In response to the Dec. 29 column “Congress Must Do More With Borrowed Time,” the author misses the broader context of the current legislation extending and extending the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act. . His RECA, passed in 1990, excluded far more people than has ever been admitted. We are well aware of how devastating that exclusion has been. I personally have worked for decades to grow and expand RECA so that justice is done. Over the past few years, we have worked as a group to expand RECA.
Our government has detonated more nuclear weapons than any other country. 928 of them were our own soil at the Nevada test site. Nuclear testing, which began in 1945 with the explosion of Trinity in the desert of south-central New Mexico, not only killed workers and veterans stationed at the Nevada nuclear test site, but also those who lived and worked downwind. It also had devastating consequences for ordinary citizens. While we wholeheartedly support the inclusion of post-1971 uranium workers in legislation expanding his RECA, many innocent civilians poisoned by fallout and dying while awaiting justice You can’t forget people. Downwinders in New Mexico have waited more than 77 years.
RECA has always been very limited in scope. Lee, who now lived in 22 predominantly rural counties in Arizona, Utah, and Nevada between 1951 and 1958, and in the summer of 1962, developed leukemia or one of 17 types of cancer. only residents of Studies since 1990 clearly show that the fallout did not confine itself to county or state lines. There were no lead walls to block the deadly radiation. The new bill includes all of Utah, Arizona, Nevada, New Mexico, Idaho, Colorado, Montana and Guam. Ultimately, it includes those affected by the fallout from Trinity in densely populated areas of New Mexico.
The bill would increase compensation from $50,000 for downwinders and $100,000 for uranium workers to a flat $150,000. But what is a human life worth? This amount cannot make up for a lifetime of suffering, health complications, financial hardship due to huge medical bills, loss of livelihoods, and the heartbreaking loss of too many loved ones. We spend $50 billion each year just to maintain our nuclear arsenal. Our lives are worth more than the weapons that will end the civilization that hurt us.
Consider this. Congress recently approved him $857 billion for the 2023 defense budget. This is only for one year. Over the past 32 years, RECA has paid almost 39,000 eligible survivors only $2.5 billion. We are Cold War veterans, but we never enlisted and paid a huge price. We are hardworking, tax-paying American citizens who have been victimized by the government we funded and trusted in developing and testing nuclear weapons. Governments that deliberately harm their own people must be held accountable. Elected leaders, especially those in Congress who do not support America’s Downwinders, are complicit in one of the country’s most tragic injustices. Justice is long overdue. Time is running out.
