The discovery that Black Lung Disease – which once appeared on the verge of being eradicated – has come roaring back among U.S. coal miners, and in a more virulent form than in the past, has ignited the fury of the United Mine Workers of America (UMWA). The union representing miners is accusing coal mine operators of putting production miners’ health and safety and state and federal agencies of failing to enforce the law.

From the early days of the 20th Century until the passage of the 1969 Coal Act in the wake of the Farmington #9 Disaster, more than100,000 miners died in the United States from Black Lung Disease – a term for several respiratory diseases caused by breathing in coal mine dust. The disease is progressive and has no cure. After the federal Mine Safety and Health Act set limits in 1978 on miners’ exposure to respirable dust, the incidents of Black Lung slowly decreased across the industry.