World Trade Center Health Program delays worry for retired NYPD detectives
Retired NYPD DET. Now, Richard Volpe of St. Augustine, Florida, developed a rare autoimmune disease that attacked the kidneys after 9/11.
St. Augustine Record/The Journal News/Lohud
- Supporters on 9/11 say the World Trade Center’s health program is suffering under the leadership of President Trump’s second administration and US health and welfare secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
- 9/11 Retired NYPD Det. Richard Volpe fears his watch will run out. “I’ll kill me in the end,” said his rare kidney disease Volpe. “I have a lot of concern with my family.”
Soon, the 2,983 names familiar to residents of the Lower Hudson Valley in New York will be read aloud on September 11, 2001 at Zero above ground. Speech and prayer include a pledge to “never forget.”
Meanwhile, the World Trade Centre’s health program has advocated a warning as 9/11 responders continue to die from ground zero toxic exposures. Survivors, including those who lived, worked, or went to schools in Lower Manhattan, face similar illnesses.
James Zadroga Founded as part of the 9/11 Health and Compensation Act, the WTC Health Program offers screening and treatment for diseases and disorders classified as occurring several months after the exposure on September 11, 2001.
Among the issues, the status of long-term research including coverage of the World Trade Center’s health programme for conditions such as cancer and autoimmune disorders, which appear to have a higher incidence among the 9/11 community.
There is no delay weight for 9/11 survivors like the retired NYPD DET. Richard Volpe developed a rare autoimmune disease that led to one kidney transplant. About 13 years after the first implant, Volpe said he was terrified about when his new kidney would fail.
“It’s going to kill me in the end,” said Volpe, who has not received the benefits or illness support from the WTC Health Program. “There’s a lot of concern in the family: the fact that they have a wife and two beautiful daughters.”
The WTC Program Provides Important Promise
The World Trade Center’s Health Program is administered by the National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health or NIOSH, which is part of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC,) in the United States.
More 9/11 responders died from exposure to toxins swirling in the air after September 11, 2001. The terrorist attacks were killed that day in the Pentagon and Shanksville, Pennsylvania.
Approximately 140,000 first responders and survivors are enrolled in the WTC Health Program. Last year, 10,000 people signed up, and similar numbers are expected to join the program in 2025.
Retired FBI agent Thomas O’Connor responded to the pentagon within 15 minutes of the jetliner hitting it. Politicians support the 9/11 community, he said, but what about now?
The WTC Health Program is small and relies on other departments such as NIOSH and CDC to work on grants, research, and compensation approvals. The reduction in these branches of HHS cascades and damages the effectiveness of the WTC Health Program, proponents say.
Amid the rounds of cuts, repairs and acquisitions, WTC Health Program staff has fallen to around 80 employees.
Meanwhile, the Trump administration and HHS leadership are committed to protecting the WTC health program and its mission.
“There’s continuity in that program,” U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said at a Congressional hearing on May 14th on reductions in HHS, including the WTC Health Program.
Information lockdown?
Nurturing chaos is a power outage of more than seven months from the WTC Health Program, which says it is suffering under the second administration of President Trump and Kennedy leaders.
A HHS spokesman refused to overage information. According to HHS, the program has accepted, reviewed and processed new registration applications and certification requests, and the information ban was lifted in February.
911 Health Watch executive director Benjamin Chevat disputes the lifting of the ban or “temporary hiatus.”
But, according to Chevat, communication failures are just part of the HHS issues challenging the WTC health program.
Loss of staffing and lack of research into 9/11-related illnesses plagued the program.
“The problem isn’t just communication failure. The problem is that seven months later (Kennedy’s tenure) has no impact on 9/11 responders and survivors,” Chevat said.
Supporters: Antithesis of WTC Programme “waste, fraud, abuse”
Under the banner of addressing waste, fraud and abuse, the WTC Health Program faces several cuts, including government efficiency, or a February plan announced by Doge, run by Elon Musk.
“Individuals with 9/11-related conditions do not need to rely on repeated uproars from the public and the media to owe the care they desperately need under the law,” New York Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand and Charles Schumer wrote in an August 5 letter to Kennedy warning of delayed treatment.
Former US Congressman Peter King said the WTC Health Program was in the wrong place. The Long Island Republicans co-hosted the Zadroga Act and defended the re-authorization in 2015.
