by insurance. "I am concerned that the construction management firms and the city will be open to exposure years after the project based on hazardous materials claims," the letter said. "This type of exposure would bankrupt the CMs and perhaps the city." ... (Newsday, by Graham Rayman, August 26, 2006)
  
• Exogenous shocks to the human sex ratio: the case of September 11, 2001 in New York City ... BACKGROUND: The human secondary sex ratio reportedly falls in populations subjected to exogenous stressors such as earthquakes or political and social upheavals. Explanations of the association include reduced conception of males and increased fetal deaths among males. The latter explanation has been supported by research reporting that the sex ratio in California fell 3 months, but not 8, 9 or 10 months, after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. .... CONCLUSIONS:Our findings support the male fetal loss explanation of the association between exogenous population shocks and the secondary sex ratio. (Hum. Reprod. Acvance Access, August. 26, 2006)
  
• Rescuers face crisis - report ... The report underscores what could be an exploding health care crisis for rescue and recovery workers, as well as people who lived or worked near the twin towers. ... (Daily News, by Greg Wilson, August 26th, 2006)
• Dormitory Authoirty Seelects Firm to Clean and Demolish Fiterman Hall, A CUNY Building Damged on September 11th. ... PAL Environmental Safety Corp. of Long Island City has been selected to remediate hazardous materials and take down Fiterman Hall of the Borough of Manhattan Community College, Dormitory Authority officials announced today. Dormitory Authority Executive Director Maryanne Gridley and Managing Director of Construction James M. Gray said today that the Dormitory Authority of the State of New York (DASNY) has signed the Letter of Intent. DASNY is supervising the decontamination and deconstruction of Fiterman Hall on behalf of the City University of New York (CUNY). The contract value is $16,313,000. Fiterman Hall, at 30 West Broadway, was damaged in the September 11, 2001, attacks on the World Trade Center when falling debris from the collapse of 7 World Trade Center ripped holes in the south façade. The building is contaminated with mold and WTC dust.The 15-story building .... (News Release, August 25, 2006)
  
• 9/11 Shrine, With the Tragic, Toxic Dust ... A Lower Manhattan store’s display of its apparel coated with the stuff of disaster became a shrine after the attacks. The apparel and the dust, sealed since 2002, are now a historical society exhibit. ... It is always dangerous to disturb toxic dust, but this dust is historic, and possibly sacred. This week, a crew in hazard suits navigated a sealed bubble at the New-York Historical Society to recreate an eerie time capsule of Sept. 11, 2001, as the fifth anniversary approaches. ... Nothing like the installation has been done before, she said. The fragile textiles and the toxic dust that coated them required delicate handling. Curators had to protect themselves from the exhibition artifacts and also ensure the safety of museum visitors. ... (NYTimes, by Glenn Collins, August 25, 2006)
  
• Claim: 9/11 dust tests misleading ... An Environmental Protection Agency scientist told the New York congressional delegation that the agency used misleading data about World Trade Center dust. Cate Jenkins, a senior scientist at the agency's office of solid waste and emergency response, said in a letter to the delegation that reports on tests from 2002 and 2003 misrepresented the alkaline nature, or pH level, of the dust, The New York Times reported Friday. Some doctors have theorized that many illnesses developed by recovery workers and nearby residents were contributed to by highly alkaline dust from the fallen towers, the Times said. ... (UPI, Aug 25, 2006)
  
• E.P.A. Whistle-Blower Says U.S. Hid 9/11 Dust Danger ... A senior scientist at the Environmental Protection Agency has accused the agency of relying on misleading data about the health hazards of World Trade Center dust. The scientist, who has been sharply critical of the agency in the past, claimed in a letter to members of the New York Congressional delegation this week that test reports in 2002 and 2003 distorted the alkalinity, or pH level, of the dust released when the twin towers collapsed, downplaying its danger. Some doctors suspect that the highly alkaline nature of the dust contributed to the variety of ailments that recovery workers and residents have complained of since the attack. Tests of the gray-brown dust conducted by scientists at the United States Geological Survey a few months after the attack found that the dust was highly alkaline, in some instances as caustic or corrosive as drain cleaner, and capable of causing severe irritation and burns. The tests that are being challenged by the E.P.A. scientist were conducted by independent scientists at New York University. Those tests also indicated that larger particles of dust were highly alkaline. But they found that smaller dust particles — those most likely to reach into the lower airways of the lungs, where they could cause serious illnesses — were not alkaline and caustic. The geological survey’s tests did not differentiate the dust by particle size. A spokeswoman for the agency, Mary Mears, said in a statement that the E.P.A. stood behind its work on ground zero environmental hazards, as did the N.Y.U. scientists. The scientist making the complaint, Cate Jenkins, who has a Ph.D. in chemistry and works in the agency’s office of solid waste and emergency response, said the test results helped the E.P.A. avoid legal liability. Residents of Lower Manhattan have sued the agency in federal court, claiming that it bungled the cleanup. Dr. Jenkins said the test reports had a costly health effect, contributing “to emergency personnel and citizens not taking adequate precautions to prevent exposures.” In her statement, Ms. Mears distanced the agency from Dr. Jenkins, who has worked for the E.P.A. since 1979 and has been in conflict with the agency for years over her whistle-blowing activities. ... (NYTimes, by Anthony DePalma, Aug. 25, 2006)
  
• Scientist Says EPA Covered Up World Trade Center Dust Danger ... An Environmental Protection Agency scientist is accusing his office of relying on misleading data about the World Trade Center dust. According to the New York Times, the researcher wrote a letter this week to the New York Congressional delegation, detailing reports in 2002 and 2003 that distorted the pH level of the dust. Some doctors believe the high alkaline levels are what caused many of the illnesses now being suffered by recovery workers. ... (NY1, Aug. 25, 2006)
  
• 9/11 Death Bill Gives Families A Second Shot; EMS Unions Hail Workers' Comp Filing Break ... Mr. Eppinger, noting Mr. Bloomberg's influence over the Law Department's Workers' Compensation unit that must approve all EMS 9/11 claims, said the Mayor's strong opposition to the new laws had him worried. ... (Chief Leader, by Ginger Adams Otis, 8/25/06)
  
• Draft Report: Thousands Sick From WTC Rescue, Cleanup ... The report, yet to be released, is from the hospital's World Trade Center Medical Monitoring Program and is based on four years of studying the lingering health impact of Sept. 11. The medical evidence suggests rescue and recovery workers are sicker than the general population five years after the attacks. ... "The health effects of rescue recovery and volunteer work at the WTC cite were highly prevalent, severe and persistent in the nearly 10,000 workers we saw clinically between 2002 and 2004," according to the WTC Medical Monitoring Program.The evidence showed sharp increases in respiratory symptoms after Sept. 11, including abnormal lung capacity in a third of the workers one to two years after exposure, and lung problems affecting five times more people than you'd expect in the general population, doctors said. ... "We're willing to say that the medical problems persist. The pulmonary problems, the sinus problems, the indigestion, the breathing test abnormalities persist in these workers at much higher rates than are found in the population in general," said Dr. Jacqueline Moline. The draft finds that those with the highest rates of lung problems were the people engulfed in the dust cloud that could be seen for miles after the towers collapsed, with 54 percent reporting lower respiratory problems and 66 percent reporting upper respiratory problems. ... The Mount Sinai doctors warn the consequences are likely to get worse, saying "there may be future late-emerging health consequences, possibly including cancers among the World Trade Center responder population." Doctors planned to step up the monitoring of cancer cases. In the draft, the number of cancer cases was not included. Doctors believe most cases wouldn't show up for at least 10 years, but hundreds of people claim they've already developed World Trade Center-related cancer. (WNBC-TV, August 25, 2006)
  
• 9/11 Lead Tests Covered up ... Three days after 9/11, city Department of Transportation officials hurriedly arranged environmental testing at the agency's headquarters at 40 Worth St. in lower Manhattan.Those tests, performed by an outside consultant, revealed major lead contamination in the building. Some tests showed lead levels 10 times higher than federal regulations allow for indoor dust, according to internal agency documents recently obtained by the Daily News. The test results were especially significant because the 20story office building that houses DOT is located 10 blocks north of Ground Zero, in an area that City Hall and the federal government reopened to hundreds of thousands of office workers a few days later - on Sept. 17. At the time, health officials kept insisting there was no threat to public health from the fires at Ground Zero. Early environmental tests, they said, showed no worrisome contamination from asbestos or other toxic substances that were released after the twin towers collapsed. The lead contamination at 40 Worth St. was a clear challenge to that official story. Who could be sure there was no similar contamination in scores of other nearby office buildings where people had returned to work? On the department's 10th floor, for example, where the office of Commissioner Iris Weinshall is located, a dust sample from a window near the elevator showed lead levels three times above federal safety standards. The contamination there, however, was never publicly revealed by city officials who eventually posted thousands of environmental test results on a Web site of the city Department of Environmental Protection. The agency quietly notified its employee union, District Council 37, about the problem and hurriedly ordered the building's landlord to fix the problem. "Extensive cleanup was done before the employees were allowed to return a few weeks later," said DOT spokeswoman Kay Sarlan. "The city tried to give us some ridiculous reason that it [the lead contamination] was from before 9/11," said Lee Clarke, health and safety director for DC 37. Nearly five years later, it has become increasingly apparent that city officials simply hid from the public some of the worst results of their environmental testing in those early days. ... Many of these documents would have stayed buried were it not for Joel Kupferman, an attorney with the nonprofit New York Environmental Law and Justice Project. Kupferman has spent the past five years doggedly filing scores of Freedom of Information requests with every government agency for 9/11 documents. ... Virtually the entire New York congressional delegation demanded Tuesday that the EPA do what it should have done from the start, what its own inspector general recommended three years ago. It should inspect and, if necessary, clean every building in lower Manhattan - and even Brooklyn - that was contaminated by dust from Ground Zero. (Daily News, By Juan Gonzalez, August 25, 2006)
• 9/11 Health Woes Reach Far Beyond New York ... Ground zero worker Jimmy Willis' lung problems got so bad in the years after Sept. 11 that he finally left New York, hoping the dry air of Nevada would blow away the after-effects of toxic World Trade Center dust. But when he moved two years ago, Willis also left behind New York-based medical expertise on the subject of 9/11 related illnesses, joining a diaspora of hundreds of ground zero rescue workers scattered across the United States. It is a population many health experts, union leaders and politicians say is vulnerable to poor medical treatment because the government has delayed release of guidelines that would help doctors around the country diagnose and treat illnesses linked to the attacks. A standard medical protocol for health care workers is just one element of what a growing chorus of advocates says should be a long-term, national program to test and treat sick workers. Five years after the attacks, Willis, 51, suffers from respiratory disease and gastro-intestinal bleeding. The creation of testing guidelines, called protocols, was shelved for years. Most recently, officials indicated a release by the end of this year. The lag has come under criticism from workers' advocates. ... Exactly how many rescue workers responded to the attacks is unknown, though estimates usually range above 40,000. ... Testing guidelines are crucial, however, to helping a doctor in any clinic or network recognize symptoms, said Kathy Kirkland, the association's executive director. She said standardized protocols can help alert health care workers to the less obvious ailments connected to ground zero work. Take the gastro-intestinal problems afflicting Willis. "That's fairly common among World Trade Center responders, but it's something a lot of clinicians wouldn't recognize, wouldn't know," she said. Or the lungs. A standard pulmonary test doesn't reveal the true extent of Sept. 11-related damage, she said, because although it can measure lung capacity it doesn't gauge the wear-and-tear inflicted on the organs. "A lot of guys on the surface seem to have normal lung function, but compared to what they had before, their lungs have aged a whole lot faster than they should have," Kirkland said. "Again, that's not something the average clinician would think to check." ... (AP, by Devlin Barrett, August 25, 2006)
• Where's the money? ... From everything we know — and with no public process, what we know these days is pretty much restricted to what the Lower Manhattan Development Corp. decides to share with the press –L.M.D.C. had long ago capped what it would spend to bring down the Deutsche Bank. In its February 27, 2004 press release announcing the building purchase and setting out the terms of its agreement with the Deutsche Bank and its insurers, L.M.D.C. states: “The agreement caps the cost of cleaning and demolition to $45 million and the insurers would pay any costs above the agency’s cap.” These same assurances were reiterated a year later by then president (and now chairperson) Kevin Rampe in response to questioning from Councilmember Alan Gerson at a February ‘05 City Council hearing on the demolition of 9/11contaminated buildings. Please add those of us who’ve been working to make the 130 Liberty St demolition safe to the chorus of community voices asking for the whereabouts of the $45 million earmarked as community enhancement funds. (Downtown Express, Letters to the Editor: Kimberly Flynn, August 18-24, 2006)
  
