Paramedic who worked at WTC morgue dies of respiratory illness (20+ now)

[Blue Diadem]

Paramedic who worked at WTC morgue dies of respiratory illness

March 20, 2006, 7:31 PM EST


NEW YORK (AP) _ A 41-year-old paramedic who worked at a morgue for months after the Sept. 11, 2001, attack on the World Trade Center was buried Monday after dying of an asbestos-related cancer.

Deborah Reeve, a 17-year paramedic, died on March 15 of mesothelioma, a lung cancer associated with exposure to asbestos, her family said. Reeve developed a cough in late 2003 and retired at the end of 2004 after becoming too ill to work.

Her doctors and family say her cancer was caused by exposure to toxic dust from the World Trade Center site. City health officials say it's too early to definitively link trade center exposure to respiratory illnesses.

A pending lawsuit alleges more than 20 deaths have been linked to ground zero exposure

http://www.newsday.com/news/local/wire/newyork/ny-bc-ny--paramedicdeath0320mar20,0,6657239.story?coll=ny-region-apnewyork

edited to add number in subject.

[serryjw]

1. I have been following these deaths

This is so sad that no precautions were taken. They deserve to win the lawsuits...Remember Senator Stevens (R-AK) who stood in the well of the senate after 9-11 and introduced a bill that the first responders should work w/o overtime pay as their contribution to Homeland Security?

[Blue Diadem]

3. I didn't know that about the overtime,

that's awful. I do remember hearing that they made the EPA change their statements about the air quality.

I just wonder how many more will die. This is hitting them so fast, not even 5 yrs after exposure and they're dead.

[serryjw]

9. Don't forget the Bridge to No Where!

Senator Stevens is the King of RW Whores in the Senate and only wants to line his pockets. The man has %&&_(+)_+_
quote.......
GOP Senator Slams ‘Everyday Heroes’
A powerful Senate Republican slammed firefighters and police officers for seeking overtime pay for exhausting homeland security duties. Senator Ted Stevens, R-AK, who heads the Senate’s influential Appropriations Committee, suggested that such “first responders” should bear the cost of homeland security by working overtime without pay.

“I feel strongly that we ought to find some way to convince the people that there ought to be some voluntarism at home,” Steven said. “I don’t know why the people working for cities and counties ought to be paid overtime when they’re responding to matters of national security.”

end quote.......
http://www.iamaw.org/publications/imail/imail_04_08_2003.htm

OMG..It's alot worse than I thought
quote........
David Worby, the attorney for approximately 5,200 Ground Zero workers says that rescue and clean-up workers were not properly protected for the dangerous job they had to perform. "This was a toxic waste site. People should have been walking around in moon suits."

He anticipates there will be many more deaths and illnesses from worker’s exposure to deadly waste at ground zero. It is estimated that as many as 40,000 people worked at the site in the months after 9/11.
end quote.....
http://www.ww4report.com/node/1515

[Blue Diadem]

11. Toxic waste site indeed..

As many as 40,000 worked there..WOW. I can't help but wonder about the residents nearby. Makes me wonder how many have died and it was never connected.

another snip from your last link:
Thousands are sick and suffering from respiratory illnesses. Nearly 400 firefighters and paramedics have left the job because of career-ending illnesses that followed their work at Ground Zero.

[serryjw]

15. I venture to say we will never

know for decades that the increase in respiratory illnesses were linked to 9-11 until some 'think tank' puts it together. Unless a dem is in the WH it will never get published

[ninkasi]

18. And in answering the call to "shared sacrifice"

maybe Halliburton should offer it's services free of charge, in an effort to prove themselves good Americans. After all, if first responders are asked to bear the burden, surely Halliburton can afford to do the same.

[serryjw]

20. Nah....They will just OVER charge

for all their work. It helps keep their stock high..that helps many Americans...just not you and I

[Lisa]

39. I didn't know either ... can we coin a whole new word describing that?

I just can't think of an adequate description for that kind of situation. A combination of arrogance, grandstanding, and selfishness, and pure gall -- "let's force people who are working/sacrificing far more than I am, to give even more" -- "Stevensesque", perhaps?