“I’ve been with the government for 50 years,” he said, working for the Legislature from 1993 to 2021, before serving as Nassau County Commissioner and at the Hempstead Town Council. “There’s waste, fraud, abuse.”
However, King called the WTC Health program “scandal-free.”
“This program works,” he said. “It’s a life and death program.”
King believes Trump and Kennedy should not be aware of the impact of the HHS policy on 9/11 responders facing illness.
“I want them to attract media attention and take them to the president in front of the president,” King said. “It will be resolved in 10 minutes.”
At just 33, a rare autoimmune disease attacked the 9/11 responder’s kidney
Volpe was a NYPD detective in the drug division on September 11, 2001. He was assigned to Ground Zero and Staten Island landfills for the next six months.
In June 2003, kidney biopsy showed that IgA nephropathy, an autoimmune disorder that can cause kidney damage. Within a year, he lost 60% of his kidney function.
According to the National Kidney Foundation, this rare disorder affects about 1 in 100,000 people, leading to kidney failure in about 1 in 5 within 10 years of diagnosis.
The WTC Health Program supports the respiratory and digestive issues he has developed to be an approved illness. However, autoimmune disorders like IGA have not yet gone through a full coverage approval process, so his personal insurance covers those treatments and medications.
Volpe, his doctors, and 9/11 supporters have been exploring decades to acquire autoimmune disorders, such as the WTC Health Program’s cover.
Volpe, who currently lives in Florida, admits that the government can move at a glacial pace. But now progress is completely frozen.
“It was just a slow roll,” he said.
Volpe’s focus is on the family at the moment.
In 2001, he was 33 years old and single. He then chose pension benefits that suited his lifestyle.
“I wasn’t even thinking about getting married,” he said. Currently 57, he is married and is “magically older dad” to two girls, ages 10 and 7.
“They haven’t got my pension,” he said. And he fears that if his autoimmune disorder is not covered by the WTC Health Program, they won’t get 9/11-related death benefits.
Former FBI agents can’t get cardiac compensation
Thomas and Jean O’Connor are former FBI agents and spouses. On September 11, 2001, Thomas arrived at the pentagon within 15 minutes of American Airlines Flight 77 crashing into the building. Jean O’Connor was in Quantico that day and responded again.
Tom O’Connor recalls his first 24 hours. They sifted through the black smoke while the building was still burning. They then worked on a 15-hour shift.
Jean O’Connor was the team leader in Evidence Recovery and worked with Debris to clear FEMA’s search and rescue team. When her team finds the human remains, they will document the location, put them in a body bag, and then the honorable guard will carry the bodies in a dignified way.
O’Connor, as a leader of the FBI Agents Association, advocated the inclusion of the crash site in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, in the WTC Health program. However, when he had a heart attack in July, he didn’t immediately consider 9/11 a contributing factor.
The WTC Health Program has not advanced research into cardiac health connectivity, which may cover costs and treatment. “I guess not or not,” Tom O’Connor said, “But either way, they should look at the research and paperwork and make a decision.”
Jean O’Connor, now 62, has not developed any 9/11-related illnesses. In addition to heart problems, 61-year-old Tom O’Connor has developed a digestive issue that has been documented for possible coverage of the WTC Health Program.
“But we knock on the tree except for something pretty good,” Tom O’Connor said.
In the Pentagon, 125 people were killed in the building and 64 passengers on the plane were killed. Approximately 27 FBI employees have died from 9/11-related illnesses.
However, O’Connor, who retired to West Virginia, believes more deaths should be considered 9/11-related. The delay in classifying more illnesses hurts people, Tom O’Connor said.
He remembered an FBI colleague who developed an autoimmune disease and ended up having to use a wheelchair, which later died. Through her illness, she was unable to obtain assistance from the WTC Health Program, and her family was not able to receive support either because her illness was not certified by the program.
She and her family were financially devastated, O’Connor said, and her children, like university fundraising, were unable to extract the benefits that would come after death when they were on duty.
They also felt dishonorable. “Now, this agent is not on the walls of FBI services,” O’Connor said. “That means a lot to us, law enforcement.”
However, respect for the service must be shown in more ways than just the name of the monument. “We all answered because it was the right thing,” Tom O’Connor said. “The government needs to continue doing the right thing to support these people.”