• Report: Search for human remains at WTC skyscraper is thorough ... (AP/AMNY.com, by Amy Westfeldt, August 24, 2006)
• Feds ripped on WTC cleanup ... The feds must take their own advice and follow the recommendations of a 2003 report on how to clean up toxins unleashed on 9/11, a contingent of local lawmakers demanded yesterday. Reps. Charles Rangel, Jerrold Nadler, Major Owens and Carolyn Maloney blasted all levels of government for botching the 9/11 cleanup, which Nadler said continues "to slowly poison" people who live and work downtown. They want the Environmental Protection Agency to follow the recommendations laid out in a 2003 report by the agency's inspector general, including: Testing for a wider variety of contaminants.; Bringing cleanup efforts up to Superfund standards. Expanding the cleanup zone above Canal St., and to Brooklyn and possibly to Jersey City. Nadler and the other Democrats said officials owe more to all of those whose health suffered due to 9/11. "We're not paying for their medical insurance, we're not monitoring them - all of the things we've been talking about since the Daily News wrote about it," Nadler said, referring to a News campaign to get government funding for health care of rescue and recovery workers. "That's a major disgrace." ... (NYDailyNews, by Greg Wilson, August 23rd, 2006)
• Our Firefighters’ Health ... These results do not support heavy metal poisoning as a causative factor. Rather, our findings support a dust-chemical induced irritant-inflammatory process as the cause for upper and lower respiratory disease. These are serious diseases that deserve serious attention. New York’s bravest deserve the best medical care, and treatment options should be based on medical validity and scientific fact. (NYTimes Letter to the Editor: Kerry J. Kelly, M.D. & David J. Prezant, M.D., Aug. 23, 2006)
• Last Gasp: ground Zero volunteers suffer in silence as the clock ticks on their health ... From sleep apnea to severe depression, these men and women are undergoing a host of health problems presumably related to their rescue work. ... Feal, 39, is the founder and president of The FealGood Foundation, a non-profit dedicated to promoting the plight of sick and injured first responders and to providing volunteers and recovery workers with financial assistance. A foot injury sustained during the recovery efforts led to gangrene and the subsequent loss of part of that foot, and he says he has had thirty subsequent surgeries. Among his other afflictions stemming from his work at Ground Zero, Feal suffers from acid reflux, a scarred lung and asthma. When he speaks, he gasps for air as though he has just finished a sprint. “Excuse me, I get out of breath sometimes,” he says. Feal claims he is also very compulsive now. ... (New York Press, by Sushi Cheema, August 23-29, 2006)
• 9/11 air fears stifled ... Less than a month after 9/11, a top city Health Department official blasted an order from City Hall to reopen several blocks near Ground Zero, and warned that "air quality [for asbestos] at those locations is not yet suitable for reoccupancy," an internal memo shows. "The Mayor's Office is under pressure from building owners and business owners in the red zone to open more of the city to reoccupancy," wrote Associate Health Commissioner Kelly McKinney in his startling Oct. 6, 2001, memo. At the time, McKinney was in charge of the city's environmental hazards program. His memo reveals sharp disagreements between health officials and other Giuliani administration aides over how to handle environmental contamination after 9/11. The memo was obtained under a Freedom of Information request by the New York Environmental Law and Justice Project. McKinney and the Department of Environmental Protection - the city agency in charge of all asbestos testing - appear to have urged a cautious approach to reopening downtown. In his memo, McKinney noted that DEP Commissioner Joel Miele was also "uncomfortable with opening the target areas" but said, "I was told the Mayor's Office was directing OEM [the Office of Emergency Management] to open the target areas next week." ... DEP's own tests for asbestos in the first week after 9/11, for example, revealed far higher asbestos contamination in lower Manhattan than officials ever acknowledged - and some of the worst test results were never released to the public. In the five days before Sept. 17, 2001, the day most downtown office workers were allowed by federal and city officials to return to work, DEP tested 38 air samples for asbestos on the streets around the Trade Center site. Of those, 27 revealed asbestos levels higher than the .01 fibers per cubic centimeter that the DEP was using as a "safety" threshold. It was not until February 2002 that the city even began publicly posting its own test results on the DEP Web site. The initial test method for air samples, known as PCM, is sometimes not reliable, so DEP began retesting any sample over .01 fibers by a more exact method that scientists call TEM, for transmission electron microscopy. The federal TEM standard for asbestos is 70 fibers per square meter. Of those same 38 tests DEP conducted in the days after 9/11, 18 test filters were so clogged they couldn't even be read under the TEM method. That left only 20 valid test results and eight of them, or 40%, revealed dangerous levels of asbestos in the air. The highest, at 157 fibers, was found on Sept. 12 at Spruce and Gold Sts., seven blocks from Ground Zero. On the same day, a level of 123 fibers was found in another test at Centre and Chambers Sts. - right between City Hall and the Municipal Building. Yet neither of those results has ever been reported by the DEP to the public. The city never disclosed it even conducted tests at those locations. .... (NYDailyNews, by Juan Gonzalez, August 23rd, 2006)
  
• Silverstein Properties Decrees Low-Sulfur Truck Fuel Use by Its Contractors at the WTC Site: MTA HESITANT ABOUT MAKING SAME COMMITMENT AT THE FULTON STREET TRANSIT CENTER: EMISSIONS WOULD BE REDUCED BY 90 PERCENT ... Mr. Silverstein, who made a brief appearance at the meeting where Janno Lieber, World Trade Center project director for Silverstein Properties, was making a presentation, is of course not alone in his ailment. Millions of people around the country, and thousands in Manhattan, suffer from the respiratory condition that, at times, simply makes breathing a difficult task. What sets Mr. Silverstein apart from his fellow New Yorkers, however, is that he is in the unusual position of actually being able to have an effect on the air quality around him. And, as Mr. Lieber announced, this is exactly what Mr. Silverstein, a principal developer of the WTC site, intends to do. According to Mr. Lieber, all construction vehicles working on Silverstein projects at the site will be required to use low-sulfur fuel, a standard that is expected to reduce emissions by 90 percent. "We want to make sure these vehicles minimize the impact on air quality," said Mr. Lieber, acknowledging that hundreds of vehicles will be active around the site. "There's no reason to compromise the quality of life for residents down here." ... Committee chair Catherine McVay Hughes, who expressed her appreciation for the environmental requirement, took the opportunity to ask William Wheeler, Director of Planning for the Metropolitan Transportation Authority -- which has undertaken its own monumental construction project with the new Fulton Street Transit Center -- if the MTA would follow Mr. Silverstein's lead and require the use of low-sulfur fuel for construction vehicles at its site. Mr. Wheeler, who was at the meeting to update the committee on the new transit center's progress, demurred. "I think it's a great idea, but I don't know, Catherine, I don't know."Elaborating on his uncertainty, Mr. Wheeler questioned whether the available fleet of vehicles, such as concrete trucks that must idle while their contents are unloaded, would he able to adjust their engines to use low-sulfur fuel. "It's one thing to set it as a goal," he said. "It's another thing to say is it really feasible." ... (Battery Park Broadsheet July 25-September 7, 2006, by Serena Hedison)
  
