We know how to prevent black lung, so why are workers still dying?
Silicosis is one of the oldest workplace hazards and public health experts have known for decades how to prevent it. Yet a new wave of workers, from Appalachian coalminers to Latino countertop fabrication workers, are developing and dying from the disease as industry fights new protections and regulators fail to defend the rules that could protect them.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/sep/12/black-lung-worker-deathsOpen linkView original on lemmy.zip
3 replies
I was a union construction worker for a couple years and one time I asked the Mexican sheetrockers why they don't wear dust masks. They asked why they would need to.
The contractor fast tracked them through Union school because of how good they were and didn't bother telling them about silicosis. After I explained it to them they started wearing dust masks. They had been doing it without masks for YEARS.
It's a combination of racism and profit over decency.
Edit: changed union to contractor
For years I worked on mills that processed flax straw, and it was never really mentioned how bad dust and particles are for you. Sure, for some situations we had masks available (for like maintenance etc in really bad areas) but everywhere was dusty, including the warehouses.
Worked there over a decade in my 20's and early 30's. Now I'm in my 50's and have Pulmonary Fibrosis. (Scarred lungs from all the crap I had to breathe, last time I was tested I was at 70% capacity but that was a few years back.)
Yes, I was younger and stupid and partially to blame, but I wish companies were a little more forthcoming on the dangers their employees have to deal with.
They should've protected your lungs. It shouldn't be legal for a company to do this sort of thing to anyone, and I'm sorry this happened to you.
The really gross detail about this situation with the union I was in is that they teach you about silicosis and the importance of dust masks during the first week of carpenter school at the union hall. They make sure to minimize the damage to their workers lungs, as long as you were born in the US and speak English as your primary language. They let the Mexican immigrants just breathe it in. It's not necessarily simple racism, as many of the union carpenters are of Mexican descent themselves. It's an anti immigrant thing.