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TechnoratiReport Details 'Coal's Assault on Human Health'
CHARLESTON, W.Va. -- Coal pollution is assaulting human health through impacts on workers, residents near mining operations and power plants, and the environment in coalfield communities, according to a new report by a group of physicians.
![[Greenpeace activists unfurl a banner condemning the use of coal near one of Beijing's biggest coal-fired power plants. (AFP/File/Frederic J. Brown)]](http://www.commondreams.org/files/article_images/coal_psrreport.jpg "coal_psrreport.jpg")
The report by Physicians for Social Responsibility examined coal's
impacts on major organ systems of the human body, from the lungs to the
brain.
"The findings of the report are clear: While the U.S. relies heavily on coal for its energy needs, the consequences of that reliance for our health are grave," said Dr. Alan J. Lockwood, a University of Buffalo neurologist and principal author of the report.
The 65-page report, released Wednesday morning, notes that coal provides nearly half of the nation's electricity "and is a significant contributor to economic development, a higher standard of living, and an increased life expectancy."
But, coal combustion releases mercury, particulate matter, nitrogen oxide, sulfur dioxide and dozens of other substances known to be hazardous to human health. The report, "Coal's Assault on Human Health," looks at the cumulative harm inflicted by those pollutants on the respiratory system, the cardiovascular system and the nervous system.
Among the findings:
* Respiratory system -- Air pollutants associated with coal combustion contribute to serious respiratory ailments, including asthma, lung disease and lung cancer. They also adversely affect normal lung development in children.
* Cardiovascular effects -- Pollutants produced by coal combustion lead to cardiovascular disease, such as blocked arteries that lead to heart attacks, and tissue death that leads to heart damage. Coal pollutants also contribute to irregular heartbeats and congestive heart failure. Exposure to chronic air pollution over many years increases the likelihood of cardiovascular death.
* Nervous system effects -- Studies show a correlation between coal-related pollutants and stroke. Coal pollutants also act on the nervous system to cause loss of intellectual capacity, primarily through mercury. Researchers estimate that between 317,000 and 631,000 children are born in the U.S. each year with blood mercury levels high enough to reduce IQ scores and cause lifelong loss of intelligence.
* Global warming -- Even people who do not develop illnesses from coal pollutants could find their health and wellbeing impacted because of coal's contribution to global warming. The discharge of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere from coal-burning power plants is a major contributor to global warming and its adverse effects on health worldwide, such as heat stroke, malaria, declining food production, scarce water supplies, social conflict and starvation.
The report also notes the grave health effects experienced by coal miners, including injuries and deaths in mining accidents and, in the last 10 years alone the deaths of at least 10,000 coal miners to black lung disease.
And, it notes degradation of the environment from surface mining and the potential contamination of drinking water supplies from storage of coal-fired power plant wastes in huge impoundments across the coalfields.
"These stark conclusions leave no room for doubt or delay," said Kristen Welker-Hood, director of environment and health programs for Physicians for Social Responsibility.
The report recommends cutting carbon dioxide emissions as deeply and as quickly as possible, reducing emissions of other coal pollutants, a ban on new coal-fired power plants, and a focus on clean, renewable energy sources.
"The time has come for our nation to establish a health-drive energy policy that replaces our dependence on coal with clean, safe alternatives," Hood said.
7 Comments so far
Show AllThe way to make these points is to talk about the financial cost of these problems. Then make the point that everyone should clean up their own mess and it is wrong to do business by transferring your costs to others. Then give data on alternatives.
The litany just doesn't work in the world of persuasion. People just can't listen anymore and to just say we need alternatives is vague and unsubstantiated. People need to know there is a good action plan.
when digging up coal deep in the earth, you also dig up the heavy metals that are toxic not only to humans but also to other life forms. Then you have coal slurry, the ashes from burning coal and the gas from coal exaust. All three of these products contain these heavy metals.
The result is that the water bird, the loon of Maine is threatened with Mercury poisoning originating in coal power plants from the Great Lakes and from mountain top removal elsewhere.
The result is that the tuna agregates the mercury because the big fish is in the top of the food chain. Women are advised by their doctors to only eat tuna once a week when they are pregnant.
So the problem is much bigger than just the health of humans-- I give the physicians a lot of credit for pointing out that humans are getting poisoned-- but it is the whole ecology that is affected.
We must stop mountaintop removal as well as slurries to clean the coal as well as the stack spreading the poison.
We must do more with solar energy. 4 Pounds of matter is converted into energy by nuclear fusion of the sun and that is the amount of energy EVERY SECOND that reaches the earth. We must harvest that energy - the plants do with photosynthesis-- solar panels will be capturing more energy from various colors of the sun and we must conserve in the meanwhile and reduce the role that coal plays.
Fouling the earth, air, and water is aggression towards life.
All life connected, every nest threatened.
Fire will fight back for balance.
Kristen Welker-Hood of Physicians of Social Responsibility says:
"The time has come for our nation to establish a health-drive energy policy that replaces our dependence on coal with clean, safe alternatives," Hood said.
