Black lung: Miners shafted by fatal mistakes

April 10, 2017 Tara

Michael Wray, The Courier-Mail:

EVERY night, even in the middle of summer, Sue Byron prepares two spare doonas and two hot water bottles in her Mackay home. Then she boils a jug of water and gets in bed.

If she’s lucky, the water will go cold before she wakes up, meaning that her husband, Chris Byron, 69, a former coal miner who was diagnosed with black lung disease late last year, has slept through the night without contracting another bout of pneumonia…

In the past decade, Chris, who spent nearly 45 years of his life digging coal out of the ground in NSW and Queensland, has suffered pneumonia more than 50 times.

It’s just one of myriad health issues, including chronic bronchitis and coughing blood and coal dust, that have steadily sapped strength from his body as black lung, which is also called Coal Workers’ Pneumoconiosis (CWP), has taken hold.

Read the full story in the Courier Mail here

Previous Article
#news Free ‘Safety Pays in Mining’ Tool
#news Free ‘Safety Pays in Mining’ Tool

NIOSH is offering a new, online tool, “Safety Pays in Mining,” which allows mining companies to calculate t...

Next Article
Awards have 25,861 reasons to promote safety
Awards have 25,861 reasons to promote safety

WorkSafe is calling on all businesses and workers to prioritise safety to help drive down the number of wor...