• Last Gasp: Ground Zero volunteers suffer in silence as the clock ticks on their health ... t’s no longer thick with dust, fumes and debris—that filled the lungs of John Feal, John Sfezaro, Scott Aline, Jack Saltarella, Jim LaPenna and thousands of other recovery workers, cleanup workers and volunteers who toiled here in the days and months following the terrorist attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001. ... From sleep apnea to severe depression, these men and women are undergoing a host of health problems presumably related to their rescue work. But in the nearly five years since the attacks, they have faced numerous obstacles in their quest to obtain workers’ compensation and other benefits. ... Last Monday, just three days before construction began on the World Trade Center Memorial and less than a month before the fifth anniversary of the attacks, Governor George Pataki signed into law bills that acknowledge the plight of the first responders. One new law gives those responders who may die from illnesses related to the attacks the same benefits as those who died during the attacks. A second law allows individuals whose illnesses emerged after the two-year deadline the opportunity to reapply for workers’ compensation benefits. Now, workers and volunteers have two years from the time at which their illness emerges to file. A third, final law allows those who have retired to change their pension status to that of accidental disability should a 9/11-related illness emerge after they have stopped working.  ... Among his other afflictions stemming from his work at Ground Zero, Feal suffers from acid reflux, a scarred lung and asthma. When he speaks, he gasps for air as though he has just finished a sprint. “Excuse me, I get out of breath sometimes,” he says. Feal claims he is also very compulsive now. .... Scott Aline, a crane operator who worked at Ground Zero, of Pataki’s new legislation. “There was a window. The window was closed to us.” He understands, however, that there is a caveat to the good news. “Who knows how many years it’s going to be once we get the money?” he asks. “My lungs are already aged,” he adds. According to a recent medical screening, his 45-year-old’s lungs are equivalent to those of a 59-year-old’s. ... His clients are scattered across the country, among them are those scores of independent volunteers who came to New York City to assist in rescue efforts. And, he says, more sick responders call his office every day. “I’ve had about 100 phone calls in the last 36 hours,” he says. Of all his clients in the two-and-a-half-year-old case, Worby says 60 have died. “They have died from causes that were 9/11 related,” he says. Among the illnesses are leukemia and other cancers. .. (New York Press Volume 19, Issue 34, by Sushi Cheema, August 23, 2006)
• 9/11 benefits law piles it on city ... f we're going to reward the responders for their exceptional sacrifices during a time of national emergency by giving them exceptional benefits, then it shouldn't be just the taxpayers of New York City who pay the bill. The feds certainly need to come up with some money. And if the governor is going to hold news conferences and claim to be such a friend of the Ground Zero responders, he should be putting up more state bucks than he's doing right now. ... Bloomberg estimates that, combined with the medical presumption bill, the new laws will cost about $650 million over the next 10 years. The state is paying only half the cost of the death benefits, or about 1 percent of the total amount, according to the mayor's office. The rest will come from the city's pension funds, which must also pay the pensions of all other city employees who retire, become disabled or die on the job. With questions now being raised about the soundmess of the city's retirement funds, the question is how big a strain an additional $600 million draw would put on them. The laws are now a done deal. But, if we're going to engage in this kind of generosity, the state and the feds need to share the cost. Pataki signed the mandate without offering much in the way of funding it. The World Trade Center attacks were an attack on the nation. The city has received some money from the feds, but the mounting health problems of the responders is a relatively new development whose cost over time could be enormous. It's unfair for the city to bear those costs alone. The feds should step up. And if Pataki is going to sign the laws and take the credit, he should put some money where his mouth is. (NYNewsday, by Sheryl McCarthy, August 21, 2006)
  
• Where’s the Money? .... From everything we know — and with no public process, what we know these days is pretty much restricted to what the Lower Manhattan Development Corp. decides to share with the press –L.M.D.C. had long ago capped what it would spend to bring down the Deutsche Bank. In its February 27, 2004 press release announcing the building purchase and setting out the terms of its agreement with the Deutsche Bank and its insurers, L.M.D.C. states: “The agreement caps the cost of cleaning and demolition to $45 million and the insurers would pay any costs above the agency’s cap.” These same assurances were reiterated a year later by then president (and now chairperson) Kevin Rampe in response to questioning from Councilmember Alan Gerson at a February ‘05 City Council hearing on the demolition of 9/11contaminated buildings. Please add those of us who’ve been working to make the 130 Liberty St demolition safe to the chorus of community voices asking for the whereabouts of the $45 million earmarked as community enhancement funds. (Downtown Express Letter to the Editor, Kimberly Flynn, August 18-24, 2006)
  
• Op-Ed: Poisoned Heroes ... ONE New York City firefighter recently told me about the health problems he has suffered since working at the World Trade Center site nearly five years ago: skin rashes, an inflamed colon, coughing and trouble breathing. He showed me a six-page list of the antibiotics and steroids doctors had prescribed over the years. These drugs helped mask his symptoms. But the problems never went away — until he began a new treatment to rid his body of the toxic substances he had inhaled and absorbed at Ground Zero. ... Still needed, however, even more urgently, is an effort to address the health problems these workers face. Many of the thousands of sufferers, like the firefighter who spoke to me, are getting treatments that offer only temporary relief. We need to figure out the best ways of curing what really ails the Sept. 11 responders. Too often, discussions about the health of these workers have met with official denials that their problems can be directly linked to Ground Zero. The denial began only a week after the tragedy, when Christine Todd Whitman, then head of the Environmental Protection Agency, declared that tests showed the air was safe to breathe. Later scientific studies showed that the air was in fact heavily polluted. And while it is true that the workers’ health problems have not been definitively linked to the environment, a wealth of evidence suggests that the air the workers breathed took its toll. A study of more than 12,000 firemen and emergency medical workers at the site, recently published in the American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine, found that on average they had a reduction in lung function equivalent to what would be caused by 12 years of aging. Doctors and other health practitioners at the Olive Leaf Wholeness Center, in downtown New York (where I work as a volunteer), have detected heavy-metal poisoning in many of the Ground Zero workers they have seen. They have given these workers detoxification treatments — including chelation for many patients. Chelation, a treatment often used on children exposed to lead paint, involves giving the patient a sulfur compound that draws heavy metals from the tissues. These practitioners have found that after three to four months of detoxification therapy, the afflicted Ground Zero workers see most of their symptoms diminish or disappear. Chelation is not the only detoxification method. No doubt, other doctors may have found treatments that work better on certain patients. The federal government has provided New York City with $1 billion to cover the cost of liability claims brought by Ground Zero workers. Some of these funds have paid the legal costs of fighting disability and other claims filed by city workers. But no money has yet been appropriated for treatment of heavy metal toxicity. There seems to be an assumption that the workers would prefer a large financial settlement to regaining their health. Political leaders should bring together medical experts who could determine the most effective protocols for ridding the body of heavy metals and make them known to Ground Zero workers and their doctors. ... (NYTimes, by Stan Altman, August 17, 2006)
• Ground Zero ma: Mike heartless ... Zadroga was specifically angered by the mayor's pledge to donate $125 million of his personal fortune for a campaign to stop smoking worldwide, saying the billionaire should use that money instead to aid the 9/11 workers who helped the city. .... (NYDaily News, by Michael Saul, August 17, 2006)
• Posttraumatic Stress Disorder and Other Psychological Sequelae Among World Trade Center Clean Up and Recovery Workers ... (NYCOSH, By Raz Gross, Yuval Neria, Xuguang (Grant) Tao, Jennifer Massa, Leslie Ashwell, Kathleen Davis and Alison GeyhAnnals of the New York Academy of Sciences July 2006)
  
• Wounded on 9/11: True Stories of Bad Air in NYC & Posted Response: The air of 9/11: It was worse for New Yorkers than reported ... One can take this one way or another, but I was a smoker for seven years prior to 9/11. In my 20's, I had not been to a hospital for 15 or so years. After 9/11, and after we were all allowed to return to work in lower manhattan, the smoke lingered for many months. My office was located at Franklin and Church Streets. Far enough that only a fine layer of dust was on the street, but definitely close enough to smell the acrid fumes from Ground Zero all day long. At the time, I was 'burning the midnight oil' to get a project done, 14 or so hours a day. Within a month, the symptomns started. First, I had shortness of breath walking up the four flights to my apartment in Chelsea. Then, even finishing a day of work only looking at a dull computer monitor robbed me of energy. The last straw came when I had to stop, THREE TIMES, on my way up the stairs, just to enter my apartment. That night, I remember having a distinct thought, "If I don't go to the hospital, it is so difficult to breathe, that I'll likely simply stop, and never know." My roommate was kind enough to help me down to St. Vincent's. Although there were dozens of people with injuries that seemed worse than mine (including a poor fellow bleeding on the floor), the doctor who went out for a smoke heard my breathing. He stopped immediately. "Do you have asthma?" I replied no, never in all my life. He immediately cut short his break and had me admitted promptly. I cannot remember the exact number, but after the breathing test, he told me that my breathing capacity was only 1/6th normal for a healthy 26 year old male (even a smoker).After months of treatment, I was on the mend. The effects linger. To this day, my breathing has not fully recovered. .. (Scripps Howard News Service, 16 August 2006)
  
• Bloomy $ick of 9/11 Bills ... Sick Ground Zero workers shouldn't be treated better than responders who become ill as a result of other disasters, Mayor Bloomberg said yesterday. ... (NYPost, By Carl Campanile, August 16, 2006)
• Gov gets WTC ball rolling.... Watching Gov. Pataki at Ground Zero yesterday, there was a sense that someone in government was starting to address the needs of the forgotten victims of 9/11 - however incompletely, however late. The governor's program holds the promise of helping thousands of World Trade Center responders by providing them medical coverage through the workers' compensation system and by boosting the availability of line-of-duty disability pensions and death benefits. .... (NYDaily News, August 15, 2006)
  
• Benefit Boost For Ground Zero Workers ... Gov. George Pataki signed legislation Monday to greatly expand benefits for workers who have died or become sick from toiling in the smoke and dust that hung over the ruins of the World Trade Center. ... Rescue workers claim they are suffering from a variety of respiratory ailments and fear they could develop cancer down the line from asbestos and other toxic substances. .... The governor's office had no immediate estimates for how many people the three new laws would cover or how much money the benefits would involve, but Mayor Michael Bloomberg complained that the legislation would cost the city $500 million over 10 years. "It's just another example of the state of New York doing something that they want to do, but making the city pay," Bloomberg said. "There's no free lunch, and Albany doesn't seem to understand that." The mayor said he did not object to the bill's purpose, "but I want them to fund it if that's what they want to do." ... (CBS, Aug. 14, 2006)
  
• 9/11 NUN'S DYING PLEA: AUTOPSY MY BODY TO AID WTC AILING ... A nun who spent six months blessing human remains in the rubble at Ground Zero says she is dying of lung disease and wants her body autopsied to prove that she and her fellow 9/11 workers were sickened by the poisonous air at the site. ... According to Worby, she now suffers from asthma, reactive airways dysfunction syndrome, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and gastroesophageal reflux disease - all severe illnesses that have plagued WTC workers. ... A friend accompanied Mahoney on a train trip to Manhattan about six months ago to register with the WTC Medical Monitoring Program at Mount Sinai Hospital. She collapsed while getting a lung test and was sent to the emergency room, Worby said. ... Sister Cindy Mahoney, 54, summoned David Worby, the lawyer representing thousands of sick Ground Zero workers, to her Aiken, S.C., hospice last week and requested that he act as her guardian and fulfill her dying wish by overseeing her autopsy after she's gone. "I can still do God's work," Mahoney said Thursday in Aiken, her hometown, where she lay connected to oxygen tubes. .... (NYPost, by Susan Edelman & Julie Stapen, August 13, 2006)
• Repaying a debt: Gov will OK WTC med aid ... To the heroes of 9/11: Help is on the way. Gov. Pataki is expected to sign today a sweeping set of laws aimed at addressing the burgeoning health problems of the 40,000 rescuers and other workers who courageously flocked to Ground Zero in the wake of 9/11, the Daily News has learned. ... These barriers include a state workers' compensation system that is all but broken, a lethargic - some say hostile - insurance industry and a government that often seems to have forgotten one of the darkest days in the nation's history. ... (NYDaily News, by David Saltonstall, August 13, 2006)
  
