Responders to the 2001 World Trade Center (WTC) terrorist attacks, who were exposed to caustic dust and toxic pollutants following the 9/11 disaster, suffer from asthma at a rate more than twice that of the general US population, according to new research presented at CHEST 2009, the 75th annual international scientific assembly of the American College of Chest Physicians (ACCP).
As many as 8 percent of the workers and volunteers who engaged in rescue and recovery, essential service restoration, and cleanup efforts in the wake of 9/11 reported experiencing post-9/11 asthma attacks or episodes, compared with 4 percent of the general population. Furthermore, the lifetime prevalence of asthma in WTC responders was marked by a dramatic increase from 3 percent pre-9/11 to a high of 16 percent in each of the years from 2005 through 2007.
"Although previous WTC studies have shown significant respiratory problems, this is the first study to directly quantify the magnitude of asthma among WTC responders compared with the general US population," said Hyun Kim, ScD, Instructor of Preventive Medicine at Mount Sinai School of Medicine (MSSM), New York, NY, and lead author of the analysis which uses data obtained from the federally-funded World Trade Center Medical Monitoring and Treatment Program. "Six years out from 9/11, the World Trade Center Program was still observing responders affected by asthma episodes and attacks at more than double the percentage of people not exposed to World Trade Center dust."
WTC Study Details
In the multi-center clinical study, researchers from the MSSM-coordinated WTC Program reported on health-related findings of 20,843 WTC responders who received an initial medical screening examination during the program's first 5-1/2 years of existence, from July 2002 through December 2007. Asthma outcomes assessed were the following: (1) prevalence of asthma episodes/attacks reported by responders to have occurred during the previous 12 months, and (2) lifetime asthma prevalence, as measured by participants reporting having ever been told by a physician that they had asthma. Results were compared with the US National Health Survey Interviews (NHIS) adult sample data for the year 2000 (pre-9/11) and years 2002 through 2007.
WTC Study Results