Today marks the seventh anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center, Pentagon and United Airlines Flight 93 that killed more than 3,000 people, including some 600 union members.
At the World Trade Center, 343 of the dead were New York City firefighters. Says Fire Fighters (IAFF) President Harold Schaitberger:

No matter how many years pass, we must always remember the ultimate sacrifice made by our 343 fallen FDNY brothers after terrorists launched their cowardly attacks on the World Trade Centers.
We must always remember the thousands of IAFF members in Washington, D.C., and Virginia who risked their lives to pull hundreds of victims from the Pentagon.

This Day of Remembrance will live forever, in honor of the price these brave fire fighters made in the line of duty….We owe it to them to continue the fight make the lives of our members and the public safer.

In late August, New York firefighters delivered a large cross made out of steel from the World Trade Center North Tower to Shanksville, Pa., where United Flight 93 crashed. The cross is now part of a memorial site there.

Today, at St. Peter’s Church, near Ground Zero, the Rev. Brian Jordan, who works closely with New York City unions, is conducting a special 9/11 mass. St. Peter’s became known, in the days after the attacks, as the place where first responders and rescue and recovery workers gathered to rest, exhausted, sleeping on the pews and the floor.
Also, several city unions are holding memorial services and the New York State Building and Construction Trades Council unions building the new Yankee Stadium will pause to remember the 61 construction trades workers killed on Sept. 11.

While solemn remembrances are being held in New York, at the Pentagon and throughout the nation, there still is no permanent medical monitoring and treatment program for the as many as 100,000 responders—firefighters, paramedics, rescue and recovery workers—who were exposed to the stew of chemicals and other toxic substances in the rubble of the World Trade Center. Seven years later they are a still suffering from illnesses directly related to the attacks.

In the years since the attacks, the Bush administration consistently has delayed and blocked efforts and cut funding for Sept. 11-related health care. Last year, Congress appropriated $108 million toward health care for Sept. 11 workers, but in his fiscal 2009 budget, Bush cut that by 77 percent—to $25 million.

A study by doctors at Mount Sinai Medical Center in New York City in 2006 found nearly 70 percent of firefighters, police officers, emergency medical crews, construction workers, utility workers and volunteers suffered lung and other serious health problems.

The James Zadroga 9/11 Health and Compensation Act (H.R. 6594) would establish a monitoring and treatment program for responders and people who lived near Ground Zero. It is named after a New York police detective who died from the aftereffects of responding to the disaster. But it is unclear when the bill will come up for a vote.

By Mike Hall
AFL-CIO Staff Writer
Washington, DC
Originally posted on the AFL-CIO Blog