• It's time to care for first responders ... In February, Dr. John Howard, Director of the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, was tapped to coordinate the federal response. March saw the approval of $75 million from Washington, which should be available soon. That's a start, but it's not enough to assess the physical toll over 20 or 30 years and ensure treatment. ... (NYNewsday, August 13, 2006)
• Mike wants proof 9/11 made 'em ill: Doesn't support benefits bill ... (NYDaily News, By Joe Mahoney, Ernie Naspretto and Frank Lombardi, August 12, 2006)
• Please help me go on living: WTC volunteer needs swift action to survive ...His name is Vito Valenti. On Sept. 11 he was caught in the maelstrom and stayed at Ground Zero as a volunteer to help in the frantic rescue and recovery operation. And today he is dying. .... His lungs are being destroyed by pulmonary fibrosis. His only hope is a double lung transplant, but he cannot afford even the oxygen he needs to make it day by suffocating day. Only through the good graces of a generous medical supply company is he being sustained with the fundamental requirement of life: breath. "After hearing that he was a 9/11 volunteer, we decided to donate the oxygen," said Ed Brown, sales representative for Homecare Concepts in Farmingdale, L.I. Someone in power must help Vito Valenti, for he will die without it. .... Valenti's office was at 125 Barclay St., directly behind the World Trade Center, making him witness to the full horrors of 9/11 and positioning him to serve as a volunteer. Over the next two days, in the thick of a toxic cloud, he distributed water and supplies and remembers escorting a dazed and bleeding firefighter to a triage nurse. He slept on West St. with a roll of paper towels as his pillow. ... By February 2002, Valenti was also coughing. Over the coming months, his respiratory distress worsened, leading eventually to a diagnosis of pulmonary fibrosis in March 2004. Fibrosis is a scarring of the lungs that prevents the body from oxygenating the blood. It is a form of interstitial lung disease, the illness that took the lives of Firefighter Stephen Johnson, Police Officer James Godbee, Detective James Zadroga and telephone worker Mark DeBiase.(9/11: The forgotten victims -- Part 6: Desperate case, NYDailyNews: Editorials, August 10, 2006)
  
• Hil rips pols who appear only in easy 'photo ops' ... Sen. Hillary Clinton railed yesterday against politicians who "do photo ops" with ailing 9/11 first responders but haven't lifted a finger to help them. "I've spent nearly five years now trying to help first responders and construction workers and others who were down at Ground Zero," she said. "It's a little tough to take that politicians will come and do photo ops with a firefighter or a construction worker." Clinton (D-N.Y.) said these same politicians haven't made good on their promises to help - even after she has pointed out to them that the "man that you just photo-op'ed with" is seriously ill from toiling in The Pit. "I don't get the help that I think people need," she said. "It really leaves a bad taste in your mouth." ... (NYDaily News, by Elizabeth Hays, Ernie Haspertto and Corky Siemaszko, August 10, 2006)
  
• Court Ruling Could Extend Rights of WTC Workers To File Claims ... A New York state judge has issued a ruling that could extend the rights of some WTC rescue workers who've filed late legal claims against the city. More than 200 of the first responders who claim to have gotten sick while working at the Trade Center site filed their claim past the city's 90-day deadline. As a result, a court is set to decide whether to consider the late claims, based in part on affidavits or medical records provided by the claimants. But Manhattan Supreme Court Justice Michael Stallman ruled this week that these supporting materials won't be required for the court to consider a late claim. The ruling is expected to affect only a handful of the 200 late claims currently under consideration. A lawyer for the city says an appeal is being considered. ... (NY1, August 9, 2006)
  
• MIKE'S 9/11 $$ SHOCK ... A bill granting generous death benefits to families of retired cops and firefighters who die after working at Ground Zero should be vetoed by Gov. Pataki as too expensive, Mayor Bloomberg says in an explosive letter opposing the measure. The legislation was spurred by retired Detective James Zadroga's January death from lung disease. A coroner blamed toxic fumes he breathed while toiling for 470 hours at the trade-center site. At present, death benefits are granted only to the family of an officer who dies in the line of duty. Families of retired responders who died after working at Ground Zero are now entitled to the less generous "accidental disability pensions." "The city is constrained to oppose this legislation due to its unbudgeted costs in the form of increased employer pension contributions, its many unmanageable precedents and the countless technical deficiencies and ambiguities," Bloomberg legislative representative Michelle Goldstein wrote in a letter to Pataki. Goldstein said it is "unprecedented" for a public pension system to pay a death benefit to the survivor of a retired responder who dies from a work-related illness. In short, Goldstein said the bill would treat World Trade Center responders more favorably than other workers who retire and subsequently die of a job-related illness. "It is questionable whether these benefits should be extended to any limited group of heroic employees where such benefits are not available to other public employees who render equally heroic service," Goldstein said. The Bloomberg aide said the bill would cost the city from $5 million to $10 million a year. Goldstein also complained of a "seemingly endless window of eligibility" - suggesting that a responder diagnosed with cancer in 2038 and dies in 2040 could receive the death benefit "regardless of whether the person's WTC-related work caused the cancer." Also, Goldstein contends that Zadroga's surviving daughter would not be eligible for the death benefit because of the way the bill is worded. The city Law Department later issued a statement suggesting the federal government pay the additional cost. (NYPost, By Carl Campanile, August 9, 2006)
  
• Judge's ruling lets 9/11 claims go forward ... Scores of Ground Zero rescue and recovery workers who believed they were exposed to toxic substances after Sept. 11 will be able to file late notices of legal claims against the city, a state court judge has ruled. ... (NYNewsday, by Anthony M. Destefan. August 9, 2006)
  
• Heroes welcome to sue: Dealine KOd for Ground Zero ailments ... Manhattan Supreme Court Justice Michael Stallman waived the 90-day notice of claim requirement, ruling the workers may not have realized until it was too late that their problems may have been linked to their time at Ground Zero. He cited case law that said such deadlines "should not operate as a device to defeat the rights of persons with legitimate claims." ... (NYDaily News, by Jose Matinez, August 9, 2006)
  
• Oliver Stone's "World Trade Center" Opens Today ... As Oliver Stone's "World Trade Center" movie opens nationwide Wednesday, workers who spent time at the site are reaching out to the public for help getting assistance for illnesses they say they contracted in the days and weeks after 9/11.Workers will be handing out flyers this evening, raising awareness of the diseases they now face, and asking moviegoers to contact the mayor on their behalf. ... (NY1, August 9, 2006)
  
• Pols join News in drive for WTC lung tests ... New York's leading politicians joined the Daily News yesterday in demanding that public health officials screen 40,000 Ground Zero workers for deadly lung diseases. The call for action came after The News revealed in a hard-hitting editorial that a $150 test done in the harrowing months after 9/11 might have detected the lung damage that afflicted many first responders - and called for full-scale health monitoring and treatment programs. ... (NYDaily News, by Lisa L. Colangelo and Corky siemaskzo, August 8, 2006)
• Money From $1 Billion WTC Insurance Fund Used To Fight Lawsuits ... A fund intended to pay insurance claims for 9/11 first responders is instead reportedly being used to fight lawsuits against the city. According to the New York Post, more than $40 million of the $1 billion dollar fund has been spent on legal fees and overhead, while none has gone to first responders with health problems. The city also reportedly used the money to file a motion to dismiss all World Trade Center-related lawsuits, claiming it has immunity. But the city's corporation counsel tells the paper that the city has paid disability to some responders and has paid for health care to World Trade Center workers. He says Congress intended the fund to pay trade center workers' insurance claims if the city was found to have acted improperly in its response. (August 6, 2006)
  
• Save lives with $150 lung exam: WTC worker’s chilling death shows need for screening ... What happened to Mark DeBiase - the sudden emergence of a rapidly fatal lung disease - is the nightmare that shadows the forgotten victims of 9/11. And the story of how this 41-year-old husband and father of three descended to death in less than four months this year is a case study in why public health authorities must establish comprehensive medical screening and treatment programs for Ground Zero responders, complete with advisories about perils that may be coming. ... Chief among them: seeing to it that everyone who labored amid the pulverized remains of the Twin Towers has their lungs checked - and finding the money to test people who aren't covered by health insurance. The procedure is simple - little more than breathing in and out of a hand-held tube - and at $150, relatively inexpensive. It measures how well lungs are functioning and, repeated over time, will signal whether they're deteriorating. As Dr. Neil Schluger, chief of the division of pulmonary, allergy and critical care medicine at Columbia Presbyterian Medical Center, put it, "Every person who was down there should have a baseline lung function study, and be followed closely over the coming years for signs of pulmonary symptoms. They should see a doctor and get a lung function test." ...By all outward appearances, he was robust and fit, ... Actually, DeBiase was on the verge of death. Inch by inch, his lungs were turning into scar tissue, slowly losing the ability to infuse his blood with oxygen and to cleanse it of carbon dioxide. As 2005 turned to 2006, he began to experience shortness of breath. He went to the doctor Jan. 10 for what became the start of a losing 89-day battle for air. He died April 9 while hoping for a lung transplant. The cause of death was interstitial lung disease, or ILD, an insidious condition that typically shows up in workers who are exposed to concentrations of inhaled substances - coal miners, for example. ... That DeBiase's death in the University of Pennsylvania Medical Center went unnoticed until now testifies to how poorly the public health system has tracked the aftereffects of 9/11. It comes to light only because his father contacted the Daily News after reading this series of editorials. ... More than 12,000 WTC responders are already sick, but not with ILD. The vast majority damaged their air passages by inhaling toxins, leaving them with inflamed sinuses, bronchitis and reactive airways dysfunction syndrome, or RADS, an irritant-induced asthma. These conditions do not transform into interstitial lung disease. ILD, which has a variety of forms, attacks not the airways but the very tissues of the lungs. Typically, the body senses the presence of foreign particles and tries to combat them as it would fight a germ. The immune system surrounds the particles with cells that build up into nodule-like bodies known as granulomas. Granulomas lead to fibrosis, an irreversible scarring that prevents the lungs from extracting oxygen from the air. Some ILDs are very treatable. Others are uniformly fatal. ... (NYDaily News, August 6, 2006)
  
