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More died afterward than that day
Who was affected
The harm arrived years later and reached well beyond the Trade Center site. It fell on the people who rushed to respond, the residents nearby who breathed the toxic dust, and the people who helped at the Pentagon and at Flight 93 in Shanksville, Pennsylvania.
The numbers
At least 400,000 people were in the area, and about 63,000 have been diagnosed with cancers. Multiply that by their families and the effects reach millions of people. Eric Shawn, a Fox News reporter who spent weeks broadcasting from the site in the dust, is among those enrolled in the World Trade Center Health Program.
What the museum adds
These losses were not visible when the 9/11 Museum was built. Its curators have kept adding stories and artifacts since, including the long-term consequences for the people who responded in New York's darkest hour.
Why do cancers appear years after exposure?
Cancer develops as damage accumulates in a cell's DNA, and that process often takes years or decades to produce a tumor that can be detected. The delay is called the latency period, and it differs by cancer type, with some blood cancers appearing sooner than solid tumors. The US Geological Survey found that the settled dust from the collapse was highly alkaline and made largely of pulverized cement, glass fibers, and other building materials.
How do researchers track illness in so many people?
The World Trade Center Health Registry, launched in 2003 by New York City's health department and a federal agency for toxic substances, enrolled more than 71,000 rescue workers, residents, and others. Enrollees answer repeated surveys over the years, so researchers can compare illness rates among groups with different levels of exposure. Congress created the federal World Trade Center Health Program through the Zadroga Act, signed in January 2011. The law is named for James Zadroga, a New York police detective who died in 2006 of a respiratory disease.
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