[KT2000]

8. Some other stuff

there are many people around the country who have been injured from environmental exposures. Many of us were trying to convince the powers that be to get the workers protective gear. The response was generally that the EPA was in charge!
If you can find the Duke University list for occupational/environmental physicians, you will see debates over whether the workers should bother with protection after 9/11.
If you saw the home page of the foremost occ/med medical specialty (American College of Occupational and Environmental Physicians) you will see their response to the events of 9/11 limited to treating psychological trauma only - no mention of environmental exposures.
Mt. Sinai, which is just blocks from Ground Zero houses the foremost occ/env medicine clinic in the country - some of their reps were out minimizing the hazards during that time.
Maybe you already know this - but corporations control occupational and environmental medicine in this country - even in such drastic events as 9/11.

[Kurovski]

25. My experience is that they are set up chiefly to divert liability

from corporations. At a Seattle hospital--the big one on a hill near a Harbor-- they famously attributed illnesses in workers at that "airplane maker factory" to psychological factors. In an adorably obnoxious about-face, they are also happy to diagnose disorders brought about from chemical damage as Chronic Fatigue Syndrome.

The state of medicine in this country is often times tragically deceptive.

[KT2000]

37. Familiar with the

View of the Harbor and their role in limiting liability. Liars all.

[Kurovski]

38. Something remarkable, yet inevitable , is how many of these clinics have

bastardized the original and actual practice of Environmental Medicine.

In my dealings, the frauds I came in contact with did not even know the basics on the studies Of Dr. Theron G. Randolph, often called the father of environmental medicine. One individual didn't even know who the man was.

http://www.nutrition4health.org/NOHAnews/Biographies/RandolphBio.htm

Even his own clinic in Illinois was purchased by a company from out of state, (Texas, if I recall correctly) and from all reports at the time, began to stray somewhat from its original orthodoxy. I do not know the state of that clinic at this time, so it would be unfair to come to any conclusions here.

[brer cat]

12. When the rethugs destroy 1st responders

they destroy the safety net for everyone.

This is so sad. They should have never sent them in without adequate protection. But then I guess *co finds them just as expendable as soldiers sent into needless war without adequate gear or equipment.

May the fires of Hell burn bright when this group of rethugs arrive.

May the families of the WTC continuing victims find peace.

[serryjw]

14. Well shit...They sent kids to iraq without

protection. They have no respect for human life.It doesn't take a scientist to know this was going to happen...and we're worried about 2nd hand smoking related illnesses?? :banghead:

[wicket]

30. Ted Stevens is such a slimey SOB

:grr: :grr: :grr:

[wordpix2]

40. as Stevens rakes in millions from Big Oil in AK, he says workers shouldn't

get overtime. I've always thought the guy is a complete a-hole and this just adds to my disgust.

[xxqqqzme]

2. hope they call todd-whitman as a witness.

[Blue Diadem]

5. I just read about her

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christine_Todd_Whitman

Thanks for mentioning her name. I wasn't up on everything she did.

[MadMaddie]

41. todd-whitman is the one that made the statement that the air

was okay to breath...I think this is a crime....the deaths are proof of the lie!!

She resigned because her ass is in trouble!!

[Olney Blue]

4. Kick.

:kick:


Oh no. This is bound to get worse in the coming months and years.

[EFerrari]

23. Yes. I've been dreading this since the EPA came out

with the sunny statement that the air was oh so okay.

In a sane world, this would be called murder.

:(

[NMDemDist2]

6. K & N n/t

[rumpel]

7. Again, this administration has to be held accountable.

Here it is a direct result of falsifying scientific data.

[IndianaGreen]

10. Really?

How about those members of Congress that wanted to pass a bailout of the asbestos industry? I believe it had bipartisan support.

[goforit]

13. Yes indeed!...Time to clean house!

[ArbustoBuster]

16. Be cautious when cleaning a house with old Republicans in it.

Like asbestos, Republicans can get into your lungs and metastatize into cancerous lobbying firms and think-tanks.

[Kailassa]

17. Their murdering never stops.

This is why they want to stop abortion and birth control, so there will be plenty of replacements for the workers they callously leave to die.

[medeak]

19. cousin is fighting lung ailment....was WTC worker

volunteer fireman on Long Island...volunteered for cleanup...has been sick for last 6 months...has two small daughters.

[Maat]

21. Oh, Goodness!

He and his family are in my prayers (or positive, healing energy headed his way)!

[EFerrari]

24. God bless that family and keep them. n/t

[aquart]

26. Thank him for me.

And my prayers are with him. And with all of them who came to help without counting the cost.