• Toxins on roof halt razing of bank ... State officials temporarily halted demolition of the former Deutsche Bank tower at Ground Zero this week after high levels of toxic dust were detected on the roof, they revealed yesterday. The suspension of work was the second time the demolition had been stopped at the 130 Liberty St. tower, which was ripped open and clogged with toxins when the twin towers collapsed on 9/11. Lower Manhattan Development Corp. officials said they had suspended work Thursday after lab results from an air monitoring station on the tower's roof revealed the release of unacceptable levels of silica July 28. The Environmental Protection Agency said the high levels of silica showed up in a test on the northeastern corner of the roof while workers were removing roofing material. The state restarted the work yesterday when officials decided that wetting the roof could contain the dust. Nearby tenants and homeowners have been concerned for years about the potential release of toxic dust during the tower's demolition. Several residents were furious yesterday that the work shutdown came a week after the silica was discovered. ... (NYDaily News, by Greg B. Smith, August 5, 2006)
• Toxic Dust Temporarily Halts Work At Former Deutsche Bank Building ... Testing found unacceptable levels of silica, which can cause lung diseases. ... (NY1, August 5, 2006)
  
• Forum would see if kids are alright 5 years later ... Bob Townley, executive director of Manhattan Youth and a Community Board 1 member, is considering planning a community forum to commemorate the five-year anniversary of September 11, 2001. If the forum is held, it will evaluate the condition of Downtown children and the mental health services available following 9/11, Townley said. ... Bringing dozens of mental health professionals into schools to aid children after 9/11 may have created more problems than it solved, Townley added. ...Earlier in the meeting, Townley said the event would not be about mental health. ... (Downtown Express, August 4-10, 2006)
  
• Shifting dollars, debatable legacy as L.M.D.C. approaches its final days: Deutsche Bank building ... I started coughing up black mucus, and there was black stuff coming out my ears and when I blew my nose. In October 2001, I started coughing up blood clots and went to the FDNY Bureau of Health Services. They gave me an inhaler and said they would monitor it. I was also seeing my own doctor, who diagnosed reactive airways distress syndrome. I would get a sinus infection every six to eight weeks. I also got urinary tract infections. I also had post-traumatic stress syndrome. In 2003, I was diagnosed with acid reflux. I had a lump in my throat and couldn't swallow. I used prednisone for my lungs. A few years before 9/11, I had contracted hepatitis C on the job. The FDNY did physicals in December 2001, and my liver values were normal. But they started increasing. In 2004, I had a liver biopsy, and the hepatitis was at stage 2. I was taking interferon and ribovirin, but the interferon seemed to make my lung condition worse. Every time I went to the pulmonologist, my vital function was decreasing. Now I'm down to 58% lung capacity. Because of the hepatitis C, nothing was working for me. The prednisone was increasing my hepatitis C viral load so I can't treat my lungs, which have scarring. (Denise Bellingham, 57, Medford, LI) ... The L.M.D.C., which has been cleaning it, hopes to begin to dismantle it this fall, but it has not come up with a deconstruction plan that has passed Environmental Protection Agency muster. The official budget for the Deutsche purchase, deconstruction and community outreach has grown to $207 million, and if that turns out to be the actual cost it will not require any shift in funds. Pryor said he has not seen any estimate that the project will cost more. Councilmember Gerson said he could support spending some community enhancement money on environmental protections to make the takedown of the contaminated building safer, but added that if money was already shifted, it should have gone through a public review process. “They shouldn’t be sapping money for one purpose and applying it to another purpose,” he said. “This was not ground zero redevelopment money. This was specifically money for community enhancement.” Menin said L.M.D.C. officials have shown up regularly to C.B. 1 meetings to talk about the demolition, but they have not answered questions about how they are going to satisfy the E.P.A. concerns. She also pointed to the two damaged buildings still standing on opposite sides of the W.T.C., Deutsche and the Borough of Manhattan Community College’s Fiterman Hall. “To see these buildings shrouded four and a half years later is at best troubling,” she said. The L.M.D.C. has contributed $15 million to the Fiterman demolition, but it is not managing the project. The Construction Command Center, which oversees all large construction projects Downtown and is funded by the L.M.D.C., will take over responsibilities for the Deutsche demolition when the corporation closes. “We’ve been at the table,” said Jennifer Nelson, the center’s spokesperson. “There is not going to be a learning curve.” Corporation staff members who are working on the Deutsche project are likely candidates to join the Construction Center. ... (Downtown Express, by Josh Rogers, August 4-10, 2006)
  
• A Samaritan's Unjust Desserts ... The Environmental Protection Agency denies New York Daily News’ claim that the White House covered up documents recognizing the air around Ground Zero as harmful. On Friday, the paper ran an article reporting that, in 2002, George W. Bush signed an executive order granting the EPA permission to hide potentially damaging information by classifying it as “secret.” The official reason for the order was to protect national security by keeping such information confidential. But thousands of Ground Zero workers who have fallen ill don’t buy this explanation..... (New York Press, by Kari Milchman, August 2, 2006)
  
• Editorials: The World Trade Center Collapse: A Continuing Tragedy for Lung Health? ... While the tragedy of the World Trade Center (WTC) collapse still sears the consciousness of those who value human life, some important lessons in occupational and environmental respiratory disease have been learned as a result of this disaster. Perhaps the most striking of these lessons is the value of medical surveillance for workers in jobs with high risk for inhalational exposure to toxicants. Because the New York City Fire Department (NYFD) had preexposure pulmonary function test results on virtually all of the firefighters involved in the emergency response to the attack on the WTC, as well as the infrastructure in place to continue to follow them longitudinally, Prezant and colleagues (1) and Banauch and colleagues (2, 3) have been able to describe the sequelae of exposure to WTC "dust" in a remarkable series of papers. The first paper reported that the relatively high-level exposure to WTC "dust" experienced by NYFD emergency responders in the initial weeks after September 11 was associated in a cross-sectional analysis with persistent bronchitis and substantial decrements in ventilatory function (1). A subsequent paper documented that a number of the NYFD responders whose symptoms failed to resolve with time away from WTC dust exposure had airway hyperresponsiveness, consistent with irritant-induced asthma (also known as "reactive airways dysfunction syndrome") (2). In an article published in this issue of the Journal (pp. 312–319), these investigators now present strong evidence from a longitudinal analysis that exposure to WTC dust caused a decrease in ventilatory function in the first year of post–September 11 surveillance equal to that of 12 years of age-related decline (3). The ongoing follow-up of the NYFD cohort has thus provided strong evidence for several concepts that previously were more speculative. A single, massive exposure to an irritant is not the only route to irritant-induced asthma since multiple, submassive exposures to WTC dust appear to have caused the syndrome in WTC responders (2). Such exposures now also appear to have caused accelerated decline of lung function, which suggests that this cohort is also at risk of developing chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) (3). .... Despite the power of the data generated from the medical surveillance of the NYFD responders, some limitations must be acknowledged. The responders present at the time of the collapse of the towers and while fires were still burning were exposed to smoke as well as WTC dust (6), making it difficult to disentangle the independent effect of the dust. ... If most of the respiratory tract injury that has been carefully documented in the NYFD cohort was due to exposure to the WTC dust in the days and weeks following the collapse of the towers, then an additional element to the tragedy of September 11 is that this occupational morbidity could have been prevented with early and well-trained use of simple respiratory protective equipment (e.g., N95 masks) ... (American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care MedicineVol 174 2006)
  
• 'Not Getting Better': A New Study Finds Serious Lung Problems among Thousands of 9/11 Responders ... It’s no surprise that many of the responders and volunteers who spent days—sometimes months—at the World Trade Center after the terror attacks on September 11, 2001, have reported physical and psychological after-effects. Ailments ranging from insomnia to post-traumatic stress disorder to various respiratory problems have been diagnosed in both responders and in residents who lived or worked in the immediate vicinity of Ground Zero. Still, with so many people exposed to the resulting toxins and at different levels, it's been difficult to demonstrate a causal link between time spent at the site and specific health problems suffered afterwards. A new study published in the August issue of the American Thoracic Society's journal, the American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine, aims to do just that. Researchers compared lung-function data compiled by the New York City Fire Department for 12,079 of its firefighters and emergency personnel for the four years before the attacks and one year after. All of those included in the study were directly exposed to the toxic cloud that enveloped Ground Zero after the twin towers collapsed—arriving either before the collapse or in the days immediately following. The result? Researchers found that in the year after the attacks, the firefighters who'd spent time at Ground Zero suffered a decrease in lung function capability equal to 12 years of age-related decline. ... What other health problems have you seen emerge over the long term in the small group you've been following? It's more anecdotal. I don't have specific numbers, but I have seen more than lower airway problems like asthma and reactive airways syndrome. I've seen upper airway problems like sinus problems, obstructive sleep apnea and reflux problems like acid indigestion and heartburn. It makes sense because people inhaled an abundance of dust and swallowed parts of what they inhaled. We've seen inflammation in the stomach and esophagus. ... (Newsweek, by Jennifer Barrett, August 1, 2006)
• WTC Rescuers Suffered 12 Years' Worth of Lung Loss ... Doctors gauged lung capacity by measuring how much patients could breathe out in one second, she says. This measure, called forced expiratory volume, or FEV, tends to decline with age. Before the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, workers' scores dropped by about 31 milliliters of lung volume a year, according to the study. In the year after the attacks, however, rescuers lost an average of 372 milliliters — a decline doctors would expect to see after 12 years of aging, says Banauch, an attending physician at New York's Montefiore Medical Center. The authors say they don't know whether lung function will continue to deteriorate or whether rescuers' lungs will heal some of the damage. Banauch says doctors will continue to analyze test results from firefighters to see whether their lung function changes over time. If the trend isn't reversed, Banauch says, workers could be at increased risk for chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. The disease is caused by a narrowing of the lung's airways that can make it more difficult to breathe. Workers who were present during the Twin Towers' collapse lost the most lung capacity, the study shows. Workers who showed up later had less lung damage. Firefighters at the site also lost more lung function than emergency medical service workers, according to the study. Balmes, who wrote an editorial accompanying Banauch's study, says the loss of lung function probably doesn't affect workers' normal activities. But they may become more winded after exercise, which is a problem for people who have jobs as physically strenuous as fighting fires, he says. ... (USA TODAY, By Liz Szabo, August 1, 2006)
• 9/11 Rescuers Have Reduced Lung Functions ... Following the disaster, many, but not all of them, developed such symptoms as cough, wheezing and shortness of breath. "So far, the two most common respiratory diagnoses have been reactive airways dysfunction syndrome (RADS) and irritant-induced asthma," Banuach said. "For a significant number of workers, unfortunately, this has affected their ability to work." Banauch said it was impossible to predict whether the dust-exposed workers will continue to experience an accelerated decline in lung function: "No one knows, because nothing like 9/11 has happened before," she said. But she added that the massive exposure to irritating alkaline dust could possibly increase some workers' future risk of developing emphysema and lung cancer. ... In response to the study, Lorna Thorpe, deputy commissioner of the Bureau of Epidemiology at the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, said, "There is evidence that some individuals who were exposed are experiencing serious respiratory problems, although data are not available on how many people are currently affected." She added, "The scientific study being published by FDNY identifies substantial lung function decline in the year after 9/11 among firefighters, but their exposure was fairly unique, making it difficult to estimate the risk to residents. DOHMH will continue to monitor for long-term health issues that may be associated with WTC exposure." In April, the department had found that 57 percent of the survivors it surveyed had reported new or worsening respiratory symptoms. About 62 percent of the survivors had been enveloped in the dust, smoke and debris spewed into the air as the towers collapsed, according to the department's report, which was published by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on April 8. ... (August 1, 2006)
• Chuck Lashes 9/11 Fund ... Show some compassion to ailing Ground Zero heroes - and stop acting like a "stingy, bottom-line-obsessed corporation." That was the message from Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) to the WTC Captive Insurance Co. yesterday after the Daily News reported that the city entity was fighting first responders - instead of compensating them for their illnesses. Schumer's angry broadside came as Sen. Hillary Clinton and two New York legislators - spurred on by another report by The News - asked the feds to expand their ongoing probe of the Environmental Protection Agency's response to 9/11. .... (Daily News, By Corky Siemaszko, August 1, 2006)

