Leukemia in railroad workers

Benzene is a colorless or pale-yellow liquid chemical that comes mostly from crude oil. It serves as a solvent, meaning a liquid that dissolves other things, and it turns up in gasoline as well as vehicle exhaust. It can also show up in products like glues, cleaners, paints, and paint removers.

Breathing it in is the main way people absorb benzene. People who work where benzene is made or used usually breathe in the most of it, and that matters because benzene can cause leukemia and can also harm the blood in other ways.

Researchers have looked at on-the-job exposure to diesel, gasoline, and other solvents as a potential cause of AML. According to the American Cancer Society, research has not proven a connection between these factors and AML, even though long-term benzene exposure is an accepted risk. Heavy workplace exposure to formaldehyde has also been tied to AML in some studies.

AML stands for acute myeloid leukemia, a cancer affecting the blood and bone marrow. Known risks include breathing benzene over many years, some other chemicals, intense radiation, and smoking. The disease grows more common as people get older and occurs slightly more often in men.

Chronic lymphocytic leukemia, called CLL, has very few known risk factors. People are typically about 70 years old when diagnosed. Farm work and years of exposure to some pesticides and chemicals might be connected to CLL, though confirming that takes more research.

State workers' compensation does not cover railroad employees. Instead, FELA, the Federal Employers' Liability Act, is the law that lets them seek compensation from the railroad.

FELA requires the railroad to pay if an injury or death comes about in whole or in part because of its negligence. Negligence is when the railroad did not use the care it owed, for example by failing to shield workers from a hazard it knew about. The Supreme Court has ruled that FELA reaches illnesses that come out of the job, not just accidents.

Under FELA, the railroad's negligence need only have played a small part in causing the illness, but the worker still needs evidence of that connection. A jury hears the case whenever the railroad's negligence contributed any part, even the slightest, to the illness. A worker also is not considered to have taken on the risks of the job when railroad negligence helped bring about the harm.

There is a three-year window to start a FELA case, and it may be brought in federal or state court. When a disease takes a long time to develop, the three years begin once the effects of the exposure show themselves, rather than when the exposure itself occurred.

That clock can quietly expire. A car inspector in a 2026 New Jersey case learned in May 2014 from his doctor that the bladder cancer he had was connected to what he had breathed at work. He filed suit in April 2019, and the court threw out the claims based on the cancer as it stood in 2014.

If the worker has passed away, the personal representative of the estate holds the claim. It is brought on behalf of the worker's surviving spouse and children.

One worker died following 38 years at Norfolk Southern. Testimony revealed that workers got respirator training but never actually received respirators during diesel exhaust work. Even as research showed the fumes caused cancer, the company was telling employees something different.