Employees, construction workers, firefighters, paramedics … Many of them lent a hand on September 11, 2001 on the ruins of the World Trade Center after the terrorist attack. If 2,600 people lost their lives there on D-Day, many still continue to pay a heavy price even today. This year alone, 2,518 workers at the Ground Zero site in New York City contracted cancer. This figure is experiencing a worrying increase since last year 1 140 cases were listed.
The American newspaper New York Post, which reveals the information, uses data taken from the World Trade Center Health Program. It examined 37,000 police officers, construction workers, municipal and sanitation workers, and volunteers. In the opinion of several scientists, inhalation of dust and toxins linked to the debris of the towers are said to be at the origin of the development of cancers, in particular that of the thyroid, prostate, leukemia and multiple myeloma (hematological cancer which develops in the bone marrow).
Little compensation
Voted in 2010, the World Trade Center health program is supposed to support the medical care of volunteers who have been exposed to toxic particles at the site of the attacks. 1145 participants asked to be compensated with the federal fund for victims (9/11 Victims Compensation Fund) before June 30. Of this total, only 881 were declared eligible. And according to the New York Post, 115 of them split “a total of $ 50.5 million, ranging from $ 400,000 to $ 4.1 million.”
