🌅 Compensating the Nuclear “Downwinders”

SOURCE

Congress.gov

WHAT TO KNOW

• People exposed to fallout from nuclear testing in New Mexico and Nevada during the mid-1940s through the early 1960s and subsequently developed certain types of cancers may be eligible for a one-time, lump sum payment of $100,000 under the recently renewed Radiation Exposure Compensation Act (RECA). The federal law grants payments to qualifying claimants who lived in Idaho, New Mexico, Utah, and some parts of Arizona and Nevada from January 1951 through November 1962. If the qualifying individual has died, their surviving spouse, children, or grandchildren can make a claim on their behalf. All claims must be filed by December 31, 2027.

WHY IT MATTERS

• From the mid-1940s through the early 1960s, the U.S. government detonated nearly 200 nuclear bombs at the famed Trinity Test Site in New Mexico and the Nevada Test Site about 65 miles north of Las Vegas, exposing people living in downwind areas to varying levels of radioactive fallout. In the 1990s, Congress passed RECA for “downwinders” in designated areas who developed cancers potentially related to exposure to the fallout. The act, which was updated in 2000 and extended in 2022, is one of the most awarded civil compensation programs in the U.S., distributing more than $2.6 billion to downwinders and workers at nuclear sites since it was enacted.

CONNECT THE DOTS

• Earlier this month, the New Start treaty between the U.S. and Russia expired, removing the last remaining mutual limit on the world’s two largest nuclear arsenals. Trump administration officials think the lapse of the treaty presents the possibility of striking a new agreement that includes China, which has massively expanded its nuclear arsenal in recent years (though still lags far behind the inventories maintained by Russia and the U.S.). However, Beijing has so far refused to engage in negotiations and has not indicated how much it will expand its nuclear stockpile in the future.