Facing a Grim New Year: Nearly 40 Die From 9/11 Illness in Last Four Months

NEW YORK (New York Daily News/TNS) —
The south tower of the World Trade Center’s twin towers begins to collapse on September 11, 2001. (AP Photo/Louis Lanzano/File)

They survived the most horrific terror attack in our nation’s history, but may not make it through another year.

Nearly 40 people who either responded to or lived and worked near the Twin Towers when terrorists brought them down 18 years ago, have died from a 9/11-related illness since September, health care advocates told the Daily News.

That’s a rate of roughly 10 a month.

“Every time someone dies, a part of me dies,” said 9/11 survivor advocate John Feal, who’s taken on the somber duty of tabulating the grim numbers. “You can have a week without posting a death, and then you can get four in a week. It’s just weird.”

Feal said at the current rate, the number of 9/11 illness deaths by September 2019 will either match or exceed 163, the total accumulated between Sept. 1, 2017, and last Sept. 1, which is considered the highest World Trade Center yearly death toll since the terror attacks.

At the same time, increasing numbers of victims suffering from the toxic effects of the terror attacks and the recovery effort at Ground Zero are applying for compensation from the federal September 11th Victim Compensation Fund to offset treatment and living expenses.

By the end of November, 41,729 compensation eligibility claims were filed with the VCF, 3,000 more than the 38,502 victims who filed claims by the end of August, or 1,000 a month.

Each Sept. 11, Feal adds the names of those who died of a 9/11 illness during that year on his Wall of Heroes in Nesconset, L.I. Everyone listed was either near the WTC when it was destroyed or worked on the recovery effort, and sought treatment through the WTC health program, dying of an illness treated by the program.

“Every time someone dies of a 9/11 illness, that’s a family suffering,” said Feal. “But there is such a lack of empathy for the 9/11 community.”

“Everybody asked me what I wanted for [a gift] this year,” he added. “I told them, ‘I want humanity to come back.’”

Feal and other 9/11 health care advocates plan to turn 2019 into the year of the WTC survivor. Beginning in January, he and a team of 9/11 survivors plan to descend on Washington, D.C., to get VCF extended.

The $7.3 billion fund is slated to expire in 2020, but so many victims have been requesting compensation there are concerns the fund will run out of money before the deadline. This February, the fund is expected to compensate for the expected shortfall by amending its award payouts; those currently applying could receive less than those who applied a year ago for the same illness.

In October, a bipartisan group of legislators introduced bills in both the Senate and Congress to extend and fully fund the VCF.

“Our approach is … everyone is going to be on our side until they’re not,” said Feal, who is pondering his own run for Congress. “Then we will deal with them when that time comes.”

It’s estimated that 90,000 first responders showed up at the WTC in the aftermath of the attack. An additional 400,000 survivors lived and worked in the area at the time.

More than 180 FDNY employees have died of illnesses from the toxic dust at Ground Zero since the terror attack, when 343 members of the department were killed.

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