Renewing the fight for 9/11 health funds
Nearly half of the 15,000 FDNY firefighters, officers and medics who were working on 9/11 — and survived — have gotten sick from their exposure to the toxins that swirled around the World Trade center site, union officials said Friday.
“We’re in hospitals every day and see dead firemen on a regular basis who have succumbed to very serious, very rare cancers,” said Uniformed Firefighters Association Staten Island Trustee Eric Bischoff, who is also battling a cancer connected to his time working at Ground Zero. “We have thousands of firefighters that have all different forms of cancers, and many that are far more sick than I.”
Bischoff declined to discuss the exact nature of his illness, but said he feels “quite fortunate” compared to some others.
Dozens of UFA members plan to travel to Washington D.C. next week to join other 9/11 survivor advocates in demanding congress extend and maintain the federal 9/11 Victim Compensation Fund, which gives out financial awards to those suffering from 9/11 illnesses and families who have lost loved ones as a result.
Fund Special Master Rupa Bhattacharyya announced last week that those currently applying for federal compensation will see roughly half of the money other survivors received a few years earlier. Those who applied after Feb. 1 are expected to receive about 70% less than what was first given out when the fund was created.
So many people have applied for compensation that the $7.3 billion fund established four years ago is running out of money. There is only about $2 billion left, which has to be spread out to those seeking help before the 2020 deadline, officials said.
UFA President Gerard Fitzgerald said union members will be targeting lawmakers from across the nation, encouraging them to sign onto a bill that will extend the fund.
Practically every state in the nation has a 9/11 survivor suffering an illness, Fitzgerald said.
“There’s only one district out of 465 that does not have a participant from the World Trade Center, either people who lived there or responded,” he said. “Every politician has someone in their district who is associated with 9/11, so we want 464 yes votes on this.”
“We’re getting out of the chute early so hopefully we can get them on record early,” he said.
Some 11,000 people were employed by the FDNY when terrorists flew two jumbo jets into the World Trade Center on 9/11.
When the smoke cleared, 343 FDNY members were dead.
Today, 6,500 firefighters, officers, emergency medical technicians and paramedics who either responded to the terror attack or toiled at Ground Zero in the months that followed are suffering from a 9/11 illness, Fitzgerald said. More than 2,000 of them, like Bischoff, have some form of cancer.
Biscoff was diagnosed with a 9/11-related cancer about 18 months ago.
“I have not yet applied (to the VCF) because I’m still going through my treatments,” he explained. “