The Trump administration plans to terminate federal employees centered on stopping and responding to work-related diseases, together with “black lung” illness in coal miners, based on an inside authorities memo obtained by NBC Information, regardless of in latest days reinstating some who had been let go.
These terminations may threaten crucial applications used to display for well being points in employees with poisonous exposures, together with 9/11 first responders, based on individuals who work on or profit from the applications. Some employees who profit from these applications have expressed fears that circumstances corresponding to most cancers or lung illness may go undetected because of this.
Issues about the way forward for these applications started earlier this month when the Division of Well being and Human Companies effectively gutted the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH), drastically chopping the headcount of an company that has been round for 55 years. The transfer was a part of a broader plan to scale back the scale of the federal workforce, together with an enormous restructuring of federal well being companies that referred to as for the termination of roughly 20,000 full-time workers.
In an agencywide e mail despatched Wednesday, NIOSH’s director, John Howard, acknowledged “a big variety of [reduction in force] notices despatched to employees” and stated some staffers had been introduced again from administrative go away this week as a part of “a brief association to assist full our obligations.” The staffers had obtained notices on April 1 that that they had been positioned on go away, with official termination dates set for June.
Howard himself obtained a termination discover in early April however returned to his put up after bipartisan opposition from members of Congress concerning his dismissal.
The notices “created confusion and gaps in info that we’re persevering with to attempt to fill,” Howard stated in his memo. Some applications inside NIOSH will transfer to a newly created company referred to as the Administration for a Wholesome America, he stated, nevertheless it’s unclear how that transition will happen.
One program caught up within the cuts is the Coal Staff’ Well being Surveillance Program, a congressionally mandated effort to watch the well being of coal miners. For many years, it provided free X-rays to determine lung scarring in miners who repeatedly inhale coal mud — what’s colloquially referred to as “black lung.”
An HHS official stated crucial NIOSH applications, together with the Coal Staff’ Well being Surveillance Program, will proceed to serve the wants of miners by way of the newly created Administration for a Wholesome America, however didn’t handle the upcoming staffing cuts.
Sen. Shelley Moore Capito, R-W.Va., said Tuesday evening on X that she was inspired by some NIOSH employees returning to work this week.
“My understanding is that that is non permanent, so my focus will proceed to be on working with @HHSGov on completely restoring these capabilities and personnel in essentially the most environment friendly and efficient method,” she wrote.
A lawsuit filed earlier this month by a coal miner in West Virginia on behalf of himself and others in his area requires this system to be reinstated. It accuses HHS of violating the Federal Coal Mine Well being and Security Act — which established this system in 1969 — by terminating staffers concerned in black lung screenings. HHS has till Thursday to answer the swimsuit.
Coal miners have a higher-than-average risk of dying from black lung by advantage of their occupation. One in 10 underground coal miners who labored in mines for a minimum of 25 years had black lung, based on a NIOSH report in 2018. In Central Appalachia, one of many primary coal mining areas within the U.S., the speed was 1 in 5.
Scott Laney, an epidemiologist on the Coal Staff’ Well being Surveillance Program, stated this system recognized new instances and supplied proof of the illness to miners submitting for incapacity advantages. He estimated that, because of staffing cuts, there are a whole lot of hundreds of X-rays at present sitting within the basement of the NIOSH facility in Morgantown, West Virginia.
“There’s a tranche of X-rays which have gone unread in our system, and these miners are ready to seek out out whether or not they have black lung or not,” he stated.
On prime of that, he stated, “if somebody calls NIOSH and asks for his or her private well being info, we don’t have the power to ship that to them proper now.”
Dave Dayton, a miner in Marion County, West Virginia, stated he has personally taken benefit of NIOSH’s cell screenings for lung illness. Many miners work lengthy shifts and would in any other case battle to see a physician, he stated.
“With out NIOSH being there to assist us, I don’t know the place we’re going and the place the miners are going to be with out their assist,” he stated.
Diane Shamis contributed.
