
US government halts study on health effects of coal mining - gwerbret
https://www.nature.com/news/closure-of-us-coal-study-marks-an-alarming-precedent-1.22512
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nroach
The study's budget was only $1m. Seems like the readership of HN could easily
pull that money together and donate the funding, if the researchers could
accept it.

~~~
kodfodrasz
I'd be surprised if this "community" could gather money for anything remotely
useful.

Also: I'd like to see the outcome of a fundraising, and the demographics of
the donators, to see how many pledge outside of CA, and outside of the USA.
This would give me an impression about the extent of the Trump is Satan and
the world is about to end mindset. (imho nothing changes, things proceed with
trump as before. business as usual)

Just to make it clear: I'd not give a single penny for it, I care for the
health of US citizens only as much as they care for the health of citizens of
other countries.

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icebraining
You're not thinking strategically. The US is one of the biggest emitters of
CO2, and coal plants are about 1/3 of that. If the study can convince the
population to reduce their use, even if with a different argument, that's
helpful for the whole planet.

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hasenj
You just admitted the would-be study actually has ulterior motives. That's not
good.

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DFHippie
Almost all research has ulterior motives in this sense, particularly
government-funded research. You want to guide policy so you collect
information on the impact of that policy, existing or proposed. The
alternative is to make policy in the absence of data.

Research guided this way is problematic only if it amounts to cherry-picking
of facts, studying only the benefits or costs to the exclusion of the other.

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bithive123
The information age is built on gathering raw data and doing pure research,
neither of which are profitable activities.

The implied threshold for wastefulness here is offensively low; basically any
project that might require one moderately competent PhD researcher for a year.

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PixelB
You hit the nail on the head, pure research is not a profitable activity. This
is why we can't trust companies and corporations to research.. their motives
are almost always profit driven. This only underlines the importance of
government funded research, and the need to have a government in place who is
willing to put the advancement of our society over their own personal gain (We
don't have that right now..).

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bmmayer1
You're forgetting about the $1.9 trillion nonprofit sector, of which 15% is
spent on health research, 12% on public + social benefit...[1]

That seems to bely the need for a government that can fund research that 'puts
the advancement of our society over their own personal gain.'

[1][https://philanthropynewyork.org/sites/default/files/resource...](https://philanthropynewyork.org/sites/default/files/resources/The%20Nonprofit%20Sector%20in%20the%20United%20States%20Size%20and%20Scope.PDF)

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chillwaves
Non-profit does not mean the system is working outside of capitalism or people
are not making money.

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bmmayer1
I don't understand your issue with people making money. Why should people not
make money while doing beneficial research for humankind? Is there some reason
why making money and helping people are mutually exclusive?

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brownbat
Outside/In interviewed some miners and families recently. It's phenomenal
radio, actually talking to the people everyone else just talks about.

I haven't been able to get it out of my mind.

[http://outsideinradio.org/shows/ep34](http://outsideinradio.org/shows/ep34)

Note, I know this isn't 1:1, not about the communities surrounding mountaintop
removal, but there are some good notes in it about modern changes to mining
techniques all the same.

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JudasGoat
That really puts a face on greed's victims. Thank you.

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ap46
You don't need anymore research to know it is obviously dangerous. What we do
need is leadership that doesn't bow down to cronies & supports stupid beliefs.

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mud_dauber
I lost an uncle to black lung. Coal mining as an industry needs to die. And I
grew up in WV.

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nemacol
Hello from WV. (Northern panhandle here) Most of my family were steel mill
folks but before the mills took off they were miners. Coal and mining (in
general) are hell on the body.

~~~
mud_dauber
Absolutely correct. Thanks for writing - I'm ready to travel back there for
real weather.

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cjslep
"But think of the freedom of speech!"

In all seriousness though, the most important bit wasn't even clarified by the
article:

 _The agency says it is reviewing spending on all projects that cost more than
$100,000._

So is it actually true and I'm supposed to be manipulated into outrage due to
cherry picking this one project? Or is it false and I'm supposed to be
actually outraged at this shadowy deceitful action?

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eridius
It can be true and you can still be outraged, because that justification is
probably just an excuse to can projects that the current government doesn't
like.

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WalterBright
> can projects that the current government doesn't like.

All administrations do that.

~~~
tstactplsignore
Really? Can you show me a legitimate scientific project that the Obama
administration shut down?

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WalterBright
As I recall, one couldn't (and still can't) get funding for research into
medicinal uses of drugs like marijuana and heroin.

Politics always drives what gets government research funding and what doesn't.
Politics defines what is "legitimate" and what isn't, and those shift over
time.

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lsaferite
> shut down

You're citing research that was never started.

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vondur
I assumed it was widely known that coal mining was hazardous to ones health.
My grandfather died from black lung before I was born.

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tzs
This study is on the health risks of surface coal mining (also known as
mountaintop removal) on the surrounding communities, not on the miners. As the
article notes there is some evidence of unusually high lung cancer and birth
defect rates in communities near such mines.

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novia
I was eating dinner with two doctors about a month ago, and they were
discussing this. They said it was difficult to prove that coal mining causes
things like lung cancer in the miners themselves because it is just about
impossible to find a coal miner who doesn't smoke.

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eat_veggies
Would they get cancer sooner or have different effects than non-miner smokers?

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KekDemaga
I think the sample sizes might get out of hand as you'd need a good deal of
miner and control subjects to filter out the noise.

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unlmtd1
Just bring back the rule of law. Tort law would mean that coal burning would
be sued to extinction. Accepting the death of all tomorrow so that some may
survive today is absurd. The church of pseudo-finance tells us that burning
our forests down and poisoning all our rivers is 'growth'. Any child would
laugh this away as insanity.

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godzillabrennus
Do they really need to conduct a study to determine that spewing black smoke
into the air hurts human beings?

The Coal lobby must love Trump.

Glad millennials won't work for Coal or Oil.

~~~
stevenwoo
You're probably premature on the oil bit, the latest oil boom is over but it
was a good run for high paying, manual labor without any education
requirements.

Coal jobs had the double whammy of cheaper energy sources for power reducing
demand and replacement of mining veins to mechanized mountaintop removal
reducing need for manual labor.

Oil demand will probably come back for the same jobs - until they can
mechanize oil/natural gas drilling like mountaintop coal removal.

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dtf
Lysenkoism proved fruitful many unpopular subjects.

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gerdesj
The world will not come to an end yet but this is not a good way to ensure its
ensuing survival.

~~~
unlmtd1
They cut the research. So what? People are free to end their own robbery
(paying taxes) to fund the research themselves. The taxes of five working
people can finance a PhD.

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alehul
> The agency says it is reviewing spending on all projects that cost more than
> $100,000.

Title of this article is somewhat misleading; it's actually even more serious,
apparently.

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kl2
These studies are often started with political goals in mind -- the article
confirm this when it highlights "the political nature of the topic". Maybe the
money is better spent on a study on the health effects of lithium extraction?

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jjawssd
Title is misleading. All projects that cost more than $100,000 are being
reviewed.

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nthcolumn
So glad POTUS did this. It is a huge waste of money to find out what the
general public already know. The health effects are very, very bad! The worst!

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yahna
Nah, you just clean the coal and it's fine.

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nthcolumn
So many jobs washing coal coal is so dirty. Dirty as, well, coal. Can you
imagine how many jobs? I can't, so many.

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amag
What are they afraid of? It's too dark down in a coal mine to read any health
studies anyway!

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Powerofmene
The article is about surface mining and its effects on the local surrounding
communities not about underground mining.

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amag
Ah, it was hard to read because of all the soot in my eyes.

