'Tremendously historic day': Firefighter says Manitoba led the world to acknowledge cancer risk
After working for more than two decades, Manitoba firefighters say the world's governing body on cancer research and prevention is finally acknowledging firefighters' cancer risk.
The Manitoba Professional Firefighters Association announced on Thursday that the World Health Organization's International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) is raising the cancer risk classification for firefighting from a 2B classification to the highest danger classification as Class 1.
This classification means firefighting is now acknowledged as a cancer risk equal to tobacco smoke, asbestos and benzene.
"This is a tremendously historic day for firefighters," Alex Forrest, a captain with Winnipeg Fire Paramedic Service and president of the Manitoba Professional Firefighters Association, told CTV News.
"It is going to be a watershed moment for firefighting not only in Canada, but around the world because this will create a greater need for governments around the world to look at this danger that is killing firefighters."
Forrest said firefighters have always known their occupation is dangerous – they are exposed to high levels of carcinogens when working to extinguish fires, which puts them at a much greater risk of cancer.
He said this announcement forces the world to acknowledge that.
"What this is going to do is it finally makes the world admit that there is a problem for firefighters exposing themselves to cancer-causing agents and you can't solve that problem until you admit there's a problem," he said.
Forrest, who is also the Canadian trustee for the International Association of Firefighters, has been advocating for this for 25 years. He said this classification will open the door to improve safety for firefighters by increasing prevention and compensation and putting more money into firefighting technologies.
MANITOBA LED THE WORLD, FORREST SAYS
"All Manitobans should be proud," said Forrest, adding he believes Thursday's announcement is due to the work done in Manitoba over the past 25 years. He said back in 1997, Winnipeg firefighters became the first firefighting organization to acknowledge the connection to occupational cancer.
In 2002, Manitoba became the first province in Canada to have a firefighter presumption including brain and kidney cancer, non-Hodgkin's lymphoma and leukemia. In the years since, the province has continued to grow the list of occupational cancers, which now includes 19 different cancers, Forrest said.
He said other provinces in Canada and countries including Australia and New Zealand have used Manitoba's legislation as a model.
"Every citizen of Manitoba and the firefighters in Manitoba should be extremely proud that they've led the world when it comes to occupational cancer," he said. "The work that we have done in Manitoba will likely save thousands of lives around the world in the coming decades."
As for why it took so long for occupational cancers to be acknowledged on a global scale – Forrest pointed to tobacco as an example.
"For 35 years, doctors knew that tobacco had a direct correlation with cancer," he said. "It took 35 years for science to acknowledge that – 35 years to acknowledge what many people now see as common sense."
Forrest said this classification is just the first step as now more studies and research will need to be done. He said it will likely be at least a generation of firefighters before new technologies and prevention can be developed to decrease the level of cancer firefighters are exposed to.
"This is just the beginning in some ways," he said.
CTV News has reached out to IARC for more information.
CTVNews.ca Top Stories
'My family doctor just fired me': Ontario patients frustrated with de-rostering
Dozens of Ontarians are expressing frustration in the province’s health-care system after their family doctors either dropped them as patients or threatened to after they sought urgent care elsewhere.
Canada Post cracks down on Nunavut loophole to get free Amazon Prime shipping
Amazon's paid subscription service provides free delivery for online shopping across Canada except for remote locations, the company said in an email. While customers in Iqaluit qualify for the offer, all other communities in Nunavut are excluded.
An apartment block collapses in a Russian border city after heavy shelling, injuring over a dozen
An apartment block partially collapsed in the Russian border city of Belgorod on Sunday, leaving at least 19 injured. Officials blamed Ukrainian shelling and said there were also likely deaths.
'It was violent': Police tear down U of A pro-Palestinian encampment Saturday morning
Multiple people at the protest camp torn down at the University of Alberta campus Saturday say police's actions against protesters were "violent" and "disproportionate."
Michael Cohen: A challenging star witness in Donald Trump's hush money trial
He once said he would take a bullet for Donald Trump. Now Michael Cohen is prosecutors' biggest piece of legal ammunition in the former president's hush money trial.
Swiss fans get ready to welcome Eurovision winner Nemo back home
Swiss Eurovision fans were getting ready Sunday to give a hero's welcome to singer Nemo, who won the 68th Eurovision Song Contest with "The Code," an operatic pop-rap ode to the singer’s journey toward embracing a nongender identity.
Millions of Canadians have been exposed to potentially toxic chemicals, and they're not going anywhere
For decades, North Bay, Ontario's water supply has harboured chemicals associated with liver and developmental issues, cancer and complications with pregnancy. It's far from the only city with that problem.
Adopted daughter in the Netherlands reunited with sister in Montreal and mother in Colombia, 40 years later
Two daughters and a mother were reunited online 40 years later thanks to a DNA kit and a Zoom connection despite living on three separate continents and speaking different languages.
As Israel pushes deeper into Rafah, Hamas regroups elsewhere in ungoverned Gaza
Israeli forces were battling Palestinian militants across the Gaza Strip on Sunday, including in parts of the devastated north that the military said it had cleared months ago, where Hamas has exploited a security vacuum to regroup.