[wicket]

31. I am so sorry

How horrible :( :hug:

[wordpix2]

42. so sorry---as an environmentalist I was horrified the workers were exposed

to smoking ruins containing all kinds of stuff---plastics, metals, insulation, asbestos. It just made common sense to me that they should have full protective gear working in the ruins.

[CatFelyne]

22. "respiratory illness"

This really gets me upset. Hello news media - its CANCER. This woman died of a very aggressive CANCER. WTF is up with sugar coating this.

My fiance's father helped with the original building of the Towers. Approximately 2 1/2 years ago, he came down with mesothelioma in his lungs. With him too, started with a cough. They told him he had 2 years, he died in less than 5 months. Husband, father, grandfather - gone that fast.

Too early to link cancer to exposure my ass. There's numerous large lawsuits and this issue has even been brought to the Senate. That's no comfort to my family, or anyone else who has faced this and will be facing this in the many years to come.

Please please don't let them minimize the seriousness of this - What we're seeing is just the tip of the iceberg. There are also many, many other people at risk from this cancer; those who have had regular contact with a person who has worked with asbestos. Because these workers and rescuers carried dust and fibers on their clothes, skin, and hair, the fibers and dust could be ingested by family members, who then become at risk

Here's a quote from one article out of numerous

Mesothelioma: risk apportionment among asbestos exposure sources.

Risk Anal. 2005; 25(4):937-43 (ISSN: 0272-4332)

The mesothelioma epidemic in the United States, which peaked during the 2000-2004 period, can be traced to high-level asbestos exposures experienced by males in occupational settings prior to the full recognition of the disease-causing potential of asbestos and the establishment of enforceable asbestos exposure limits by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) in 1971. Many individuals diagnosed with mesothelioma where asbestos has been identified as a contributing cause of the disease have filed claims seeking compensation from asbestos settlement trusts or through the court system. An individual with mesothelioma typically has been exposed to asbestos in more than one setting and from more than one asbestos product. Apportioning risk for mesothelioma among contributing factors is an ongoing problem faced by occupational disease compensation boards, juries, parties responsible for paying damages, and currently by the U.S. Senate in its efforts to formulate a bill establishing an asbestos settlement trust.

[Hekate]

27. A crime to make the angels weep. Jimmy Breslin: "The air is thick w/ lies"

This is a heinous crime against humanity. Workers, soldiers, it's all the same to the BFEE, isn't it? Everyone is an interchangeable worker-bee unit to them.

In August 2003 a friend sent me an article by Jimmy Breslin, written after Christine Todd Whitman left the EPA. It confirmed my worst fears about New York City's post-9/11 air quality. I was able to find it online just now, and it's worth reading the whole thing at
http://www.commondreams.org/views03/0824-03.htm

Hekate
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Here's the first few paragraphs:

The Air Is Thick With Lies
by Jimmy Breslin

I was a few hundred yards up on Liberty Street when the Two Tower
of the World Trade Center blew. I put my nose inside my shirt
and ran through smoke that turned day into night. In the smoke were
computers, asbestos, pulverized glass, human bodies, lead. I got on
another street and One Tower blew up. Again, the air was black with
a pulverized 110-story building.

I did not feel well for two months. I never said anything because
I was too embarrassed. A couple of thousand had died. So many others
were scorched and broken and maimed. I had no right to open my mouth,
I thought. Besides, from the first day, the government's Environmental
Protection Agency had announced that air was remarkably clean. Work
on. Breathe on. You're fine.

They lied. They lied because the administration did not want people
not going to work. They lied the first week and they lied the week
after that and they have lied every day of the past two years to the
people of this city.

Christine Whitman was the EPA head until recently. I wasn't disturbed
that her education was a jump horse school, but I thought she was
better than standing up and doing what she was told by George Bush's
White House, telling lies to a public who had to breathe this air.
Turns out she isn't much of a human being. The EPA has just admitted
that they lied for all this time.

