2/3 article in Seattle Post-Intelligencer re: compensation ofDOE workers

[Jim Hardeman <Jim_Hardeman@mail.dnr.state.ga.us>]

Hanford workers finally free to tell of
illnesses Public hearing will break a long
security silence 

Thursday, February 3, 2000 By ANGELA
GALLOWAY
 
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER
CAPITOL CORRESPONDENT 
RICHLAND -- Hanford workers -- who for
years were forbidden from even
discussing what may be killing them with
their own doctors -- can break their silence
tonight. 

Tonight, Assistant U.S. Energy Secretary
David Michaels will hear from current and
former Hanford workers about radiation to
which they were exposed and about
illnesses they have faced. 

"The Cold War has ended. The need for
secrecy and denial has ended," Michaels
said. 

"DOE has made some mistakes,"
Michaels added. "If we made some
people sick, we should take care of them."

The testimony will be included in a March
report to the White House on how working
at atomic bomb factories may have hurt
employees, and how they should be
compensated for increased risk of cancer
and other illnesses. Part of that report, a
draft review of health studies, has already
said workers were harmed. 

For many of the former workers in the
nation's atomic weapon complex, the
public hearings are their first opportunity to
publicly say what weren't allowed to tell
even their doctors during the Cold War. 
Tim Takaro, a University of Washington
researcher who runs a health-screening
program for former Hanford workers, said
the meeting marks a new era of
openness. 

"It's historic," Takaro said. "This is the first
time Hanford workers have felt free
enough to speak." Tonight's hearing
comes on the heels of the federal
government's most significant admission
to date that elevated rates of cancer and
other illnesses have been found among
workers in nuclear weapons factories.
Energy Secretary Bill Richardson last
week said workers were exposed to
harmful levels of radioactive and chemical
contamination. 

His admission follows the leaking of a
draft report that shows elevated rates of
22 types of cancer among workers at
Hanford and 13 other atomic weapons
facilities. Ordered by the White House in
July, the report is part of a project to
determine happened to the workers, what
the government has done to help them
and how they should be compensated for
illnesses. 

While he wouldn't discuss the report,
Michaels said its findings are to be
expected. 

"They worked with some of the most
dangerous chemicals known to man," he
said. "Frankly, it's not very surprising." 
Perhaps the biggest remaining issue is
how to pay for harming workers. In July,
the government admitted that some
nuclear workers were made ill, or will
become ill, from contact with beryllium -- a
more limited admission that Richardson's
recent statements. 

Legislation sponsored by U.S. Rep. Paul
Kanjorski, D-Pa., calls for payments to an
estimated 500 to 1,000 former workers
who either have the illness or are at high
risk of developing it. President Clinton will
propose an appropriation of about $10
million as a start, Michaels said. The
Hanford Nuclear Reservation made the
plutonium first used in the secret
Manhattan Project and was a key weapons
factory until the late 1980s, when it
became the world's largest clean up
project. Between 100,000 and 200,000
people worked at Hanford. 

The hearing is at 6:30 p.m. tonight at the
Federal Building Auditorium, 825 Jadwin
Ave. Confidential comments can be made
by calling toll-free 1-877-447-9756
weekdays. For more information:
509-373-5647. 

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