New York, NY – Retired Lt. Joe Sesack discovered stage four pancreatic cancer during donor screening, underscoring the health risks fire fighters still face from Ground Zero exposure.
When New York Uniformed Fire Officers Association (UFOA) Local 854’s Joe Sesack volunteered to donate a kidney, he thought it would be a simple act of service to a longtime friend. Instead, the decision led to a life-changing diagnosis. During screening at NYU Langone Health, doctors found something unexpected: cancer.
“Lo and behold, I have a mass on my pancreas,” the retired FDNY lieutenant said. “I’ve been diagnosed with stage four pancreatic metastasized cancer, and that has also spread to my liver.”
Sesack retired in 2019 after nearly three decades of service with the FDNY. He served as a lieutenant with Ladder Company 133 in Queens and responded to the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. He also took part in recovery efforts at Ground Zero following the Sept. 11 attacks.
“There’s just a cloud of dust everywhere. Even though the politicians went on TV and told us that the air was safe to breathe, we all knew it wasn’t,” said Sesack. “This is a World Trade Center 9/11 cancer diagnosis for me. And it was absolutely 100% related to that.”
A recent news report shows that 48,579 first responders and others have been diagnosed with cancers linked to Sept. 11. It’s a 143% increase over the past five years, based on the latest figures from the World Trade Center Health Program. Many of those cases are in responders now in their late 50s and 60s.
There’s a lot of sick people on this job from their exposure to 9/11,” said Sesack. “Everybody needs to realize you need to go get yourself checked.”
