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Plan to Pay Sick Nuclear Workers Unfairly Rejects Many, Doctor Says

Plan to pay sick nuclear workers unfairly rejects many, Doctor says
THE HUFFINGTON POST by Laura Frnk 3 August 09
Carla McCabe spent a decade building nuclear bombs at the sprawling Rocky Flats complex near Denver. When she developed a brain tumor and asked for help, federal officials told her that none of the toxic substances used at the top-secret bomb factory could have caused her cancer.Now, on the eighth anniversary of the federal program created to help sick nuclear weapons workers, the man who until recently was the program’s top doctor says that McCabe, now 55, and many others like her are being improperly rejected……

…..”I was muzzled,” said Schwartz, a Harvard-trained doctor with a master’s degree in nuclear engineering, whose job was overseeing medical decisions at the federal compensation program……..

………..sick workers, who have banded together in multiple advocacy groups across the nation, point out that the Labor Department has denied nearly three out of four claims — 127,000 filed on behalf of sick nuclear weapons workers or their survivors in the past eight years.

The sick workers and their advocates say they feel vindicated that Schwartz confirms many of the complaints they’ve raised previously about waste, bias and bad science within the program.

Plan to Pay Sick Nuclear Workers Unfairly Rejects Many, Doctor Says

August 3, 2009 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | 1