WHEREAS, Cancer is the leading cause of death among firefighters in the United States. California’s firefighters are exposed to many known and suspected human carcinogens in the line of duty; and

WHEREAS, Recent studies from the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) confirm an increased risk of cancer in firefighters, including a 14-percent higher risk of dying from cancer than the general United States population, a twofold increase in both the incidence and mortality of firefighters diagnosed with mesothelioma, and a tenfold increase in the incidents of bladder cancer among women in the fire service; and

WHEREAS, A NIOSH case-control study of California firefighters found significant increases of melanoma, adenocarcinoma of the esophagus, multiple myeloma, acute myeloid leukemia, and prostate, brain, and kidney cancer; and

WHEREAS, In 1982, when the death of two Los Angeles County firefighters from the same extremely rare form of cancer brought home the connection between firefighting and cancer, the state passed AB 3011, the nation’s first firefighter cancer presumption law, to secure workers’ compensation protection for firefighter cancer; and

WHEREAS, In 1985, California Professional Firefighters’ Personal Exposure Reporting was established to offer an easy, secure, and comprehensive method for firefighters to record exposures to cancer-causing chemicals and biological toxins and has been a secure lockbox for more than 100,000 exposure reports. These reports provide critical documentation needed in workers’ compensation cases involving job-related illnesses and in medical diagnoses for those illnesses; and

WHEREAS, In June 2022, the International Agency for Research on Cancer classified occupational exposure from being a firefighter as a Group 1 known human carcinogen; and

WHEREAS, The Office of Emergency Services, the Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, and the Office of the State Fire Marshall jointly administer the FIRESCOPE Program, which represents the unified voice of the fire service in California. In August 2022, FIRESCOPE established the Cancer Prevention Subcommittee within the program; and

WHEREAS, In 2023, the Legislature passed and the Governor signed AB 700, which established the California Firefighter Cancer Prevention and Research Program administered by the University of California and FIRESCOPE to award grants for community-based participatory research examining biomarkers of carcinogenic exposure and effect in order to identify the biological mechanisms that cause cancer in firefighters and to reduce the incidence of cancer among California firefighters; and

WHEREAS, In 2024, the University of California announced eight awards, totaling nearly $6,000,000, and research is currently underway; and

WHEREAS, California must continue to bolster efforts to reduce cancer risk, strengthen early cancer detection, and ensure world-class cancer treatment is available to firefighters; now, therefore, be it