WTC rescuers suffer ill health

[dArKeR]

Washington - When Dan Kochensparger was on his hands and knees sifting through cement, metal and other debris at the World Trade Centre site in New York, specks were floating in the thick air. He didn't think about what they were.

He was doing his job as a hazardous materials specialist, monitoring the wreckage as he and other members of Ohio's emergency response team searched for survivors of the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. The breathing problems came later.

"The air was pretty much filled with (particulate matter) the whole time. We didn't realise it, but a lot of the photo documentation we had done, there were particles on the pictures," said Kochensparger, a 21-year veteran of the Upper Arlington Fire Department in central Ohio.

A federal programme created to monitor the health effects of work at the site has found thousands still suffering from asthma, pneumonia, bronchitis and depression.

http://www.news24.com/News24/World/News/0,,2-10-1462_1413080,00.html

It's that Bush magic spreading around the world!

[Rainbowreflect]

1. To bush this man is just a photo-op.

What happens to him after that does not matter in the least.

[newyawker99]

2. I agree RR. He is more concerned about oil

than he is about the citizens of this country. :puke:

[gratuitous]

3. The moment I heard about asbestos

In the days after the towers fell, there were all sorts of structural analyses about why they collapsed, and the composition of the building materials. When I heard that asbestos had been used in the construction of the towers, I knew right then that this was one of those cases where the true costs wouldn't be known for decades.

It's less than two years out, and already we're hearing about workers at the scene. In the next couple of years, expect to hear about sickness in residents of lower Manhattan. Within 10 years, we'll be hearing about folks in Brooklyn and Queens, and so on for the next 30 or 40 years.

Thousands of people will die lingering, gruesome deaths because of the attack, and because functionaries in Chimpy's government were more worried about his poll numbers than in the long-term safety of the citizenry.

[pfitz59]

4. Spitting up blood......

Coughing up hunks of lung. Attached to O2 bottles. Chronic wasting. My sympathies for New Yorkers.