As director of the New River Health Association Black Lung Clinic, Emery’s seen guys as young as 45 getting double lung transplants as disease rates soar among miners forced to dig through more rock filled with deadly silica to reach the remaining coal — far worse than the dust their grandfathers inhaled.
A rule approved last year by the U.S. Mine Safety and Health Administration would cut the federal limit for allowable respirable crystalline silica dust exposure by half to help protect miners of all types nationwide from the current driving force of black lung and other illnesses.
But, now, it’s in jeopardy amid other Trump administration cutbacks and proposals targeting workers’ health and safety guardrails: Stuck in a politically charged environment that promotes industry, with lawmakers arguing to change it and the federal agency that wrote the rule not pushing to enforce it. Some angry retired miners with black lung are fighting back, demanding that Donald Trump honor promises he made to the people who voted him in.
I guess black-lung county voted to die. May they have the day they voted for.
On a somewhat related note, people may know that Pittsburgh is one of the top places in the US for medical research and treatment. It’s the home of Carnegie Mellon University, the University of Pittsburgh, and many others. It has “the second-most hospitals and second-most doctors per capita of any in the nation”.
But why would the “Steel City” have such good medical care? It turns out that for a while, steel worker unions were really powerful, and one of the main benefits the unions fought for was good health care for their members. Now the steel industry is long gone, but what remains is a great medical system that was essentially founded by those unions.
Moral of the story? If you’re a worker in a dirty, dangerous industry, you can either vote for someone like Trump who will gut your healthcare and strip you of government protections, or you can form a union and get the protection you deserve.
They should complain to dear leader
You can’t always get what you want but if you vote MAGA, you’ll get what you deserve.
Who could have ever seen it coming
Awww, such a shame.
They’re getting what they voted for (no sarcasm)
It can be a little sarcastic.
Some angry retired miners with black lung are fighting back, demanding that Donald Trump honor promises he made to the people who voted him in.
This is the epitome of the leopard meme. Still, I can’t help but feel sad - even for the misguided idiots that brought this harm into the world.
I can’t bring myself to feel bad for these people anymore. They’ve had countless times to realize how they were being taken advantage of but they never did. They have a mountain of evidence so big it makes Olympus Mons look like an anthill. And these people willingly voted to harm others, to dehumanize others, to abuse others. So I can’t even feel bad for them given what they’ve done.
Trump doesn’t care about them and their black lung. If the lung would be white, that would be another thing, but black? Never! 🙄
Some angry retired miners with black lung are fighting back, demanding that Donald Trump honor promises he made to the people who voted him in.
“You are infected with the WOKE AGENDA! Only weak get the BLACK lung and use it as an EXCUSE. Everybody’s saying it. We will MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN and remove the WOKE MIND VIRUS (which is also apparently invading lungs). THANK YOU YOUR ATTENTION TO THIS MATTER!”
The worst part is, we can generate electricity without giving people black lung. Just a waste.
Yes but without beautiful clean coal America would become a communist state. That’s what our dear leader told us anyway.
It proves you have humanity.
Can’t sidestep the fact that heritage foundation and associates basically bought all rural media and pushed their manipulative agenda out pretty much with nobody blinking an eye.
It’s terrible that Trump is going all in on coal and oil while also cutting back on the regulations that keep these people safe. At least they’re not working on windmill farms that are really hazardous to their health though. /s
Someone should tell these guys that we know their guy won the election, they can stop bragging about it.
Be COMPASSIONATE to these People! They thought Trump would ONLY Harm Gays and Brownies and NOT them! An HONEST MISTAKE!
The leopards are eating sooo well
I am very worried about the leopards’ health right now. They’re massively overeating, and getting very little exercise between meals. I hope the American people will have the sense to stop feeding themselves to them sometime next year.
Good news, then: Ozempic about to get cheap.
Nah. The lepords will look like the average american
Silicosis is a horrible way to go.
I understand that in many coal mining towns, there really isn’t much other work than the mines due to a litany of historical and economic factors. If working in a toxic environment that is going to kill me in order to dig up a bunch of rocks that are killing the world is the only option, do it temporarily and save up enough money to leave?
I get that doing that is easier said than done, but it really seems like miners are completely dependent on electing republicans into office to keep their dying industry hobbling along. Then, the Republicans they elect act like Republicans and all of the miners go full surprised Pikachu that the mines get less safe due to removal of regulations. This cycle has been repeating for years. At some point, you have to stop doing the same thing and expecting different results.
There’s a lot of remediation, construction and maintenance work that the same skill sets apply to. It’s a matter of funding restoration instead of destruction.
But they’ve been told that for decades and don’t want it.
Its the dummycrat cabal again trying to convince you that brown stuff hes droppin on you from a plane aint chocolate ice cream. Stay strong and dig into your wallets and give for the new ballroom to own the libs.
