Listen: 9/11’s Overlooked Impact On Women; Long Haul Covid

Government officials told the public the air around Ground Zero was “safe to breathe.”

By Bob Hennelly

On this episode of the Stuck Nation Radio Labor Hour we explore the continuum of COVID and the occupational health implications for America’s essential workforce with Dr. Gounder, senior fellow and editor-at-large for Public Health at Kaiser Health News. Topics include the lack of an accounting for the work exposure related deaths of essential workers during the pandemic and the longterm challenges of long COVID as potentially disabling.

We also cover the importance of paid sick time in the age of infectious disease as well as what front line workers can do to protect themselves and their families when working remotely is not an option.

In the final segment we look at the long overlooked 9/11 WTC health impacts on women with Sara Director, a leading 9/11 World Trade Center attorney with Barasch & McGarry about the latest developments for women who were exposed to the toxic air in lower Manhattan and western Brooklyn on 9/11 and in the several months of the botched cleanup.

Sara’s firm has been advocating for 90 women who contracted uterine cancer due to their presence in lower Manhattan on 9/11 and for the months of the recovery and for over 20 years could not get recognized. Last week, uterine cancer was finally classified as a WTC cancer qualifying those who contracted it for free health care and financial compensation from the Victims Compensation Fund.

Sara is joined by cancer survivor Karen Smith Hagman who herself was working at 40 Wall Street on 9/11 and now wants to get the word out about the eligibility of tens of thousands of residents, students and workers who were not first responders but were exposed to the air that the U.S. EPA mischaracterized as being "safe to breathe."