South Africa: Miners sue gold giant over diseases

Eighteen former South African workers who suffer from silicosis or silico-tuberculosis are bringing a test case against the mining giant Anglo American South Africa (AASA), a subsidiary of the British-based Anglo American Corporation, the British Guardian said on November 17. The workers were employed by AASA between the 1970s and 1998.

The workers say tens of thousands of South African goldminers have contracted lung diseases because employers failed to protect them from breathing in harmful dust. The Guardian said a series of major studies found that one in four long-service miners suffered from silicosis, which put them at significantly increased risk of TB and lung cancer.

The Guardian reported that the workers say they "were not provided with facemasks or any other protection against intensive and excessive exposure to dust and were encouraged to continue working even after they fell ill. They say they received no aftercare or medical treatment."

Black miners, often migrants, were the worst affected during the apartheid era as they often did the dustiest jobs. "Unlike white miners, they did not have access to onsite showers or changing rooms to remove dust from their bodies", the Guardian said.

From GLW issue 819