Now what are we supposed to do? By now I feel better physically
because I have adjusted to feeling lousy. I'm not going near a doctor.
Once I read what was in that air, and in it for all those days I
spent around there, I didn't want to know anything more. Don't scare
me. My friend Dan Collins, whose office is on Broadway, only yards up
from the site, said he has not taken a good breath for two years.
"They tell me it's good and I know it's bad," he said.
<snip>

[Dover]

28. Immunity for ex-chief Whitman denied in toxic dust suit

http://www.cicac.org/recull/2006-febrer/RECULL_INT... page 24

Immunity for ex-chief Whitman denied in toxic dust suit

A federal judge blasted former Environmental Protection Agency chief Christine Todd Whitman onThursday for reassuring New Yorkers after the September 11 attacks that it was safe to return to their homes and offices while toxic dust was polluting the neighborhood.
U.S. District Judge Deborah A. Batts refused to grant Whitman immunity against a class-action lawsuit brought in 2004 by residents, students and workers in lower Manhattan and Brooklyn who said they were exposed to hazardous materials from the collapse of the World Trade Center.
"No reasonable person would have thought that telling thousands of people that it was safe to return to lower Manhattan, while knowing that such return could pose long-term health risks and other dire consequences, was conduct sanctioned by our laws," the judge said.
<snip>
Quoting a ruling in an earlier case, the judge said a public official cannot be held personally liable for putting the public in harm's way unless the conduct was so egregious as "to shock the contemporary conscience."
Given her role in protecting the health and environment for Americans, Whitman's reassurances after September 11 were "without question conscience-shocking," Batts said.

[wordpix2]

43. oh, good, can't wait to see the emails Todd Whitman got re: protecting

workers and how she ignored them.

Par for the course from BushCo destroy-the-environment execs.

[Dover]

29. More info - The "Sick Building Syndrome"

This is from another poster:


While these asbestos-liability-mitigation efforts were underway, the workers in the WTC and similarly afflicted buildings began visiting their doctors frequently and persistently. Soon the medical profession came up with what is now known as the Sick Building Syndrome.
http://www.nsc.org/library/facts/sickbldg.htm

The Port Authority sued unsuccessfully, several times trying to absolve itself of responsibility for the toxins within buildings that it owned and controlled.
Some of the WTC asbestos had been placed by well connected British firms with a strong international presence.

http://www.whitelung.org/jfalerts/sprayedasbestos.html

"So prominent had the firm (Turner & Newall) become that in 1939 it was obliged to issue a report denying that it was a monopoly, as it only had 20 per cent of the world asbestos market!" By the late 1950’s its sales had overtaken those of US asbestos giant: Johns Manville: "while Johns-Manville had sales of $304.1 million in 1959, T&N had sales of $450 million the previous year." Of course, T&N is a well-known company; it is a frequent defendant in both US and UK personal injury cases.

http://www.btinternet.com/~ibas/lka_tn_expo.htm

The New York and New Jersey Port Authority
could not see any light at the end of the tunnel,
other than that of an oncoming train.
So they deeded the property to Larry Silverstein and his pals
after their initial candidate wimped out.
Osama, international leveller of defective buildings,
then took the rap for the demolition of the entire WTC complex,
and a few adjacent buildings.
By the time the dust settled, the insurance companies had all rewritten their contracts and the new contracts now contained language that somehow also eliminated any asbestos-type claims.

http://info.insure.com/business/terrorist901.html

[mcscajun]

32. "Sick Building Syndrome" predates 9/11 by more than a decade.

It began with the advent of modern office buildings where the windows could not be opened and the air was conditioned year-round. with a reduction of fresh air intake.

http://www.epa.gov/iaq/pubs/sbs.html
http://www.lhc.org.uk/members/pubs/books/sbs/sb01.htm
http://unionsafe.labor.net.au/hazards/104787226026344.html

[adigal]

33. Pray there is no link

My husband, who was a fireman in NYC, has the trade center cough. I have been following the health of the dogs, who seem to be okay according to a study by the vet school at the University of Pennsylvania.

[drm604]

34. Anyone know who the defendant is in that lawsuit?

Presumably it's the EPA, but the article doesn't say.

[AnneD]

35. As a health care worker.....

I can only say that how these and other workers are treated will affect how health care workers respond in the future.

I have been in this biz since '91 and am no longer shocked or surprised at the callousness displayed to wards health care workers of all stripes. We are treated like disposable parts.

How many of us contract HEP, AIDS, and SARS, and died because hospitals didn't want to spend the extra pennies for gloves, no stick needles, and quality masks. How many died from the small pox vaccine because some political genius:sarcasm: thought it would be a good idea for 'Homeland Security'. How many have had to prematurely end their careers due to lack of ergonomic equipment like lifts and non latex gloves. This has been the sum of my experiences.

