Wednesday, July 20th, 2011

Written by Erika Skaggs, Alliance for Appalachia Legislative Intern

I know this country needs electricity but if it means hurting my children then go ahead and shut mine off.

Those are the words of Paula Foley Swearingin, a native West Virginian and mother of four, describing the terrible reality of what it means to be a parent in Appalachia. Fortunately for Paula’s children they weren’t born in her hometown of Mullens, WV, because if they were, the chances of them growing up to be such beautiful, healthy, strong young men would have been substantially less.

That’s because according to the results of a new peer reviewed study by Dr. Micheal Hendryx of West Virginia University and Dr. Melissa Ahern of Washington State University, infants whose mothers live in counties where Mountaintop Removal coal mining occurs have up to a 181% greater chance of being born with a circulatory or respiratory disorder, and are 42% more likely to suffer from birth defects of any type, even after accounting for confounding factors like race, obesity and poor access to prenatal care.

To put that in perspective, the highest risk associated with cigarette smoking is a 50% increase in the likelihood of having a child with Omphalocele (being born with all or part of the intestines outside of the body), while the rates for other types of defects like clubfoot or cleft palate only go up by an average of 28%*. Just think about that for a second, simply living in a county where Mountaintop Removal occurs can put babies in three times more danger than if their mother smokes while pregnant.

Dr. Hendryx and Dr. Ahern’s study has already been covered in USA Today, Rolling Stone, The Huffington Post and dozens of other newspapers across the country, as well as countless blogs. If that pace keeps up it won’t be long until the entire country is aware of one of coals dirtiest little secrets- Mountaintop Removal kills children.

Clearly, that has put the coal industry on serious defense. Shortly after those results were published Cromwell and Moring, a Charleston based law firm representing coal interests, released this:

“The study failed to account for consanquinity [sic], one of the most prominent sources of birth defects.”

That post has since been deleted but the message made it through load and clear. The coal industry is so far out on limb that they are willing blame a major human health crisis on inbreeding, that’s right inbreeding. As if the suffering born by generations of Appalachians weren’t bad enough, the industry is now resorting to the most dehumanizing lies imaginable to convince the rest of the country that mountain people are too stupid and inbred to be worth caring about.

Clearly they are not, but this study does put people like Paula Swearingin in an unthinkable position. How does she raise her children in a place where the very air they breath and the water they drink is toxic?

Some would say “If it’s that bad, why don’t they just move?” but that response is every bit as despicable as the coal industry’s. If this were happening in the Adirondack’s or the Rocky’s no one would dream of poisoning people out of their homes for coal, but because Appalachia has been written off for generations, it’s citizens don’t seam to enjoy the same consideration or protection as the rest of us.

So what does this mean? Should we simply abandon Appalachia to the will of the coal industry as they continue to maim and kill more children, or do we stand up and say enough is enough? The answer seams clear – Our fellow Americans deserve better, and it is unacceptable for this country’s endless thirst for energy to be quenched at the expense of our most vulnerable citizens.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, July 20th, 2011 at 1:52 pm and is filed under News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.