October 15 - Too Little, Too Late for Radiation Sickness

Labor History in 2:00 · Oct 15, 2026 · 1m

On this day in Labor History the year was 1990.

That was the day that President George H. W. Bush signed the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act.

Worker safety at the Nevada Nuclear Test Site had been sacrificed during the Cold War era, as the United States rushed to keep pace with the Soviet Union’s nuclear arsenal.

The result was an increase in cancers including leukemia from workers being exposed to deadly radiation.

For more than a decade these workers tried to get congress to pass legislation for compensation for radiation sickness.

Uranium miners from states including Nevada, Utah…