Mountaintop Removal Linked to Health Hazards Again

It’s been pretty well established that mountaintop removal is bad for the health of the folks who live around the mines. Mountaintop mining kicks up a lot of dust, and many of the ailments that afflict those who live close to the mines is directly related to inhaling coal dust or silica associated with the mines.

            Well, it turns out that recent research indicates that the ultrafine dust from the mines can make people sick, too. This is dust so small that you cannot see it. It is so small that it can pass through the incredibly small holes in the cell walls of living tissue. Once the dust enters the cell through the cell wall, inflammation occurs, and inflammation can lead to a number of ailments.

            Lab research backs this up. In one case, rats exposed to dust composed of titanium oxide, the white pigment in paint, suffered no ill effect. If the titanium oxide dust was very, very small, the rats died.

This mine can make you very sick.

If these particles are so small they can pass through the pores of cells, they are too small to be stopped by dust masks or other prophylactic devices. On the other hand, getting rid of these ultrafine dust particles in Appalachia is pretty simple. End mountaintop removal.

The Casualties In Coal's War on Us.

Rand Paul is keeping the “war on coal” meme alive. Meanwhile, increased use of coal in northern China is robbing millions of their lives. On average northern Chinese residents lifespan has been shortened by five and a half years, due to breathing the particulate laden air of that region.

            Published Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the study focused on deaths during the 1990s that were caused by heart disease, stroke, lung cancer, and respiratory illnesses.  The study compared deaths from these illnesses south of the Huai River with similar data north of the river, where the Chinese government has been providing residents with free coal since the 1950s.

            Despite Rand Paul, who once dismissed concern over mountaintop removal as “missing a few hills here and there,” it seems that our use of coal extracts a heavy price. Men die in coal mining accidents, where they also risk getting black lung disease, which has been increasing in recent years. A geography of increased disease and death encircles mountaintop removal mines, and the heartland of this country is hot and possibly going dry from global warming, caused by our throwing tons of CO2 in the air, most of which comes from coal.

            Maybe somebody should tell Rand Paul that it looks like coal has a war on us.

Hendryx leaving WVU, but research will continue

Hendryx leaving WVU, but research will continue

This just in from Ken Ward's Coal Tattoo blog: Dr. Michael Hendryx is leaving West Virginia University for a new position at Indiana University. Hendryx is presently the Director of the West Virginia Rural Health Research Center and Founding Chair of the Department of Health Policy Management and Leadership in the School of Public Health at WVU. The move, he says, is prompted by his wife getting a great job offer.
          Although mountaintop removal had been a mining practice since at least the eighties, no scientific studies had been performed on its health effects until 2007, when Dr. Hendryx published a study on hospitalization patterns among residents of coal country. A health expert with dozens of other peer reviewed scientific papers published, Hendryx has gone on to produce a number of other studies on the health consequences of large-scale surface mining. The findings of his work are staggering and scary. One study of mountaintop removal published last year found that folks who live close to mountaintop removal mines have cancer rates that are twice that of their fellow Appalachians who do not live close to these mines.
          Hendryx says that his work will continue. Let us hope so.

No Heavy Metals For Kentucky's Public Drinking Water

This is from the Kentucky Division of Water. A study that looked at 12 years of data of Kentucky’s drinking water found that the drinking water was safe from heavy metal pollutants, even in the counties where there is a lot of coal mining.

            Using data from the National Cancer Institute, the study compared counties where coal production has been high with counties where coal production has been low and found no significant difference in cancer rates, although the study did find that cancer rates were higher in the eastern Appalachian mountains of the state.

            Other recent scientific studies have found high rates of cancer, birth defects, and other ailments afflicting those who live among mountaintop removal mines. These studies were peer reviewed. The study from the Kentucky Division of Water has yet to receive peer review. Also, the study only considered public drinking water and not well water. It is water drawn from wells that is usually fouled by mountaintop mining. And, as well, cancer rates were compared between counties of high and low coal production. Including counties where there is no coal production, a control group, was not included.

