Public Employee Press

2001-2011
Workers confront mental scars, physical disabilities
Living and dying with 9/11 diseases

By JANE LaTOUR

The sad legacies of 9/11 include thousands of working people suffering from debilitating diseases caused by their exposure to the toxic air of Ground Zero during the response, recovery and cleanup efforts.

Many have died and the toll of death and illness is still climbing. The World Trade Center Health Program, which provides health care to eligible workers, treated 18,462 participants in 2010 and monitored 27,837.

PEP spoke to two public employees who worked in the long recovery and cleanup efforts. Both suffer from their exposure to toxins at the site - a tragic consequence of their dedicated service.

"I'll never forget it," said Thomas Bazerjian, then a Borough Supervisor in the Dept. of Transportation. Ten years ago, the Local 1157 member was at work in his office under the Manhattan end of the Brooklyn Bridge, when the attack occurred.

"The first day, we worked in the pit, loading and passing buckets of debris like an assembly line," he said. For months afterward, he supervised the night shift on the cleanup. "We were working 12-hour days, six days a week," he recalled.

Six months after that exposure, Bazerjian was diagnosed with asthma. Now, at 56, he lives with the effects - post-traumatic stress disorder, asthma and sinusitis, acid reflux disease and insomnia - and needs a constant barrage of medication.

"I go to the Mount Sinai program on Staten Island," he said. "They check my breathing and provide my medication. If you had to pay for them out-of-pocket, it would be a real problem. The doctors, nurses and the social worker are all very experienced and helpful."

Bazerjian has difficult nights and a hard time going to work. "I do the best I can. My health isn't what it used to be. I used to play basketball, go to the gym and run. I can't be active anymore."

Engulfed in flames

On the morning of 9/11, Local 375 member Charles Kaczorowski left the subway right across from the North Tower, which was engulfed in flames. A Construction Project Manager for the city's Dept. of Design and Construction, Kaczorowski spent 2,278 hours supervising the cleanup and recovery efforts at Ground Zero. "We worked 8-hour shifts around the clock," he recalled, until July 1, 2002.

In February 2002, Kaczorowski developed a cough. He went to the Mount Sinai program and had his first pulmonary reading. Now, the Vietnam veteran, at 64, suffers from an array of illnesses: acid reflux, sinusitis, asthma, and RADS (reactive airway dysfunction syndrome). He's had two heart incidients and suffers from gall bladder, kidney and liver disease.

"It's tough getting up in the morning," he said. "I tire really quickly."

To help sufferers like Bazerjian and Kaczorowski, DC 37 was in the forefront of the fight for compensation for victims of the exposures, which culminated in January when President Obama signed the James Zadroga 9/11 Health and Compensation Act. Kaczorowski was part of that fight and lobbied for the bill in Washington, D.C. with a DC 37 delegation. "I received Congressional recognition for doing that," he said.

The National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health ruled in July that since cancer could not be conclusively linked to Ground Zero toxins, it would not be covered by the Zadroga Act.

A committee created under the law will review scientific evidence and make recommendations to 9/11 Health Program Administrator Dr. John Howard on covering additional conditions. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention appointed Principal Program Coordinator Guille Mejia of DC 37's Safety and Health Dept. to that committee.

Congress members Carolyn Maloney, Jerrold Nadler and Peter King, authors of the Zadroga Act, filed a petition with Dr. Howard that requires him to reconsider adding cancer coverage - a decision he will make in consultation with the committee.