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Archive for the ‘Mesothelioma’ Category

Congressional Republicans defeat 9/11 bill

Thursday, August 26th, 2010

House Republicans this month blocked a Democratic plan to provide billions of dollars for medical treatment to rescue workers and residents of New York City who suffered illnesses from the toxic dust and debris at ground zero.

Emergency workers inhaled all sorts of toxins, notably asbestos. Asbestos exposure has been linked to rare but deadly cancers like mesothelioma. Many of the workers at Ground Zero have been diagnosed with these kinds of cancers.

A majority of the lawmakers in the chamber supported the bill, but the 255-to-159 vote fell short of the two-thirds margin needed under special rules that were used to bring the measure to the floor. In the end, 243 Democrats and 12 Republicans supported the measure; 155 Republicans and 4 Democrats opposed it.

Democrats used rules requiring a wider majority for approval to prevent Republicans from offering amendments on the floor that would embarrass Democrats in an election year.

Republican opponents of the legislation expressed concern over the $7.4 billion cost of the program and called the funding mechanism a tax increase on businesses. The bill was to be funded by closing a loophole  that allows American companies chartered off shore to operate in the U.S. without paying taxes on income earned in this country.

Democrats accused Republicans of being callous and vowed to bring the bill back for another vote in the fall.

Source: The New York Times

This is what happens when corporate influence goes unchecked

Friday, July 9th, 2010

To those who say that government isn’t the answer to our problems, we offer this rather egregious list from Move On of the top-10 reasons we need more — not less — governmental oversight.

  1. Exxon Mobil made billions in profits, and yet paid not one dime in federal income taxes in 2009.

  2. The 2005 energy bill had a little known provision, commonly called the Halliburton Loophole, which exempted natural gas drilling from the Clean Water Act. The result? Water so contaminated that you can light it on fire.

  3. Massey Energy was cited more than 2400 times for safety violations in its mines, but chose not to fix potentially lethal problems because low penalties meant it was cheaper to simply keep paying the fines. This spring, 29 miners were killed in an underground explosion at a Massey mine in West Virginia.

  4. Michael Taylor was the FDA official who approved the use of Monsanto’s Bovine Growth Hormone in dairy cows (even though it’s banned in most countries and linked to cancer). After approving it, he left the FDA—to work for Monsanto. Until last year, when he moved back to the government—as President Obama’s “Food Safety Czar.” No joke.

  5. Internal Toyota documents outline how the company was successful in limiting regulator actions in the recalls last year—saving hundreds of millions while the death toll continued to climb.

  6. GE and its lobbyists—including 33 former government employees—have successfully lobbied Congress to override Defense Department requests to cancel a GE contract to work on a new engine for the Joint Strike Fighter jet. GE will need $2.9 billion to finish the project.

  7. Top executives at 9 big banks including Citibank, Bank of America, Goldman Sachs, and Morgan Stanley paid themselves over $20 billion in bonuses just weeks after taxpayers bailed them out to the tune of 700 billion dollars.

  8. During the waning days of the Bush administration, officials responded to a long-term lobbying campaign by pre-empting product liability lawsuits for dozens of entire industries. They bypassed Congress entirely and rewrote rules ranging from seatbelt manufacturing regulations to prescription drug safety.

  9. Sunscreen manufacturers including Johnson & Johnson and Schering-Plough, in the interest of profits, are opposing an FDA proposal requiring full reporting on sunscreen labels. The New York Times just confirmed that current SPF ratings don’t even measure sun rays that cause cancer.

  10. And of course BP—a company with a record of 760 drilling safety and environmental violations—was granted safety waivers in order to operate the deepwater drilling rig that ultimately created the worst environmental disaster in US history.

Companies knew asbestos was dangerous in the 1930s

Wednesday, June 23rd, 2010

In 1933, the Johns-Manville Company settled with an attorney on behalf of 11 former Manville employees, all asbestosis victims. The attorney received $30,000 for the victims, in exchange for a written promise that he would not “directly or indirectly participate in the bringing of new actions against the Corporation.”

This fact did not come to light for more than 45 years. In the meantime, the company was able successfully to avoid damage suits. Had the public known about this settlement, it is likely that the hazards of asbestos would have come to light decades earlier.

Companies like Alcoa that used asbestos in its daily manufacturing processes have denied knowing that asbestos exposure could be a danger to those who worked closely with the mineral. In fact, these companies have managed to set the late-1960s as the benchmark for when they could have known about the dangers of asbestos — nearly 40 years later!

Asbestos has been linked to mesothelioma, an aggressive and deadly form of cancer. It is difficult to diagnose and symptoms often take 20-30 years to manifest. Usually, by the time symptoms show up, it is too late to save the patient.