On July 23, I attended a screening of “Dust: The Lingering Legacy of 9/11″ at the 9/11 Museum. Though originally released in 2021, the award-winning documentary was recently picked up by Amazon. This special screening marked that milestone and the renewed the urgency of its message.

“Dust” confronts the ongoing health crisis caused by 9/11, one that still affects thousands 24 years later. Director Bridget Gormley created the film in memory of her father, Bill, a firefighter who died in 2017 from one of the 69 cancers now linked to Ground Zero toxins. The documentary exposes both the scope of this public health disaster and the survivors’ ongoing fight for recognition and care.

As a 30-year licensed NYC tour guide who regularly leads groups through the 9/11 Memorial, I was deeply drawn to the film. But after my own cancer diagnosis this March — also tied to 9/11 toxins — this story is no longer just professional. It’s personal.

On 9/11, my husband and I watched a plane hit the South Tower from our balcony, just six blocks from the World Trade Center. We ran to Battery Park, hoping for safety, only to be engulfed in debris as the towers fell. Hours later, we were rescued by boat and taken to safety in New Jersey.

Within days, officials declared the air “safe.” Ten days after the attacks, our landlord emailed us to return, saying our building was “fully operational.” Skeptical but desperate to reclaim normalcy, we moved back. Fires still burned below. Dust coated everything in our apartment, no matter how often we cleaned.

Years later, a flyer from Barasch & McGarry — an advocacy law firm representing survivors — arrived in our mailbox. At their seminar, I learned the truth: the air downtown was a toxic brew of jet fuel, asbestos, glass, concrete, electronics and other deadly particles. Exposure wasn’t limited to first responders. Residents, workers, students, and volunteers were also at risk. That event helped me connect the dots: the health crisis was real, ongoing, and far closer to home than I’d realized.

My husband and I were among 25,000 residents south of Canal St. Add to that 50,000 students and staff, 300,000 office workers, and 100,000 responders and volunteers. By 2019, deaths from 9/11-related illnesses had already surpassed those from the attacks. Today, more than 130,000 people live with certified conditions from WTC exposure — a number still climbing.

Actor and activist Jon Stewart was one of the speakers at the seminar who informed us that two funds are used to financially assist those who are sick: the Victim Compensation Fund (VCF) and the World Trade Center Health Program (WTCHP). At the time, I never imagined I’d need them. Until I did.

After troubling symptoms earlier this year, I was diagnosed with uterine cancer. The CDC officially recognized this cancer as 9/11-related in 2023 after years of research. I underwent a hysterectomy in March and bladder surgery in June. My care should qualify under WTCHP, but the program is now in crisis.

Though designed to last until 2090, the WTCHP was left out of the most recent federal budget and is running out of money. The situation worsened when the Trump administration announced cuts of 10,000 jobs at the Department of Health and Human Services, including deep reductions at the CDC’s National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH), which oversees the WTCHP. NIOSH was projected to lose two-thirds of its staff, threatening not only funding but also basic program operations.

“This is a national emergency,” attorney Michael Barasch warns in “Dust.” “Cancer isn’t going to magically stop.” Stewart is even blunter: “It’s as if they’re getting penalized for getting cancer later than other people.”

For me, this fight has become urgent and real. Health benefits must remain accessible to every survivor who qualifies.

In the documentary, several Lower Manhattan residents said they chose to remain and rebuild because leaving would mean the terrorists won. Even Mayor Mike Bloomberg echoed that sentiment, praising those who refused to “abandon their communities.” My husband and I said the same and stayed. But now, that defiance has come to feel far more complicated.

9/11 didn’t end when the towers fell. It lives on in the bodies of those who were there: responders, residents, workers, students, volunteers. People like me.

If “Never Forget” is to mean anything, it must include remembering the ongoing cost, and fulfilling the promise to care for those still living with its aftermath.

Ray Stanton is the author of “Out of the Shadow of 9/11.”