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.
“And every day you’re in this place you’re two days nearer death. But you go.”
That’s not the coal song it’s the chemical song, silly.
Try this one on for size.
I thought coal was clean and beautiful, though?
Green coal. It smells like strawberries. I’m eating a bowl right now!
It is. These miners are lying. It’s a false flag event. Fucking Biden!
/s.
Fuck Joe and Brandon! 😏
Get what you voted for
Coal causes so much fucking harm to this world.
It, alongside OIL and lead have to be some of the all time greats in terms of materials causing harm.
Wow. I had a great-grandfather that died of black lung. Before I was born. When I was told this as a child, I never would have imagined I’d be reading about it still happening in 2025.
When I think about the race to get to renewables and the race to fully automate things like coal mining from end-to-end, and I see how people like Pedonald and his supporters cling to these lionized versions of coal mining as a vocation, that phrase about “who wants to be the last American killed in Vietnam” comes to mind…
The same idiots voted for Trump again after having seen Trump do nothing to help them in his first term, so they’re just getting what’s coming to them.
He clearly needs more black lung. I think the government should cut the guardrails entirely who cares about those, just extra cost. This people will vote in a heartbeat anyway.
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.
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.
even for the misguided idiots
I don’t think a single one of them didn’t vote to hurt some marginalized group.
I think they’re all actually single issue voters, and their issue was “hurting the right people” to maintain what they feel their status in the hierarchy should be.
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! 🙄
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.
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!”
🤣 WTF is this photo?
It’s a real photo of Trump not giving a shit that someone fainted.
It’s also a nice metaphor for how he is treating the US.
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 proves you have humanity.
I guess black-lung county voted to die. May they have the day they voted for.
They voted for bigotry, sexism, and Christian nationalism but ended up getting burned. Fuck’em. I have no sympathy.
It’s cathartic to watch them suffer.
The unfortunate thing is marginalized people suffer the most, so most of them are more than happy with the sacrifice.
On one hand, yes, on the other hand, I pity their stupidity that made them think trump was what they needed to fix their problems.
You can’t always get what you want but if you vote MAGA, you’ll get what you deserve.
Be COMPASSIONATE to these People! They thought Trump would ONLY Harm Gays and Brownies and NOT them! An HONEST MISTAKE!
Awww, such a shame.
They’re getting what they voted for (no sarcasm)
It can be a little sarcastic.
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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