JULY

• Clinton, Nadler, Maloney Call for GAO Investigation Into EPA's Classifying of Data ... Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton, Congressman Jerrold Nadler, and Congresswoman Carolyn Maloney today asked the Government Accountability Office (GAO) to expand its ongoing investigation into the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) response to the September 11th attacks to include an examination of classified documents.  A report in the New York Daily News on Friday revealed that President Bush signed an Executive Order in May 2002 authorizing the EPA Administrator to classify information as “secret,” which could include documents relating to World Trade Center environmental contamination. Earlier this year, at the request of Clinton and Nadler, the GAO agreed to investigate EPA’s failure to establish an effective, science-based testing and clean-up plan in response to the post-9/11 environmental disaster.  Clinton, Nadler, and Maloney expressed concern that the GAO investigation might be hampered if important information about the Agency’s response to WTC contamination is kept secret.  These concerns were also heightened by a 2003 EPA Inspector General report, which found that the White House instructed the EPA to issue false assurances about the air quality, and to delete cautionary statements from public statements. ... In a letter sent today to the GAO, the Members wrote: “The EPA continues to refuse to fulfill its responsibility to conduct a comprehensive testing and cleanup program.  The people who live, work and go to school in the area impacted by Ground Zero debris deserve to know the full extent of contamination that may exist in their neighborhoods.” Specifically, the letter requests that the GAO expand its investigation to determine:
  ·  Whether any information was, in fact, classified as secret by the EPA pursuant to this Executive Order;
  ·  If any of the information classified as secret pertains to the nature and/or extent of the environmental impact of the WTC collapse; and
  ·Whether all of the information classified as secret received this classification for legitimate national security reasons. ...(News Release, July 31, 2006)
• Insurance Superintendent Concerned About WTC Insurance Funds ... The state wants to know what's going on with a billion dollars intended for claims by workers who helped in the rescue and recovery effort at the World Trade Center site. According to the New York Post, the state's insurance superintendent sent a letter to the city controlled-WTC Captive Insurance Company asking why no claims have been paid, while millions of dollars have been spent for professional services. In the letter, Howard Mills says he's concerned the federal aid is not being used for its intended purpose. Congressman Jerrold Nadler is reportedly asking the Department of Homeland Security to investigate. Nadler tells the paper that money from the fund is being used to dispute claims rather than pay them. A spokesman for the insurance company tells the Post the company has faithfully followed its mandate to insure the city and its contractors. .... (NY1, July 30, 2006)
  
• I never complained, or sued, nor will I, but in case I die... Each time I go to Mount Sinai Medical Center, I lose more of my lung. The first time, it was 21% gone. The next, 33%. Now they say I've lost 44%. I can't even walk up a flight of stairs (Daniel Arrigo, 51, SI).... I've got acid reflux. I've got asthma and upper-respiratory infections. (Robert Curcio, 34, SI) .... Two years later, in March 2004, I had my first real asthma attack. That same month, I was forced into the process of retirement. Christie Whitman's EPA people lied: They said the air was safe.... Because I did my duty on 9/11 and in the recovery operations, I'm now totally and permanently disabled. (william gleeson, 45, Hicksville, LI) ...I retired in 2004 at the age of 42, believing myself healthy. Within nine months, I was diagnosed with multiple myeloma, which is caused by asbestos, smoldering steel and benzene, all present at Ground Zero. Since then, most of my time has been spent at Sloan-Kettering, getting stem-cell transplants and chemotherapy. And now, after 20 years of service, I'm left with a half-pay pension and little more than an incurable, life-threatening disease and partial paralysis in both hands. Yet not a single city, state or federal agency will acknowledge the air at Ground Zero might be a problem. .(Patrick DeSario, 44, New City, NY)... Ever since, I've had chronic sinus infections, and many other volunteers have worse. We weren't paid workers, so we can't retire or go on disability, and there's no way to pay our medical bills. We gladly did what we did - but we are now forgotten. (Kathy Davy, 45, Manhattan) (NYDaily News, July 29, 2006)
  
• EPA Denies White House Classified post-9/11 Air Quality Documents ... The Daily News reported Friday that George W. Bush signed an executive order in 2002 giving the EPA permission to hide potentially damaging information by classifying it as "secret." ... a spokesperson for the EPA says the 2002 order had absolutely nothing to do with air quality. She says information about the air at the WTC site had already been made publicly available for months. ... (NY1, July 28, 2006)
  
• THE LMDC'S GIFT TO N.Y. ... Now that the Freedom Tower has been fully built and rises magnificently out of what was once an ugly, empty, forlorn pit, it's fitting that the Lower Manhattan Development Corp. is set to close up shop. Thank goodness the LMDC officials were able to get the World Trade Center's insurers to avert further legal action and cough up all the money needed to fund the tower. What a miracle that the agency got all the sparring parties to agree on an acceptable, affordable plan for a cost-saving memorial and museum at the site. And how do you like the speed with which the LMDC took down and rebuilt the Deutsche Bank and Fiterman Hall? After just five years, all that work is already done. Er, wait a minute - our bad: In fact, none of that work is done. There is no Freedom Tower. Won't be one for years. (If ever.) Insurance companies are still holding out on a big chunk of the proceeds needed to build it. Families of 9/11 victims continue to fight the plans for the memorial. The scarred hulks of Deutche Bank and Fiterman Hall still stand. Terms for a revised lease between the Port Authority (which owns the land) and developer Larry Silverstein have yet to be finalized, once and for all. And the hole in the heart of Lower Manhattan continues to collect rainwater. Nonetheless, the Lower Manhattan Development Corp. - set up to ensure quick and appropriate rebuilding at Ground Zero - is wiping its hands, lighting cigars and tacking up the "Gone Fishing" sign. Question is: Will anybody notice? Ah, but the answer to that may well be yes - because things may actually start moving, now that the LMDC is stepping out of the way. And now that Gov. Pataki - who never showed an ounce of interest in doing the hard work needed to get the project done - is cleaning out his desk. Let's face it: For the most part, the LMDC really has been an impediment to Ground Zero's renewal - though the blame devolves to Pataki, primarily, and to Mayor Bloomberg secondarily. .... (NYPost, July 28, 2006)
  
• In the Wake of Continuing Evidence of the Negative Health Effects of 9/11 on Volunteers, Workers and First Responders, Senator Clinton Calls on Senate and FEMA to Address their Medical and Mental Health Needs ... Senator Calls on FEMA to establish a coordinated long term recovery program for future disasters ... (News Release, July 28, 2006)
  
• 'Secret' 9/11 lies? 2002 exec order let EPA bury info on air hazards ... With New Yorkers already fuming about reports that the feds downplayed the danger of Ground Zero dust, the White House gave EPA chief Christie Whitman the power to bury embarrassing documents by classifying them "secret." "I hereby designate the Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency to classify information originally as 'Secret,'" states the executive order, which was signed by President Bush on May 6, 2002. Although the stated reason for Bush's directive is to keep "national security information" from falling into enemy hands, advocates for thousands of ailing Ground Zero heroes are convinced there's a more sinister motive. "I think the rationale behind this was to not let people know what they were potentially exposed to," said Joel Kupferman of the New York Environmental Law and Justice Project. "They're using the secrecy thing to cover up their malfeasance and past deceptions." ... (Daily News, by Corky Siemaszko, July 28, 2006)
• Structural Transition at Ground Zero ... The Lower Manhattan Construction Command Center will continue as coordinator of some $21 billion worth of public and private development in and around the World Trade Center site even though its "parent," the state's Lower Manhattan Development Corp., is disbanding this fall.LMCCC is taking on LMDC's responsibility for the deconstruction of the 130 Liberty Street office building, damaged after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks by the collapse of the 110-story Two WTC across the street. According to executive orders of New York's Mayor Michael Bloomberg(R) and Gov. George Pataki(R), LMCCC will disband on Dec. 31, 2010. ... (Architectural Record, July 27, 2006)
  
• 9/11 cash for what? ... The city is using a big slice of the $1 billion it got from the feds post-9/11 to fight first responders who claim they got sick on the site, a lawyer who is suing the city charged yesterday. David Worby, who is waging a suit on behalf of 8,000 WTC responders and their survivors, said $20 million has been "spent on city lawyers to deny the claims of cops, firefighters and others who were sickened." ... "Currently there are also over 100 firefighters that FDNY doctors have deemed as too permanently disabled to continue working as firefighters, yet the city won't allow them to retire," added Steve Cassidy, head of the Uniformed Firefighters Association. ... (NYDaily News, by Joe Mahoney , Corky Siemaszko, Lisa L. Colangelo, July 26, 2006)
  
