Sept. 02--NEW YORK -- US firefighters who first reached the World Trade Center, which was attacked by terrorists a decade ago, are 19 per cent more likely to have cancer than those not exposed to cancer-causing materials at the site, the medical journal The Lancet reported Friday.
The Lancet's special issue on the September 11, 2001 attacks showed that a higher proportion of male firefighters at Ground Zero, 263 cases, have been diagnosed with cancer compared with 238 cases expected in the general New York population.
For rescuers who were not directly exposed at Ground Zero, there have been 135 diagnosed cases compared with 161 expected in the general population, the study said.
All 9,853 firefighters involved in the study had good health records during periods well before 9/11.
David Prezant, the chief medical officer of the New York Fire Department and physician colleagues at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine of Yeshiva University and Montefiore Medical Center in New York took part in the study.
The study focused on cancer incidences and potential links seven years after the attacks.
Hundreds of firefighters were the first to reach the site after the 110-storey twin towers of the World Trade Center were hit by two terrorist-hijacked commercial airplanes. More than 2,700 people were killed -- among them were 360 firefighters.
Prezant said in revealing the findings of the study that cancer was "biologically plausible" with the first responders. Health officials in New York have since 2001 not admitted the link to cancer for those working at Ground Zero, saying that it would take decades to prove.
"This is not an epidemic, but an increased risk (of cancer)," Prezant said. He said firefighters who reached Ground Zero when the towers were burning, should screen for tumors and take part in cancer monitoring programmes.
The twin towers, built in the early 1970s, were known for use of cancer-causing asbestos, a material widely used in construction in the past.
The study said cancer types related to Ground Zero include prostrate, melanoma, colon, non-Hodgkin lymphoma and lung.
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