'It feels like the cavalry is coming': Ontario vows $1M to help miners exposed to aluminum dust

The Ontario government says it will commit $1 million in funding over the next year to help ailing Ontario mine workers who believe years of exposure to aluminum dust have left them with neurological diseases.

The Ministry of Labour said Wednesday it will fund research that will assess miners exposed to the fine aluminum dust called McIntyre Powder. 

• Watch The Fifth Estate's "Miner's Daughter" Friday at 9 p.m. ET on CBC Television​
• Watch 1979 Fifth Estate episode on McIntyre Powder: "Powder Keg"

The funding will allow Occupational Health Clinics for Ontario Workers (OHCOW), a publicly funded organization that deals with workplace and work-related health issues, to establish a team to review information collected about miners exposed to the dust.

That information comes from intake clinics OHCOW hosted for miners from across the country who inhaled the powder on the job. The clinics map and study detailed health histories of the miners, collate the data and examine their findings.

These findings will be reviewed by this newly funded team, which will include occupational health and medical health professionals. 

The Ministry of Labour said the workers "could then use this information to make claims to the Workplace Safety and Insurance Board (WSIB) for potential compensation."

McIntyre Powder, which was developed at McIntyre Mine near Timmins, Ont., is a finely ground aluminum dust that company officials said would protect miners' lungs if inhaled at the start of every shift.

The Ministry of Labour estimates that 10,000 miners were exposed to McIntyre Powder. The Occupational Cancer Research Centre — which is conducting a WSIB-commissioned study regarding neurological disorders and McIntyre Powder exposure — says it has confirmed that more than 27,500 miners were exposed to the powder. 

Many mine workers around the world were forced to use it as a condition of employment between 1943 and 1979. The product had only been tested on a small number of rabbits and guinea pigs before it was put on the market and provided to tens of thousands of miners.

There is no proven scientific or medical link between neurological disorders and McIntyre Powder, but mounting anecdotal evidence has motivated some scientists and doctors to take another look. 

The miner's daughter

Janice Martell has been at the forefront of efforts to.boost miners' awareness of McIntyre Powder in memory of her father, Jim Hobbs, who died after a battle with Parkinson's disease she believes was related to the substance. She has been the only person working for OHCOW on McIntyre Powder since March 2017.

She said Wednesday's announcement "feels like the cavalry is coming."

"I wish my dad was alive to see it, to know where it's gotten to, so that's hard — it's really hard — but there's a lot left to do. It's been a long fight and my whole life has been put on hold and dedicated to this."

OHCOW will continue to work with mine workers to determine whether their health conditions, commonly neurological disorders such as ALS or Lou Gehrig's disease, are linked to the use of McIntyre Powder.

"It is critical that occupational diseases be treated with the same seriousness and importance as physical injuries," said Labour Minister Kevin Flynn.

In a media release, the Ministry of Labour said OHCOW has 325 case files of mine workers exposed to McIntyre Powder.

It said another 90 workers or survivors are seeking OHCOW's services related to exposures to the powder. Another 195 workers have reported health effects — particularly neurological disorders like dementia — to a voluntary registry maintained by Martell's McIntyre Powder Project.

Intake clinics

OHCOW ran intake clinics for mine workers exposed to McIntyre Powder throughout 2016. 

At those intake clinics, mine workers and family members were invited to tell their stories. Their information was gathered and entered into a database that included information about symptoms, illnesses and the mines where the workers were employed.

Martell said being able to dedicate resources to deal with the databases is a step forward to help the mine workers.

"I'm happy that it's finally here," she said. "My dad was alive when they put in the original proposal and he's since passed, and I've lost 28 mine workers since I went public with my voluntary registry [called the McIntyre Powder project] back in 2015.

"It's been frustrating to sit and wait, and have mine workers ... dying and not getting answers, so today is a big day for moving forward with this and being able to create a database."

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Martell said the database will allow researchers to pool the information and be able to give workers an opinion about whether their illnesses are related to McIntyre Powder.

"If they're looking for a pool of workers who are exposed to this at varying degrees or doses, we can quickly pull that off with a database, whereas now we'd have to go through each individual file."

'Still more work to do'

Martell said while the announcement is a step forward for research into McIntyre Powder, she and OHCOW still have a lot of work to do.

Martell said that she feels workers were part of a "public health experiment." She's heard from several who feel their stories were brushed "under the carpet."

"Most of the people at the intake clinics, their main goal was to make sure this never happened to anybody else."