• Safety victory for labor coalition at 90 Church Street ... An aggressive two-year campaign by a coalition of city, state and federal workers at 90 Church St. — directly across from Ground Zero — scored a major health and safety victory when management agreed to add a second set of interior windows throughout the building. The New York City Housing Authority and the United States Postal Service recently notified the 90 Church Street Labor Coalition that both agencies would join the state agencies in doubling windows on all 15 floors of the building. The interior windows are needed to reinforce the building’s old leaky windows to help shield workers from the effects of the massive 9/11-related demolition projects and new construction that have already begun around Ground Zero and will continue for more than a decade. ... (Public Employee Press, July 2006)
  
• Fury of forgotten: Vics in 9/11 health crisis fume Mike 'dropped ball' ... But when The News asked Bloomberg point-blank yesterday how much more evidence the city needs before it does right by heroes whose health was ruined, the mayor simply repeated his earlier vow to "take a look" at the situation. ... In a series of editorials, The News noted that: 600 firefighters have been forced into retirement; 25% of active-duty FDNY and Emergency Medical Service workers developed lung conditions since the disaster, and at least four responders died after giving their all at Ground Zero. ... (NYDaily News, by Lisa L. Colangelo, Michael McAuliff, Corky Siemaszko, July 25, 2006)
• Death Sentence ... The official record carries Johnson as a retired firefighter who passed away after a heart attack and a bout with a lung ailment two years after he left the force. This is because, callously and in disregard of overwhelming evidence, the City of New York has refused to acknowledge even the likelihood that working around the smoldering rubble of the World Trade Center proved fatal to anyone. But that is precisely what killed Johnson, whose death stands as the earliest Ground Zero fatality from disease for which cause and effect has been established. And it is precisely what killed Police Officer James Godbee. And it is precisely what killed Detective James Zadroga. And it is precisely what killed Emergency Medical Service Paramedic Debbie Reeve. ... The vast majority of the sick suffered damage to their respiratory tracts from breathing air thick with particles, including concrete dust, pulverized glass and asbestos. The materials, in effect, burned the air passages, causing inflamed sinuses, bronchitis and reactive airways dysfunction syndrome, or RADS, an irritant-induced asthma. ... Early in 2004, Johnson became short of breath while shoveling snow. Over the next few weeks, his shortness of breath worsened. That March, he went to a hospital, where doctors feared he was suffering a heart attack. That wasn't the case, and that May he was diagnosed with interstitial lung disease, or ILD. Caused by inhaling irritants, ILD is a rare condition found, for example, in miners who work amid coal dust. The presence of particles in the lung provokes the body to try to combat them as it would fight a germ. The immune system surrounds the particles with cells that build up into nodules known as granulomas. Granulomas retard breathing, can cause lesions and lead to irreversible scarring, called fibrosis, on oxygen-extracting tissues.By the time Johnson was diagnosed, 80% of his lungs had been destroyed. He required oxygen 24 hours a day, and joined the waiting list for a lung transplant. But he never got that far. Suffocating, Johnson suffered a fatal heart attack. ... In November 2003, Godbee developed a cough, shortness of breath, joint pains, fever, weight loss and swelling in his salivary and tear glands. Based on a chest X-ray three months later, his doctors suspected sarcoidosis, a form of ILD. Dr. Frank Accera, a pulmonary specialist at Beth Israel Medical Center, performed a biopsy, during which Godbee's lung collapsed. The test confirmed the diagnosis. Sarcoidosis is believed to be caused by contact with irritating foreign substances, but no irritant has ever been identified as its trigger. In addition to the lungs, the illness attacks organs such as the heart, skin and kidneys. Treatable and rarely fatal, sarcoidosis can lead to "progressive multi-organ failure in an unfortunate minority" of cases, according to a 1997 study published in the New England Journal of Medicine. High dosages of a steroid got Godbee's symptoms under control, but the drug made him sick to his stomach. Over the next seven months, Godbee's lung distress fluctuated as he tried to wean off the steroid, and, feeling generally better, he stopped seeing Accera in October 2004. Godbee's wife, Michelle, a school guidance counselor, said her husband continued to work. On Dec. 30, 2004, he felt "a little down, a little sick," but he nonetheless took the couple's daughter to a Jim Carrey movie, Michelle Godbee said. At 9:45, he returned to the family's apartment in Manhattan's Stuyvesant Town, gave his daughter "a long hug good night," and minutes later suffered a seizure. ... Early in 2004, Reeve developed a cough and shortness of breath after exertion. Her doctor diagnosed flu and pneumonia and prescribed antibiotics that proved useless. Out of sick time, she asked for clearance to return to work, which required a chest X-ray because of her haz-mat status. The X-ray led to the discovery of mesothelioma, a rare cancer caused by asbestos. From late 2004 until late 2005, Reeve underwent chemotherapy, followed by removal of her right lung and part of her diaphragm. She had radiation and was declared cancer-free. Six weeks later, Reeve starting having pain in her leg and hip, and X-rays showed mottling in her thigh bones — a sign the cancer had returned. In January 2006, doctors removed infected marrow from her legs, but a month later they found cancer in her back, lung and spine. ... (NYDaily News, July 23, 2006)
  
• COP Union Starts Its WTC-WOE Tracker ... More than 25 police officers who believe their illnesses stem from toxic smoke, dust and debris at Ground Zero have already signed on to a new medical registry that their union will unveil tomorrow. The sick cops, and one who died, are aged 32 to 48. They include seven with sarcoidosis, a potentially fatal inflammatory disease, seven with cancer, one who suffered a heart attack, and four with lung disease. Patrolmen's Benevolent Association President Pat Lynch said the registry was created to fill an "information void" from the federally funded World Trade Center monitoring and treatment programs, led by Mount Sinai Hospital. "Our members have received precious little information . . . [on] health consequences our members are experiencing," Lynch said. The registry lists data on each unnamed officer: age, sex, symptoms, diagnosis, time spent at Ground Zero, the WTC morgue or Fresh Kills landfill. Soon, cops will be able to communicate with each other to ask questions and share information on the registry Web site, nycpba.org/wtc. More than 120 disabled NYPD cops have joined a class-action lawsuit against the city, said lawyer David Worby. He said WTC doctors "in medical denial" have not asked him for mounting data on more than 300 cancers in 9/11 responders. Mount Sinai said Friday it is finishing an "initial analysis" of cancers in WTC workers examined between 2001 and 2004, and compiling data on cancers found since then. "We have said since Day 1 that an increase in cancer was a real risk to these workers," a spokesman said. ... (NYPost, by Susan Edelman, July 23, 2006)
  
• Abandoned heroes ... Forty-thousand-strong, they labored at Ground Zero under miserable conditions in a time of crisis, working 10 and 12 hours a day to search for the lost, extinguish underground fires and haul off 2 million tons of rubble. As a direct result, well over 12,000 are sick today, having suffered lasting damage to their respiratory systems. ... They cough. They wheeze. Their heads and faces pound with the pressure of swollen sinuses. They lose their breath with minor exertion. They suffer the suffocation of asthma and diseases that attack the very tissues of their lungs. They endure acid reflux, a painful indigestion that never goes away. ... The city's chief attorney, Corporation Counsel Michael Cardozo, says, for example, that he is confident Ground Zero workers have been provided with appropriate medical attention and disability benefits. This may be wise to argue for the purpose of limiting liability, but it's destructive denial as a public health strategy. Never did the state health commissioner, Dr. Antonia Novello, or the city health commissioner - Dr. Neal Cohen in the days immediately after 9/11, Dr. Thomas Frieden since January 2002 - step forward to lead a crusade that marshaled the resources of New York's vast public and private health systems. Nor did Cohen or Frieden ever issue protocols advising physicians on recognizing and treating syndromes generated by World Trade Center exposures. Inexcusably, Cohen failed to disseminate advisories at a time when the Giuliani administration was declaring all was safe at The Pile, and Frieden's staff is only now getting around to completing its first bulletin. ... (NYDaily News, July 22, 2006)
  
• Hulk from Hell - Fiterman Hall Blights On ... CUNY, which owns the site via its Borough of Manhattan Community College, couldn't care if the ruin stands forever. And the federal environmental bureaucrats who've called the latest halt on Fiterman have grown so terrified of even the remotest risk, they're making it impossible to take down anything larger than a mailbox Downtown. In any rational state or city, the Fiterman Hall eyesore would have been fixed or demolished promptly after 9/11. But CUNY, selfishly craving public money for a new building, refused to even consider having it cleaned and fixed. Yet the existing structure likely could have been saved. With $120 million in insurance and FEMA funds, CUNY had enough to repair the damaged hall - but it was $60 million-plus short of what it needed for a new one. [Pataki], as spineless and unfocused as ever, let CUNY drag its feet - at the expense of the rest of the neighborhood. ... (NYPost, by Steve Cuozzo, July 13, 2006)
  
• New delay for Fiterman demolition ... The demolition of a 9/11-contaminated building faced another setback last week as officials rejected demolition bids from four contractors. Fiterman Hall, a Borough of Manhattan Community College building on W. Broadway, has stood damaged and contaminated since the World Trade Center attacks on Sept. 11, 2001. After reviewing bids to clean and demolish the 15-story structure, the State Dormitory Authority rejected them all, sending the contractors back to the drawing board. “Not a one of them met all of the environmental specifications that we had,” said Claudia Hutton, a Dorm Authority spokesperson. Cleanup on the building was scheduled to start in October, but Hutton does not know how long this latest development will delay the process. The next round of bids will be due on Aug. 3. “Nobody wants to have any delay at all, but at the same time it would’ve been wrong to proceed with what we had,” she said. Fiterman Hall has stood contaminated and shrouded in black since 9/11, its south face visibly gashed and scarred. It took City University of New York until May 2005 to raise the $185 million necessary to dismantle the structure and rebuild a new one in its place. At the time, Governor George Pataki speculated that demolition would begin by the end of 2005. The Environmental Protection Agency, which is overseeing the demolition, has yet to approve the school’s plans. Hutton said the selected contractor will help submit the revised plans to E.P.A. ... (Downtown Express, by Ronda Kaysen, July 7-13, 2006)
  
