New York City has reached an agreement to give some information to a hospital studying the health of Sept. 11 first responders.
Some elected officials had called on the city to disclose information sought by Mount Sinai Medical Center ahead of a federal review. Officials will consider whether cancer should be added to the illnesses covered by the World Trade Center health bill named after police detective James Zadroga.
The city cited privacy restrictions when it declined the hospital’s November request for data on police officers including names and addresses.
Deputy Mayor for Operations Cas Holloway announced Wednesday that the city will share a list of names and birth years. It also will ask individuals with cancer for permission to share that, too.
“Following further conversations this morning between City officials and Mt. Sinai, the City will subject to a confidentiality agreement; shortly be disclosing to Mt. Sinai the names of the uniform and civilian members of the NYPD who participated in the recovery and clean-up operations following the 9/11 terrorist attacks,” said Holloway in a statement.
Since Federal and State laws prevent us from disclosing the names of those who have reported that they have cancer or other conditions without their permission, we are developing a process to ask all of those individuals if they will authorize the release of their names. We are committed to working with Mt. Sinai to share this information as quickly as possible,” the statement continued.
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