Mitchell Reports   |  September 11, 2012

Certain cancers included in WTC program

The National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health is giving surviving first responders and victims of the 9/11 attacks cancer coverage under the Zadroga Health and Compensation Law. NBC’s Robert Bazell reports.

Share This:

This content comes from Closed Captioning that was broadcast along with this program.

>> nbc chief science and health correspondent robert bazell joins me now. bob, we remember back when the epa was saying no worries, nothing is wrong with the air there and we all know what has happened since. finally these people are being compensated although there's still big health issues for those still ill .

>> a lot of health issues, andrea. the idea that air and those of us who breathed it, the idea that air was somehow not unhealthful, was just a fantasy. it was terrible. it had every kind of pollution you could imagine in it, including just plain all kinds of metallic dust as well as toxins and the idea that it won't lead to cancer is just absurd. now it takes many years to prove that it will cause cancer because as we know from studies of smoking and other carcinogens it takes many years between the exposure and the cancer. there's no scientific proof yet that the fumes from the pile of 9/11 caused any cancers, but very few people who are in knowledge of this doubt that it will and that's why this is such an important decision by dr. john howard who heads the 9/11 fund.

>> robert bazell , thank you very much. thanks for joining us