After hearing horror stories from my Nurses friends in NOLA and my experiences in Rita, I came to a personal conclusions regarding first response. I will help my family, friends, and neighbors, but I will not be forced, coerced, or shamed to come in.

While we were being evaced for Rita, I was told that I was to evaced to another city (leaving my family behind). I was off so I did not go. When I arrived to our home campus after the evac to take care of those that couldn't leave until later (I was off but out of the goodness of my heart I came in to help), there were no Oxygen tanks for those folks and I had to take my personal car (no reimbursement) and beg for O2 from the local hospital. The order came down that all staff was to report to the campus. When I got there, most of the residents were coming back in. There were no daily meds for most of the residents. I did not know these residents and there was not always someone to help me identify them (med error waiting to happen). I was told (ordered actually)I would be working 12 hours indefinitely but no provisions were made for us such as food, sleeping space, etc (this was my part time job-my full time job had closed for several days due to hurricane). As I listened to my Supervisor (talking to us as if we were dogs), something snapped. I did something I never thought I would do, I wrote a letter of resignation, citing unsafe nursing practices and walked out. I felt badly for the residents, but what good is a Nurse if she can't practice safely. Also, Nurses had been place in impossible situations at this place and the management had no qualms when it came to punishing errors (read, hauling you up to the board and you having to defend you license).

There comes a point when you cannot stomach the abuse and all your compassion is burned up. I think many in health care have reached that tipping point. I will retire in a few years and once I hang up those shoes, I will never work in a facility as a Nurse EVER AGAIN. I might consider the Peace Corp, working somewhere where my skills are truly appreciated and can make a difference, but that is the only exception. It just isn't worth it any more.

And if the Gov thinks they can order me, or threaten me with jail time for not complying to 'help them out' in a crisis that THEY engineered, all I have to say is lock me up. It is to the point that a day in jail is better than a day on the floor.

[wordpix2]

44. please send this to DHS (anonymously if you want) because they ought to

know the conditions first responders are expected to work in and how some are refusing.

[AnneD]

48. They know it...

they refuse to acknowlege it. They expect they can strong arm or shame us into placing ourselves AND our patients in harms way because they refused to consult us before making a plan. Many of us boomer Nurses are getting older and refusing to put up with the crap anymore. The average age of Nurses is 46 and climbing fast (the Nursing professors are 51). Most Nurses I know are planing to be out in 5-10 yrs and no amount of money will bring us back. Even now, hospitals insist on 12 hr shift instead of a sane 8 or 10 hours (add the charting time you need to do but can't do until your relief arrives and you can add another 1-2 hours to your 12). Oh, and by the way, if your relief doesn't show up, those patients are YOUR responsibility-it's called mandatory overtime. I call it involuntary servitude.

I am not bitter, I took the same courses that these docs took and did as well or better. But I didn't want to be a Doctor because I love patient care. I would love to see Nursing survive as a profession, but frankly it is undervalued to the point that recruiting kids into it will be harder. I figure our salary should be under a Docs but over a Pharmicist-I say that because pharm always consults us as to drug interaction (says we are the experts in this-LOL). When I asked my daughter if she wanted to be a Nurse (at the tender age of 8), she said no, you work to hard and you don't get much money (and I never portrayed my job in anything but the most positive of terms). Guess she got tired of my missing holidays, weekends, etc. Nursing has been immune to the forces of the market place for far too long. We are highly skilled and are continually required to update our skills, yet we are expected to mop floors and take out the trash during evenings or nights (ignoring pt care because corp wants to save some money while giving themselves fat raises). I always liken us to canaries in the mine. One day we will be gone or dieing and it will be too late.

[Olney Blue]

47. Thank you for your post.

I support all that you say.

[WindRavenX]

36. the air around WTC and Battery Park was filled with carcinogenics

Besides asbestos, think of all the lead and other heavy elements around that was thrown in the air.

The air was dangerous. And the brave men and women who went there to search and treat the survivors were put in harms way and then the government denied it.
I too had family go to Ground Zero as first responders-- I worry about them. Many of the rescue dogs have or are dying of cancer.

[wordpix2]

45. burning plastics, metals, insulation, asbestos--Todd Whitman is criminal

to let first responders and even New York residents work and go outdoors unprotected. I hope she and her Bush cabal counterparts responsible are held accountable.

[lovuian]

46. This is aBush & Giuliani disaster in the making!!!

theres alot to answer for!!! People are going to learn...Bush
never was concerned about them!!!