• Maloney, Fossella Ask Health Czar for Progress Report on Response to 9/11 Health Crisis: Reps Ask When Gov't Will Release Plan to Monitor and Treat Everyone Exposed to Ground Zero Toxins ... "Dr. Howard has moved quickly to enhance the federal government's response to the health impacts of 9/11,” said Congressman Fossella.  “He understands the need for quick action, but also recognizes that we must have a comprehensive, long-term plan in place to help the first responders, workers and residents who may have been impacted by the attacks. We will continue working with Dr. Howard in the months ahead to ensure that those who are sick get access to the resources they need." ... (News Release, July 13, 2006)
  
• FEMA big faces heat in aid mess ... A TOP FEMA official faces pointed questions today about the agency's failure to prevent massive waste, fraud and abuse in the federal government's $21.4 billion program to help New York recover from the 9/11 terrorist attacks. Members of the oversight subcommittee of the House Homeland Security Committee are expected to kick off two days of hearings with an intensive grilling of Joe Picciano, FEMA's regional deputy director, regarding several key debacles: . A clean-air program that allowed tens of thousands of New Yorkers to receive free air conditioners, HEPA vacuums, air purifiers and air filters even though they lived nowhere near Ground Zero or the path of the toxic plume created by the collapse of the World Trade Center towers. ... Delays in initiating an adequate program to remove pollutants from contaminated buildings in lower Manhattan, which undoubtedly contributed to nagging health problems. ... (DailyNews, by Richard T. Pienciak, July 12, 2006)
  
• Medical Surveillance: New WTC Helath Impacts Coordinator makes Responder Treatment Top Priority ... Coordination, residents Also Priorities: identifying unmet needs, such as the lack of a monitoring and treatment program for affected residents ... For a thrid priority, Howard said he plans to address theunmet need of monitoring and tratment for residents. He hops to launch studies based on the WTC Health Registry that will identify residents' health issues. There is only one local clinic currently treating residents for the WTC-related health problems, Howeard said, and the "backlog is huge." (Occupational Satey & Health, Vol. 36, No. 28, BNA 7-13--06)
  
• Search For 9/11 Remains At Deutsche Bank Building Delayed Again ... Workers set to resume the search Monday for remains of September 11th victims at the Deutsche Bank building were delayed because their protective gear was not ready. Workers are now scheduled to resume their search Tuesday. The gear in question is what caused the cleanup efforts to be put on hold back in April, when the EPA found that workers were not protected from asbestos. The discovery of hundreds of bone fragments at the dilapidated building, mostly on the roof, has delayed the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation's plans to tear the vacant tower down. ... (NY1, July 10, 2006)
  
• Ground Zero Cancer Curse ... More than 40 World Trade Center rescue and recovery workers have been hit with two cancers - a double whammy they claim stemmed from deadly toxins. The twice-struck are among 330 Ground Zero responders with cancer who have joined 5,000 cops, firefighters and other workers in a class-action suit against the city, said lawyer David Worby. They include Reggie Hilaire, now 35, a rookie NYPD cop on 9/11 who logged 890 hours digging through WTC debris at the Fresh Kills landfill andpatrolling Ground Zero. A nonsmoker, he beat thyroid cancer last year, only to learn this year he has multiple myeloma, a blood cancer. .... Other dual-cancer victims include a female NYPD cop, 40 (tongue and myeloma); a Con-Ed worker, 39 (stomach and testicular); a sanitationworker, 48 (liver and leukemia); a housing worker, 39 (throat and liver); and an NYPD cop, 55 (bladder and kidney). ... Worby lists 24 other 9/11 responders with thyroid cancer. He contends lethal combinations of dioxins, PCBs and benzene accelerated carcinogens - triggering various cancers - while pulverized metals like lead, mercury and cadmium weakened the immune system. ... (NYPost, by Susan Edelman, July 9, 2006)
  
• The Rebuilding of Lower Manhattan: If the Rebuilding Effort’s Progress to Date is a Victory in Disguise, Then Lower Manhattan Residents Say, “It’s a Very Effective Disguise Indeed.” .... residents' perceptions of the environmental clean-up have deteriorated from 61% who thought it went well in 2003 to just 32% who think the same today. Also, a robust majority, 59%, believes there is a long-term health risk to residents as a result of 9/11.... In terms of the cleanup and monitoring of air quality in Lower Manhattan, we observe a similar negative trend. In 2003, 61% of residents thought these environmental efforts were going either “very well” (24%) or somewhat well (37%); that meant positive ratings (61%) outnumbered negative ratings (31%) by 30 percentage points. By February 2004, this confidence surplus had shrunk to 4 points. By September 2004, skeptics (57%) outnumbered true believers (39%) by 18 percentage points, and that confidence gap remained virtually unchanged in 2005 (16 percentage points) before nearly doubling to the yawning maw (30 percentage points) it is today. ... (A Pace Poll Survey Research Study, July 8, 2006)
  
• Program Has Critics: Set Body Scan For Ground Zero Dets. ... The Detectives' Endowment Association last week announced that it will soon offer its members who worked at Ground Zero a complete body scan designed to detect potential health ailments. The comprehensive test, which normally costs $850, will be available to active Detectives for $175 and all retirees for $375. Inner Imaging, the company contracted with the DEA to conduct the exams, is affiliated with Beth Israel Medical Center. ... Albert E. Barrette, the managing director of Inner Imaging, asserted that the exam will save lives. The test, he said, has the ability to determine if someone has coronary heart disease and other lung and abdomen ailments years in advance. "Heart disease is the number one killer" among officers, he said. "This can see the diseases 15 to 17 years before symptoms occur." According to the FDA, another concern is the issue of false positives and false negatives. "False positive results, in which the scan indicates abnormalities that don't exist, can lead to more tests and medical procedures, some of [which] carry their own hazards," the FDA stated. "And ironically, instead of providing peace of mind, they induce needless anxiety." But Mr. Barrette called the Imatron Ultrafast Electron Beam Scanner test the "golden standard upon which everyone else compares themselves." He claimed that conventional scans cannot fully see the heart's right artery. "We can predict heart attacks," he asserted. The scanner takes a series of high-resolution images of the heart, which physicians then examine for flecks of calcium in the areas where the three major coronary arteries are located. According to Mr. Barrette, over 2,000 independent clinical studies have shown that the Imatron is 98-percent accurate in detecting coronary heart disease. The exam also closely looks at patients' lungs and abdomen. Inner Imaging owns the only such scanner in the entire state. Asked why more hospitals haven't begun to use the technology, Mr. Barrette responded, "Prevention is not a big seller." FDNY Doctor Skeptical -- Dr. David Prezant, the FDNY's Chief Medical Officer, noted that radiologists feel the abdominal and pelvic portion of the scan is not worth the added radiation "because it does not pick up early disease and does not replace proven screening methods such as colonoscopy. We don't want to give false impressions to patients." Dr. Prezant said he recommends that only high-risk patients undergo chest scans. "It is not meant to be a screening test," he remarked. "These chest CT tests are best served in a treatment program for those people who really need it." The chest CT scan, he added, is "frequently a test that requires further testing." Local physicians have also questioned the use of the body scan test. "I'm not sure that routine screening is healthy for you," said Dr. Robert Frankel, the Associate Director of Interventional Cardiology at Maimonides Medical Center. "You may wind up doing all sorts of tests. You may wind up biopsing and taking out tumors that are doing nothing." Mr. Barrette countered that "prevention is not well understood [at] most institutions" and private practices fail to use it as a tool "mostly because it is laborintensive." Dr. Frankel sarcastically replied, "I'm glad that he's the only one who understands prevention." 'Another Option' Mr. Palladino said that the test has already detected various ailments Detectives who toiled at Ground Zero have suffered. "We don't know what we are dealing with at Ground Zero; our people were exposed to significant toxic ailments," he added. "If I can give my members another affordable option that will give them early detection on these killer diseases, that's my goal." The DEA is also backing a bill that would amend a state pension law to give lineof duty death benefits to public employees who die from 9/11-related illnesses. The measure, called the Det. James Zadroga Bill after the officer who died in January from a combination of diseases that a New Jersey Medical Examiner tied to exposure to toxic substances at Ground Zero, passed both the Senate and Assembly the previous week. ... (The Chief Leader July 7, 2006)
  
• Gerson Wants Funds for Health Follow-Up ... City Councilman Alan Gerson asked the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation last month to fund a $5 million pulmonary and environmental health center to diagnose and track ailments related to the destruction of the World Trade Center. ... It is not known how widespread the health problems are, or whether they can be attributed with certainty to the attacks. But doctors from New York Downtown Hospital said they regularly have seen patients with persistent complaints of asthma, coughs and shortness of breath since Sept. 11, 2001. “The reasons are hard to sort out,” said Dr. Lester Blair, acting chief of medicine at New York Downtown Hospital. ”We may never know. That’s the tragedy.” Dr. Robert Glennon, a pulmonary specialist at the hospital, said that based on the patients he had seen, “I definitely think there is a connection.” ... Some residents who have experienced worsening health since Sept. 11 say that while there may not yet be proof of a direct link to the trade center’s collapse, they have little doubt. Mariama James said at the City Hall press conference that she spends more than $300 a month for medications for the problems her three children have developed. “I truly believe this is the result of that unfortunate incident,” she said. William Albert, a 36-year resident of Southbridge Towers, agreed. “I’ve been coughing more. I never coughed before. There was definitely something up after 9/11.” ... (Tribeca Trib, by Etta Sanders and Barry Owens, July 3, 2006)
• Search for remains on roof of WTC skyscraper to resume ... The Environmental Protection Agency suspended work on the roof of the building in April, citing the LMDC for failing to properly protect workers from asbestos. It said in mid-June that the agency, which owns the vacant skyscraper and began dismantling it last fall, could resume the work. ... (Newsday/AP, July 3, 2006)
• Bids to raze hall rejected ... Bids from four contractors to decontaminate and demolish Fiterman Hall at the Borough of Manhattan Community College were rejected yesterday by the state Dormitory Authority, an agency spokeswoman said. "There was a flaw in that none of the firms fully addressed the environmental issues," spokeswoman Claudia Hutton said. "We were hoping to start in October, by going in and cleaning the building," she added. "We're not sure how much time we will lose now." Fiterman, a 15-story building on West Broadway, was badly damaged by the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attack. According to Hutton, the four firms, along with a fifth prequalified company that declined to bid the first time, will be invited to submit new proposals by Aug. 3.... (NYDaily News, by Paul D. Colford, July 1, 2006)