More than five years after the attacks on the World Trade Center, thousands of New York’s downtown residents are convinced that toxic residues still lurking inside their homes are damaging their health.
And it seems that the city’s politicians and health authorities are taking their concerns seriously.
A new health clinic to diagnose and treat those people who live and work around Ground Zero has just opened with more than $17m funding from the city and from private charities.
WASHINGTON - The mayor of New York City asked Congress on Wednesday to reopen the government fund for victims of the Sept. 11 terror attacks — and spare his city the prospect of losing billions of dollars in related lawsuits.
The fund closed in December 2003, and Mayor Michael Bloomberg told a Senate panel that federal help is needed for those sickened years after the attacks.
Philip Rooney spent five grim weeks at the World Trade Center after it was destroyed by terrorists, catching glimpses of body parts as he cleared the debris. It was a land of ghosts he was proud to inhabit.
Just over five years later, the city Department of Transportation carpenter is dead at age 41.
Rooney died March 1 of acute leukemia, after logging 202 hours at the site beginning on 9/11, the DOT confirmed.
State lawmakers passed a bill Thursday to protect more city employees who may have been exposed to toxins at the World Trade Center site during the clean-up and recovery effort in the wake of the 9/11 terror attacks.
The State Senate passed an amendment to a law that would offer accidental death benefits to both retired city employees who came back to work on 9/11 and correctional officers who helped in the disaster response.
Emergency responders and others who say working at or living near Ground Zero sickened them charged Wednesday that President George W. Bush is more than a day late and a dollar short in providing health programs for them.
About a dozen advocates called on Bush, who was in the city for a Wall Street appearance, to commit to a long-term plan for monitoring the health of those who worked at or lived near the World Trade Center site and for treating their Sept. 11-related illnesses.