Cough On This
January 6th, 2006 | Posted in Environment, Politics
I subscribe to the Sierra Club’s e-newsletter, RAW: uncooked truth, beyond belief, and was a little disheartened to find a disturbing but not altogether surprising story by Megan Lewis on the forgotten heroes of 9/11. She begins with this heroic description:
On September 11, 2001, Paramedic Marvin Bethea was buried in debris when the first World Trade Center tower fell, but he got out, and returned to provide aid to others. Demolition supervisor John Feal oversaw and carried out recovery work at Ground Zero until his foot was crushed on site, hospitalizing him for two months. U.S. Air Force Captain Mike McCormick worked at Ground Zero through the first six days of the rescue effort, at one point unearthing the World Trade Center towers’ flag, which was later displayed at the Olympics. Structural Ironworker Jonathan Sferazo performed search and rescue and burned iron to reach lower areas of the pile in the search for survivors. He did this grueling work for more than 30 days.
Inspiring, no? Of course the Bush administration would like to have you believe everyone did a noble job and went home, happy and healthy, to their loved ones. The truth is much darker.
. . . life hasn’t gotten any easier for these men. Bethea suffered a stroke attributed to 9/11 stress, and later was diagnosed with adult-onset asthma and chronic rhinitis. Half of Feal’s foot was amputated, and his respiratory system became impaired. McCormick now suffers from respiratory illness and gastro-esophageal reflux disease. Sferazo has lost 31 percent of his lung capacity, and is unable to work.
Ground Zero was a war zone when these brave people went in to help their fellow Americans and everyone knows that in rescue work there is danger. But, one would think that the government and its officials, sworn to protect the citizens of this land, would do everything in its power to assist those helping the victims of any tragedy. But that wasn’t the case four years ago, and to make matters worse, that wasn’t the case four months ago.
What they were told about the air pollution around Ground Zero and what was the truth are now emerging as two very different tales. Five days after the attacks, the EPA, under the White House’s direct supervision, released the following statement: “The new samples confirm previous reports that ambient air quality meets [Occupational Safety and Health Administration] standards and consequently is not a cause for public concern.” But soon 9/11 workers and residents started experiencing serious respiratory problems, a condition now called “the World Trade Center Cough.” Thousands of rescue workers are sick, and no one knows what long-term health impacts may arise in the future.
Americans cannot rest assured that the missteps of Ground Zero are in the past. In fact, the same errors are being repeated in the Katrina disaster area. A Sierra Club report finds that the Bush administration’s new National Response Plan even incorporates some of these missteps as federal policy.
The frustrations of those who sacrificed life and limb are growing, and with due cause. The homepage of the EPA boasts, “35 years of protecting human health and the environment”. How can a few men, who are with every passing day being proven the worst kind of leaders, make a puppet out of an organization whose mission is to protect us and our environs? Lewis concludes with:
Americans involved in disasters need strong, effective action from their national government. There are already too many forgotten heroes asking the same questions as John Feal: “They called us ‘Heroes’! But where are our heroes? We are the ones that need the help now. Where is it?”
The number of people suffering in this country because of misinformation is growing at an alarming rate. The heroes of 9/11 need a spokesman, a martyr, their own hero, to step up and make it known to the world that in a once-a-generation moment, when a government can truly rise up and help a country heal, it let the very people picking up the pieces suffer the most.
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