Atomic workers ridiculed in training manual
Tom Beyerlein
The undated Labor Department manual, used in training people who screen applicants for possible compensation and medical benefits, also refers to the pathologist in a hypothetical dead worker’s case as the fictitious serial killer Dr. Hannibal Lecter.
The manual’s jocular attitude toward workers who have suffered from cancers and other serious illnesses is “indicative of the disrespect that’s shown to claimants” by Labor Department officials, said worker advocate Deb Jerison of Yellow Springs, who heads a nonprofit that helps sick atomic workers and their survivors obtain federal benefits. Some of the workers have died from their illnesses.
Labor officials did not return repeated phone calls seeking comment.
The Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Program, administered by the Labor Department, provides medical benefits and compensation for sick atomic workers, if it is shown their illnesses were caused by occupational exposures. Workers suffering from cancers and some other illnesses known to be caused by radiation exposures can receive lump-sum payments, as can certain survivors.
For decades, the Energy Department claimed that none of its workers was sickened by radioactive exposures. Since the program was established in 2001, it has paid $7.4 billion in compensation and doctor bills for more than 86,000 claimants.
Jerison obtained the manual in a Freedom of Information Act request to Labor and found it riddled with pop-culture references.
“None of the (hypothetical) claims examiners had names like this. It was like ‘Jane Doe.’ Bland names, which is appropriate (for the tone of a training manual),” said Jerison, whose father, Mound physicist James Goode, died in 1960 at age 36. After a six-year process, Jerison helped her mother win survivor benefits, but her mother died in 2008 before the money arrived.
In a letter to Labor officials, chemist David Manuta of Waverly, a member of the Alliance of Nuclear Worker Advocacy Groups, called the humor “examples of (a) history of disrespect” for applicants.
Manuta also criticized the “shameful comments” in May of program Director Rachel Leiton, who, according to a meeting transcript, told an advisory board that sick workers couldn’t be trusted to tell the truth in affidavits about their work history at atomic plants. Many cases involve decades-ago employment for which records are hard to find.
Sept. 25, 2011