BUFFALO, N.Y. — The significant risk of exposure to carcinogens for Buffalo firefighters may be reduced in part through new state funding for heavy duty laundry equipment to thoroughly wash out their turnout coats and other gear they may wear to battle a fire.
New York State Senator Sean Ryan announced that $190,000 will be used to pay for the purchase and installation of the extractors, washers, dryers, and storage racks for such gear at the Buffalo Fire Department Service Station. Deputy Fire Commissioner Ron Barrett says "This stuff washes basically our pants and our jackets. The new equipment that's coming will do everything as far as our masks, our tanks, our cylinders, our harnesses. Anything - even fire axes that we can decontaminate from the fire scene."
The National Fire Protection Association reports that the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) recently undertook two large studies focused on firefighter cancer and concluded that firefighters face a 9 percent increase in cancer diagnoses, and a 14 percent increase in cancer-related deaths, compared to the general population in the U.S. They have set up a nationwide registry to educate firefighters on the topic and better share information.
That may be due to elements they encounter while battling the fire including chemicals, certain heavy metals, and other substances which can contaminate what they are wearing or what they actually come into contact with. They do try to limit exposure in some ways after fires according to Battalion Chief Scott Heywood "We start at the scene with de-conning firefighters. Rinsing them off, scrubbing them off to remove the big particulates. We have wipes on scene and once they go back they're encouraged to shower within the hour, change their gear into clean gear."
The Buffalo Professional Firefighters Local 282 has worked with the Buffalo Fire Department and Roswell Park Cancer Center to set up a Cancer Prevention Committee to seek to reduce the exposure risks. Union President Chris Whelan says "We've had an amazing participation in this committee and it has directly lead to this moment where right now with these extractors we're gonna save lives. There's no other way to put it."
Buffalo Fire Department Deputy Commissioner Ron Barrett says since 2002 there have been 16 firefighters from the BFD who have been diagnosed and passed away from some form of cancer.
Mary Reid who is Chief of Cancer Screening and Survivorship at Roswell Park Comprehensive Cancer Center says that they have seen firefighters suffering from cancers of the bladder, colon, kidneys, and skin along with female firefighters facing a greater risk of breast cancer. Reid says "We know that firefighters have a six percent increase in cancer over the general public. We know that female firefighters have eight times more breast cancer."
RELATED VIDEO: