after all these are heros like our veterans. >> nbc chief science and health correspondent robert bazell joins me now. bob, we remember back when the epa was saying no worries, nothing is wrong with the air there and we all know what has happened since. finally these people are being compensated although there's still big health issues for those still ill. >> a lot of health issues, andrea. the idea that air and those of us who breathed it, the idea that air was somehow not unhealthful, was just a fantasy. it was terrible. it had every kind of pollution you could imagine in it, including just plain all kinds of metallic dust as well as toxins and the idea that it won't lead to cancer is just absurd. now it takes many years to prove that it will cause cancer because as we know from studies of smoking and other carcinogens it takes many years between the exposure and the cancer. there's no scientific proof yet