by MARTIN C. EVANS
WASHINGTON - In testimony before Congress, the Bloomberg administration announced its support yesterday for a 9/11 health bill that would require the federal government to pay for health care for first responders and other environmental victims of the attack that crumbled the World Trade Center.
Deputy Mayor Edward Skyler said the federal government should help pay the cost of treating illnesses associated with the attack, which he said exposed some 400,000 area residents, Manhattan visitors and disaster first responders to environmental hazards and emotional trauma.
"In sum, the James Zadroga Act represents a vital lifeline to the men and women who risked everything and helped lift our nation back onto its feet during our time of greatest need," he said.
The bill was named after a New York City police detective who died at 34 of a respiratory disease he apparently contracted after helping with rescue operations at Ground Zero.
It would reauthorize the Victim Compensation Fund, which paid out $7 billion to nearly 3,000 9/11 victims or their relatives. The fund closed in 2003, before many victims realized they had health problems.
The legislation, whose backers include New York City Reps. Carolyn Maloney (D), Jerrold Nadler (D) and Vito Fossella (R), represents a new consensus among New York's congressional delegation, which had split over rival bills that differed in some provisions.
But the ranking Republican on the Energy and Commerce Health subcommittee, Georgia's Nathan Deal, expressed concern that the bill could stick taxpayers with runaway health costs.
New York City will spend some $27 million for 9/11 health-related programs in the current fiscal year, according to the mayor's office, and has committed another $100 million through fiscal 2011.
The Bloomberg administration has estimated that the nation spends $393 million per year in medical bills related to the 9/11 attack, but declined to estimate how much the legislation would cost in new federal spending.
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