            Even still, I’d be interested to know more about some of this research and what might be concluded after this study receives peer review.

Judas Priest, heavy metal you might want photo: last.fm 

A coal ash spill, heavy metals you probably don't want photo: celcias.com

Appalachians: Should They Be Treated Like Americans?

The Sierra Club, along with Kentuckians for the Commonwealth and the Ohio Valley Environmental Coalition, are suing to have the approvals for mountaintop removal mines in Kentucky and West Virginia reversed

            The groups contend that the Army Corps of Engineers did not consider the detrimental effects the mining would have on the health of the local residents. By law health concerns are part of the permitting process.

            There is growing evidence that there is nothing healthy about living near a mountaintop mine. Health investigations have found learning disabilities, kidney stones, tooth loss, diarrhea, rash, and some forms of cancer in individuals living close to Mountaintop mines.[i] Mountaintop removal has also been associated with birth defects of the circulatory, respiratory, central nervous musculoskeletal, gastrointestinal, and urogenital systems.[ii] And people who live around this destructive mining practice also experience extreme psychological stress.[iii]

            Considering that the people of Appalachia are our fellow Americans, how much of a stretch is it to think that they should be safeguarded by the same laws that keep the rest of us safe and healthy?

---

[i] Holzman, David C. “Mountaintop Removal Mining.” Environmental Health Perspectives Vol. 119, Issue 11 November 1, 2011 electronic journal

[ii] Ahearn, Melissa M. et at. “The association between mountaintop mining and birth defects among live births in central Appalachia, 1996–2003.” Environmental Research Vol. 111 Issue 6. Aug 2011, p 838-846 electronic journal

[iii] Paige Cordial, Ruth Riding-Malon, and Hilary Lips. Ecopsychology. Vol.4, Issue 3, September 2012, 201-208. electronic journal

H.R. 5959 The Appalachian Communities Health Emergency Act: Common Sense From Dennis Kucinich

Thank goodness for Dennis Kucinich. He has introduced to Congress the Appalachian Communities Health Emergency Act. It is heartening to know that there are members of Congress who are trying to help people and that there are 13 cosponsors for this bill.

            The Appalachian Communities Health Emergency Act (H.R. 5959) simply makes the commonsensical requirement that before more West Virginia, Virginia, Tennessee, and Kentucky mountaintops are blown apart for their coal, the health implications of the residents around those mines need to be understood.

We currently do not have a comprehensive understanding of the health effects of mountaintop removal. Only ten investigators study the relationship between this type of mining and public health.[i]
There is nonetheless reason for concern. Recent evidence points to mountaintop mining as the root of many health problems for the residents of Appalachia. Among the recent investigations were a toxicologist and an associate professor in the department of Community Medicine at West Virginia University who found learning disabilities, kidney stones, tooth loss, diarrhea, rash, and some forms of cancer in individuals living close to MTR operations.[ii] Using GIS mapping techniques, a team of health professionals and geographers found higher rates of circulatory, respiratory, central nervous system, musculoskeletal, gastrointestinal, and urogenital birth defects in areas close to mountaintop removal.[iii]

            Kucinich’s bill would require a detailed review of these, and possibly other, health risks to be conducted by the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, which is part of the Department of Health and Human Services. Mountaintop removal would be suspended until the research is completed. If the research finds no health risks, then mountaintop mining could resume.

            As I said before, this is commonsensical. The FDA requires that new drugs be proven safe before doctors can prescribe them. And product safety is part of the process of other consumer goods hitting the market. Shouldn’t we do the same for the people who live around the mountaintop mines?

---

[i] Holzman, David C. “Mountaintop Removal Mining.” Environmental Health Perspectives Vol. 119, Issue 11 11/1/2011 electronic journal

[ii] ibid

[iii] Ahearn, Melissa M. et at. “The association between mountaintop mining and birth defects among live births in central Appalachia, 1996–2003.” Environmental Research Vol. 111 Issue 6. Aug 2011, p 838-846 electronic journal