The Deepwater Horizon oil spill happened almost ten years ago. The environmental, health, and economic impacts of the spill continue, ling after the disaster first occurred. Recently, a new batch of lawsuits was filed following a court ruling that excludes thousands of people from a medical settlement that was negotiated after the oil spill.
The court ruling, if allowed to stand, could create clogged court dockets and extra-long wait times for plaintiffs who say they have suffered long enough. Some Gulf area residents and oil spill cleanup and rescue workers who breathed in large amounts of toxic fumes from the oil spill suffered respiratory illnesses, and some even developed lung damage. The people whose health was damaged by the BP oil spill are becoming increasingly frustrated that they are not yet able to recover financially for the injuries they have experienced.
The medical claims were consolidated with economic and environmental lawsuits in federal court. U.S. District Judge Carl Barbier in New Orleans has been presiding over the oil spill lawsuit. He recently issued a ruling that limits access to a medical claims compensation fund created during the oil spill litigation to plaintiffs who had been diagnosed by a doctor with an oil-spill-related injury or illness before April 16, 2012. That ruling could prevent anyone diagnosed after that time from receiving for their illness or injury. Some of the individuals with later diagnoses say that the ruling is not fair because cancer and other severe health conditions caused by bp oil spill take longer to diagnose than more acute injuries and illnesses.
Illnesses like bronchitis and sinusitis have both acute and chronic forms and plaintiffs who were diagnosed after the cutoff date claim that the court’s ruling fails to account for the varied nature of illnesses and injuries caused by the spill. Some of the injured individuals are people who worked in the cleanup programs after the spill. They say they did not realize that they could get so sick from the work they were doing. The cases of plaintiffs shut out of the settlement are being transferred to federal courts according to where the plaintiffs reside. BP is defending itself against those claims, stating that it did not cause the plaintiffs’ injuries. Fortunately, long-term health research projects have been following the effects of the oil spill on Gulf residents. The results of that research from the National Institute of Environmental Health and other organizations may be helpful to plaintiffs who are trying to prove that the oil spill caused their illnesses.
The road to recovery had been fraught with roadblocks for many injured by the BP oil spill. Whether the damage was economic, health-related, or environmental, those harmed by the BP oil spill have had to fight for their recovery every step of the way. To learn more about BP oil spill litigation, call the Mississippi BP Oil Spill Attorneys at Barrett Law PLLC at 1 (601) 790-1505, to arrange an initial consultation.
