Energy Dept. Rule Eases Claims Process for Nuclear Workers

WASHINGTON â€”  Under pressure from Congress, the Bush administration has decided to reverse policy and quit fighting illness compensation claims from Cold War-era nuclear weapon workers who were exposed to toxic chemicals.

Final Energy Department regulations expected to be issued today instruct contractors not to contest medical panels’ findings that workers’ illnesses are related to job exposure.

The new rules reverse a decades-old policy and differ from a draft proposal circulated earlier this year that allowed contractors to contest such findings, and even said the Energy Department would help pay for appeals.

Lawmakers from states with nuclear weapon plants said the administration’s original proposal ran counter to the intent of a bill Congress passed two years ago.

“It appears that DOE has addressed the major concerns that were raised about the draft rule last spring,� said Sen. Fred Thompson (R-Tenn.).

Thompson added that more workers now could be compensated.

Richard Miller, a policy analyst with the Government Accountability Project, a Washington watchdog group, said Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham “overrode his own staff and really deserves some credit for reversing some of the flaws in the previous rule.�

The rule is aimed at helping thousands of workers across the country who were exposed to toxic substances at Energy Department facilities run by government contractors.

Those workers were not included in a year-old federal program that provides medical care and $150,000 each to weapon plant workers made ill by exposure to radiation or silica and beryllium, which cause lung diseases.

Instead, Congress told the Energy Department to help such workers file claims under state workers’ compensation systems.

“This rule is directed at ensuring that DOE assists as many of those contractor employees, who may have been exposed to toxic substances while working at DOE facilities, as possible in obtaining the state workers’ compensation benefits they deserve,� Abraham said.

Uniform Guidelines

Under the new rule, the Energy Department will establish a uniform standard for physicians to consider when determining what made a worker sick.

“A single causation standard rather than 50 different state standards is a major help,� said Sen. George Voinovich (R-Ohio).

Lawmakers also praised the uniform standard for being generous rather than restrictive. It says a claimant should be reimbursed if exposure to a toxic substance on the job was “a significant factor in aggravating, contributing to or causing the worker’s illness or death.�

The new regulations also provide that only a majority vote is needed to find in favor of a claimant; that change compares to a unanimous vote required under the old policy.

The potential cost of claims is in the hundreds of millions of dollars.

Many weapon plant contractors are self-insured and are reimbursed by the Energy Department for workers’ compensation costs.