Tri-Valley CAREs
Communities Against a Radioactive Environment
Currently, post-1973 Livermore Lab employees who believe they have been made ill by on-the-job exposures must go through a burdensome process called "dose-reconstruction," whereby the Department of Labor recreates the employee's on the job radiation dose looking at their specific records. If the illness is determined, by Department of Labor medical consultants, to have a 50% or more likelihood of causing the claimed illness, the claimant is approved. Unsurprisingly, this process rarely results in approval.
Pre-1973 Livermore Lab employees can avoid this process if they have one of 22 cancers acknowledged by the DOL to be caused by radiation exposure. This is because a Special Exposure Cohort was established for these employees. They just prove their work time (must be for at least one year) and they verify thier diagnosis and get compensated.
A petition is pending with the Department of Labor to expand the Livermore Lab Special Exposure Cohort ("SEC") to include workers until 1995. This would match the SEC's at Los Alamos and Sandia Laboratories.
To expand the SEC, there needs to be evidence that exposures went undocumented and/or record keeping of exposures was poor during this period. The workers Tri-Valley CAREs has helped through our Sick Worker Support Meetings have repeatedly mentioned both of these conditions existed during the 1974-1995 period.
There is a public meeting in Livermore on Tuesday, November 17th at 7pm to discuss the SEC expansion and hear from workers about the conditions during this period.
Location: Robert Livermore Community Center, Palo Verde Room, 4444 East Avenue, Livermore, CA
Contact Scott at Tri-Valley CAREs if you have questions about this event and how you might participate. 925-443-7148
Click here to read the invitation.