Officials Slow to Hear Claims of 9/11 Illnesses

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Five years after the World Trade Center towers collapsed in a vortex of dust and ash, government officials have only recently begun to take a role in the care of many of the 40,000 responders and recovery workers who were made sick by toxic materials at ground zero.

But for many of the ill and those worried about becoming sick, government actions — coming from officials whom they see as more concerned about the politics of the moment than the health of those who responded to the emergency — are too limited and too late.

The delay in assistance along with a lack of rigorous inquiry into the magnitude of the environmental disaster unleashed that day is all the more disturbing, they say, as the country faces a future in which such disasters could happen again.

Dr. John Howard, who was appointed by the Bush administration in February to coordinate the federal government’s 9/11 health efforts, readily admits that costly delays and missed opportunities may have shattered responders’ trust in the government.

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/05/nyregion/05health.html?ei=5094&en=329f137739f9f06f&hp=&ex=1157515200&adxnnl=1&partner=homepage&adxnnlx=1157429316-YyMjS4LeCsueXMTg3y9spw