With all due respect, statements like these are more and more of the Alice in Wonderland variety.
When we end up with a Health Care Reform bill which makes health insurance even more unaffordable and fines people who can't afford it for not having it, and the Health Insurance Corporations are due to clean up mega-billions more, and
No matter what subject crucial to The People of the United States and of the World, and it has to do with war, torture, wanting to make more war against other countries, pro-corporation agricultural, energy, economic and monetary policies, climate change, human rights, etcetera, what I keep coming across is blatant lying and denying by those whose sole interests seem to be making profits or staying in office or controlling oil, gas, and other minerals and other people's land, no matter what sovereign nation "own" these items that are coveted or no matter what rights or claims other human beings have.
As far as the needs of The People, with very few exceptions among those the U.S. considers reasonable allies, the chief "bottle-washers" engage in LYING and DENYING and GIVING A PASS to the most egregious behavior against others that is so blatant, it takes the breath away. And we are very short on courageous, truth-tellers who are prepared to raise a ruckus and go for broke [literally].
Kristen Welker-Hood is undoubtedly very sincere, but what we really should be doing or must do for our safety and security in the near future is dismissed, shrugged away, not even considered because currently we are governed [robbed, cheated, ignored, exploited, imprisoned or killed] by the sickest bunch of inhumane, dehumanized humans that I think has ever been, at least in my lifetime. At least Hitler was incredibly vocal about what his plans were, but these people? slime oozing through the cracks in the ceiling and the walls.
It seems they are all stuck way back there at some kind of first-level reptilian brain response. "Ah, there is a big bug I want. Shiny, expressionless eyes focus like a laser. Nothing else enters their vision. The tongue whips out and grabs the bug and crunch, crunch, crunch. Then clump, clump, clump on to the next hunt for an even bigger bug, no matter trees are being knocked down, streams are stirred into mud, etcetera.
I'd rather be in a discussion with someone who is dead wrong, but passionate about his/her beliefs because both that person and I eventually can connect at a feeling level and then a conversational level at some point and begin to hear each other.
It is the cold, calculating ones that I am most afraid of. They do the dirtiest and ugliest of things without blinking an eye and then lie, make excuses, justify, and invariably blame someone else for why they do what they do.
They are unreachable because their hearts are just a muscle that beats in their chests. But the feelings we have come to associate with Heart are absent.
THEY DO NOT CARE past that Big Bug they want. And that is the scariest, most dangerous kind of monster that I can imagine, and they are currently all over the place.
So given who is interested in holding on to whatever holdings or business they are in [coal, oil, gold, natural gas, diamonds ...] that chances "...for our nation to establish a health-drive energy policy that replaces our dependence on coal with clean, safe alternatives." ... are pretty slim.
Idaho and Montana ... Oh, phosphate, a mother-lode ... well, let's cut down the forests and lop off some mountain tops and level some mountain ridges. MEGA-MONEY here!!!! There was a ban; suddenly it is lifted.
And who is going to stop them or help us? Obama? The Congress? The Media? The People? The Courts?
A cold, calculating insanity has taken hold. Old Reptilian- brain-stem level.
Everything has a cycle, however. Most often, much must necessarily be destroyed in order to gain new life and the ability to create anew.
Listen to Mozart's greatest works and you'll hear the grand story of the universe at its highest level. Exquisite beauty, profound order, but with intricate and extravagant creative threads woven together into a breathtaking, multi-leveled magnificence.
If you are looking for hope, there it is from a few centuries back.
/cm
I'm with you, but what happens when the music stops,
and you can't find a chair?
Capitalism doesn't provide seating for all.
One at a time they drop out,
Like the game of Monopoly.
Hope is for the future.
Everyone deserves a place to be,
a spot on the board,
a voice in the discussion.
I hope the game changes so the music can start again.
Not much this old Indian can say. The land was pristine & unpolluted then the Europeans arrived. This is the world they built. The nuclear waste cash register people. So the Europeans have their stolen Indian land & everyone is being poisoned to death one way or the other as they destroy the earth.
One person's born on the Rez, another in coal country, another in the city, this town, & that town. Walmart is everywhere. You have your boring preditable nuclear waste earth destroying cash register world now?
So what's your hype & hoopla? You went to the store & bought something. I have accomplished living the European's way upon the earth. I went to the store & bought stuff.
And at the store were other people buying stuff that just wanted to get home, eat, & watch tv.
Then people of your world that caused the destruction because of the way you live upon the earth sit at computers offering their nothing opinons that don't solve anything but they like to b.s. themselves that they are smart.
When all they going to do is the same as everyone else & that is go to work, & pay their bills. Yeah yeah yeah.
An old Indian.. or a Wise Sage?
Methinks ShadowDancers' ancestor's might have summised that the civilized world could one day turn into a Mega-Reservation, for the most worthy cause of progress.
One need only look at this country's past policies, to understand what the future (now) would hold. The story is simply following the script that was written long ago, the difference being that the story then was unpleasant only for some, and that same story has become unsustainable for all.