"Totally avoidable"? Yeah, I guess we could have just evacuated NYC permanently -- left it for the sands or whatever to cover.
As I understand it, the smell was pretty awful for months after 9/11, and surely relief workers are routinely fitted with protective gear.
He says thousands of relief workers and residents are sick and dying. In a city the size of NYC, wouldn't there be thousands of residents sick and dying at any given time? I'd like to see more specifics tying the illnesses to the clean-up period.
And what about the fact that the worst level of toxins had to be worst in the hours and days immediately following the attack -- when most people were thinking about survival and survivors, not environmental threats. How would exposure those first frew hours and days have been "totally avoidable"? How can they distinguish between the effects of the initial blast of toxins and the lingering levels?
I don't know about all of them, but I'm pretty sure toxic effects of asbestos usually take more like 30 or 40 years to show up.
I think he's pretty short on facts and analysis -- but long on Republican bashing and hysteria.
The fact is that we are now seeing the premature deaths of first responders and emergency site workers from respiratory ailments.
However, many did not wear respirators even when the equipment was available and it is somewhat understandable given the urgency in the immediate moments following the attack.
But when rescuers fail to wear proper protective equipment and fail to follow safety procedures they often become casualties themselves.