October 22, 2013

I'M SAD TO REPORT THIS!

I am deeply disturbed and saddened by a recent event. I just caught a glimpse of myself nude in the mirror. Actually, I'm serious. A dear friend has been diagnosed with cancer. She's been given about six years to live and her cancer came on very aggressively. Her persistent cough turned into lung cancer and is quickly spreading, requiring hospitalization. Often a selfless person, she urged everyone to get checked up regularly for even a recurring cough, and also had a message she hoped I'd share. My friend's cancer is a result of exposure from radon which was released at 9/11. Dig this: she lives in the East Village/Lower East Side--not even near the Towers. Women are particularly susceptible to this cancer--even younger ones--and one woman had already died from radon-induced lung cancer because she wasn't strong enough to take the treatments. Donna Summer died of this same lung cancer. Apparently, Donna freaked out after 9/11 and stayed home a lot--residing near the still-poisonous WTC. I felt horrible for my friend, especially after realizing that I was grieving more for Donna Summer than her--KIDDING! Is this the same radon that could leak out of the Spectra natural gas pipes which were they just had a protest about on this past Saturday? (When these gas pipes have leaked in other areas, radon has been the main problem--though the pipes aren't usually place in areas as densely populated as Manhattan/NJ. Or in affluent neighborhoods.) I remember officials were warning 9/11 rescue workers about respiratory ailments from dust and asbestos. There was cancer-causing radon gas there, too? What else that we might want to know about? Because the East Village is not that near Ground Zero. If everyone that far away or closer is affected, this is going to be a multiple mess for many! Already is, if you ask my friend. So I look online to see what radon is and it's a colorless, odorless gas which often seeps out of soil or in our homes and is most prevalent in basements. So anyone with a home is susceptible to radon-induced cancer? Who knew? My friend says she received a letter from the World Trade Center Organization which sounded like an invitation to tea at Saks Fifth Avenue. The organization, a branch of the government, let her know that it's paying for all of her treatments. What is the connection between the Towers exploding and radon? Was a lot of it released, trapped in those huge buildings that fell? Radon can be naturally occurring, but it's radioactive and the second biggest cause of lung cancer after smoking. I don't want to freak anyone out, but I do want to alert you a clear danger. A friend has stage 4 cancer which is spreading and The World Trade Center Organization is paying her medical bills. It's hard to trust anyone nowadays, with our government bought and sold by industries which make profit from many things which are bad for our health: war, sugar, drugs, tobacco, alcohol, genetically modified foods, oil with disastrous spills like BP's incident in the Gulf, etc. We certainly can't trust the government to protect us if somebody can make a coin off hurting us. And if the below passage from Wikipedia is to be believed, that skunk Giuliani was so eager to reopen the trading on Wall Street within 3 days of 9/11 that he lied about the safety of the air. At the urging of the delightful George W. Bush. I'm very alarmed right now. I don't want to send people rushing to buy radon testing kits for their homes (even though I will letcha know they are commercially available) or to pointless doctors' visits over mild coughs. But I'd also prefer not to see you in the hospital with an aggressive cancer which seems to be stemming from 9/11 and if there's any accidents, a new pipeline in Chelsea. Unlike people, radon lives for millions of years! I'm sure some of you will say, "Whatever! You can walk outside in perfect health and get hit by a bus." That's very true, but for those of us that hasn't happened to yet, we might want to acquaint ourselves with a VERY real danger in NYC. At least I have the wigs should cancer come calling! WIKIPEDIA: Alleged government downplaying of health risks Critics assert that government officials – notably Bush, Christine Todd Whitman (former head of the United States Environmental Protection Agency), and then-New York City mayor Rudy Giuliani – downplayed the health risks of the area and rushed to reopen the area around Ground Zero, although this posed a grave and immediate health risk to first responders. Many corporations were eager to hear the news of the New York Stock Exchange being reopened only a few days after the collapse. On June 25, 2007, Whitman testified before a House of Representatives committee chaired by Jerrold Nadler. She said that a White House official informed her that President Bush expected that the Financial District would reopen within three days, that is, by September 14. She said that she replied that this would be cumbersome, since the EPA was still judging the health situation in the area. Investigations after the attacks suggest that the Bush administration pressured Whitman and Giuliani to provide health reassurances in order to keep Wall Street operating Statements by Mayor Rudy Giuliani Two days after the collapse of the World Trade Center, mayor Giuliani said, "The air is safe as far as we can tell, with respect to chemical and biological agents." Giuliani, in attempting to deflate New York Daily News journalist Juan Gonzalez' reportage of the 9/11 air issue, claimed that "the problems created… are not health-threatening." In the first month after the attacks, the mayor said, "The air quality is safe and acceptable." In November 2001, Giuliani wrote to the city's Congressional delegation and urged that the city's liability for Ground Zero illnesses be limited, in total, at $350 million. Two years after Mayor Giuliani finished his term, FEMA appropriated $1 billion to a special insurance fund to protect the city against 9/11 lawsuits. In a September 18, 2006 New York Daily News article titled, "Rudy's Black Cloud: WTC health risks may hurt Prez Bid", Sally Regenhard, mother of Firefighter Christian Regenhard, who died on September 11, is quoted, "There's a large and growing number of both FDNY families, FDNY members, former and current, and civilian families who want to expose the true failures of the Giuliani administration when it comes to 9/11." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_effects_arising_from_the_September_11_attacks