Working coal miners in central Appalachia are suffering from black lung disease at the highest rate in nearly 50 years.

That's according to New data released this month from the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health.

Pikeville radiologist doctor Brandon Crum has spent decades diagnosing the disease in Appalachian coal miners.

We asked him about his reaction to the new numbers and what could be done to slow black lung in Appalachia.

The research letter from the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, Ornish reveals that 1 in 3 miners who have worked at least 25 years underground have pneumoconiosis or black lung disease.

The last time Nai ash reported these rates in 2018, it was 1 in 5.

Some experts, including Doctor Brandon Crum, say conditions for coal miners are no better off than they were 50 years ago.

That percentage of severity or incidence you have to go all the way back to around 1978 to get it to where it was that bad.

And the most concerning thing about that is, is we only implemented the dust standards in about 1969, 1970.

So we're pretty much back to the same level as we were, or worse, before any of the dust standards, implementations, enforcements or any efforts was made to try to prevent this disease.

We're right back to where we started from, in other words.

And after billions and billions of dollars spent, we're no better for it in central Appalachia.

Black lung is an incurable disease caused by the inhalation of coal dust or the more dangerous silica dust, which is a finer rock dust that results from mining smaller veins of coal.

Crum says the dust can be so small that a miner could inhale it, even an air that looks clear.

Nyasha has recommended stricter regulations on silica dust exposure since the 1970s.

But when new silica dust regulations passed in 2024, lawsuits from the mining industry delayed enforcement of the new rules indefinitely.

It's a complete failure of the system right now.

Or we wouldn't be seeing this much disease.

And it's, you know, frustrating after a decade of study, after study after study after study by private clinics like myself, and also from knowledge that nothing still is being done about it.

You know, there's no significant change.

According to the National Mining Association or NMR, mining companies have been increasingly compliant with existing silica dust exposure limits, achieving a 97% compliance rate.

Last year, the National Mining Association issued a response to the Nai ash study.

It reads in part, quote, it is important for people to understand that newly diagnosed cases are not representative of current exposures.

Pneumoconiosis is a disease of long latency with symptoms that do not typically present for at least ten years.

This means that the incidences discussed in these studies cover miners whose initial exposures date back years, and in many cases, decades.

These incidences do not reflect the conditions, practices, protections or regulations that are in place today, unquote.

Doctor Crum says that's the same response he heard after publishing Record-Breaking Black Lung Data in 2016.

Some of the excuses then were these are from old exposures and not current trends or what we should be seeing in terms of actual current dust exposures.

But you still look ten years later, a decade almost to the month, and we still see significant disease.

The National Mining Association suggests that the spike in data from the Nai ash report likely corresponds to exposures from 2004 to 2012.

It says dust levels have dropped dramatically due to water spray technology, more effective facemasks, and Hepa filters in enclosed vehicle cabs.

These conversations take place as national interest in the coal industry is on the rise.

In June, President Trump announced plans to invest $700 million into coal fired power plants and coal exports.

No time in the history of the United States are miners going to be more important than over the next 3 to 4 decades?

The amount of power that's going to be needed for the air boom and the technology boom is massive thing.

They just approved almost 200 million in terms of trying to recruit miners in the United States.

And if we only had half of that, we could protect the workforce that's already mining.

Crum says he believes the well-being of miners and the strength of the coal industry don't have to be at odds with each other.

I started working in the mines when I was 14 or 15 years old.

My family were coal operators and coal miners for four generations.

I understand how important coal is.

We can work together to one mine.

Coal, effectively and economically, and do it in a safe manner that keeps our miners from getting sick.

We're not against the coal industry.

We are against the miners getting sick and dying from the disease.

And I think we can have both if we'll work together to help prevent it.

For Kentucky edition, I'm Mackenzie Spink.

In June, Kentucky's only Democratic congressman, Morgan McGarvey, co-sponsored the Support Our Miners Act.

This aims to increase federal benefits for miners.

According to the Appalachian Citizens Law Center, recipients in 2023 received 30% less in benefits than recipients in 1969.

When adjusted for inflation so far.

No other Kentucky congressman has supported that measure.