Nuclear Weapons 179 - Program to Compensate Nuclear Workers Exposed to Radiation While Working on U.S. Nuclear Weapons Must be Improved
The nuclear industry likes to brag about how safe it is. They like to say that almost no one has died as a result of nuclear accidents or operational problems at nuclear power reactors and research laboratories. However, they are not so vocal about the death toll from the development and manufacture of nuclear weapons for the U.S. arsenal. One of the big problems with health dangers of nuclear radiation is the fact that if a dose is not great enough to cause immediate and obvious serious tissue damage, it may take years for an exposure to result in a cancer or other serious health problems.
A recent study states that while working in the U.S. nuclear weapons program over one hundred and seven thousand workers have been diagnosed with cancers and other possibly radiation related diseases since World War II. Almost thirty forty thousand of the workers have died A special fund was established in 2001 to compensate workers and their survivors for health problems caused by workplace exposure. The numbers quoted in this post come from records that were compiled for that program.
Originally, the government estimated that it would cost about one hundred and twenty million dollars to compensate about three thousand people. However, in the fourteen years of the program, over twelve billion dollars have been spent on fifty three thousand people. Only about half of those who have been applied for compensation have been approved. Sadly, even though the dangers of nuclear weapons work have been known for decades, the current safety standards for workers against regular exposure and day-to-day accidents have not improved much. More than one hundred and eighty thousand nuclear employees have suffered radiation exposure since the compensation program was established in 2001. Here are a few examples of worker exposure and compensation at specific worksites.
The federal government has just acknowledged that work done at the Idaho National Laboratory "likely caused or contributed to" the deaths of 396 employees. Hundreds of employees and former employees have filed health insurance claims stating that the work they did with nuclear materials at the INL caused them to become ill. Fifty three million dollars has been paid out to cover health care costs for some of the workers injured by radiation exposure. Another one hundred and eighty eight million dollars has been paid to the survivors of four hundred and seventy one former INL employees who have died from radiation exposure during their work. Some INL employees have found it difficult to get compensations with over two thirds of claims being rejected.
In Kansas, almost three hundred former workers at the Kansas City Plant have collectively received over fifty five million dollars in compensation for health problems related to their work with radioactive materials. Over half of the money was received by the survivors of workers who had already died from their radiation related illnesses. A total of four thousand four hundred and forty workers have applied for compensation but less than three hundred approved and received compensation. The approval rate for claims at the Kansas City Plant is twenty three percent which is less than half of the national average for such claims.
Since 2000, over thirteen hundred workers and their families have been given compensation for work related illness at the Pantex nuclear weapons plant in Texas. More than one hundred and seventy million dollars has been paid out on claims. A few years ago, the approval rate for claims was under twenty percent. With the growing body of evidence of the health dangers of radiation exposure, the number of claims approved has risen to about fifty percent which is the national average. However, over half the claims that have been paid have gone to survivors after workers have died. Critics of the program claim that the claims process is deliberately dragged out because it is cheaper to pay survivors than to pay for long term care while the claimant is alive.
While the compensation rate of nuclear weapons workers with illnesses caused by their exposure to radioactive materials has been improving, there are still many ill workers and their families who have had difficulty proving that their illnesses are related to their work. The process must be streamlined so that more deserving claims are approved. The safety measures at nuclear weapons plants must be improved.
Texas Pantex Plant:
