Former Uranium Plant Workers Reportedly Not Compensated for Illness

Friday, February 26, 2016 | 0

Former employees of a uranium processing plant in Ohio say they’ve been sickened by the radiation exposure at their workplace, and the U.S. government is denying their claims for compensation.

The Portsmouth Gaseous Diffusion Plant produced weapons-grade uranium for the U.S. military.

The Portsmouth Gaseous Diffusion Plant, south of Piketon, which opened in 1954, produced weapons-grade uranium for the U.S. military. The plant stopped operating in 2001 and is now being decommissioned.

Former plant employees say they have become sick from working there, including several workers with an aggressive form of prostate cancer. But the Department of Energy won’t look into the matter and has denied many of their claims, Al Jazeera America reported.

DOE set up a program known as dose reconstruction for determining whether an employee qualified for workers’ compensation. But the program overlooks certain key data, sources told Al Jazeera.

David Manuta, the uranium plant’s former chief scientist, is reportedly preparing to sue the government over the allegedly flawed dose reconstruction simulation.

A Department of Energy spokesman didn’t respond to Al Jazeera’s request for comment.