"However, in lesser developed countries and some developing countries, many miners continue to die annually, either through direct accidents in coal mines or through adverse health consequences from working under poor conditions. China, in particular, has the highest number of coal mining related deaths in the world, with official statistics claiming that 6,027 deaths occurred in 2004.[19] To compare, 28 deaths were reported in the U.S. in the same year.[20] Coal production in China is twice that in the U.S."
So counting deaths of coal mining from countries were human lives are considered to be expendable resources sounds a bit dishonest. Not that I want to promote coal mining, but I don't trust these PR pieces, sorry.
I think that article also counts accidents from people colliding with coal transporting trains? How is Uranium transported, are there never any collisions?
Also, abandoned mines seem popular for storing nuclear waste. Were the deaths for creating those mines counted towards the nuclear power toll, too?
As for "we don't care about deaths in China", strange enough nuclear power plants tend to be built next to country borders, so that possible pollution has a good chance of blowing into the neighbor's land, not your own. At least that is a story I heard about french nuclear power plants.
What are you trying to say? I just pointed out that the numbers form the pro-nuclear article are to be taken with a grain of salt. You can always do creative accounting to make look good what you want to look good.
Do the black lung people even die because of it? If not they shouldn't count, just as the cancer patients don't seem to count as long as they don't die in a timely manner.
> You can always do creative accounting to make look good what you want to look good.
Yes, that's why I'm trying to make it clear what all the numbers represent. I believe that you're correct, for example, with China's coal miners having about 4x as much accident risk as US miners, but I think that's still limited to accident risk. I don't remember if Wikipedia explained which figures it was comparing very carefully.
> Do the black lung people even die because of it?
"As dangerous an undertaking as coal mining is, there’s no comparison between the risks of cave-ins or flooding or explosions, and the risks of contracting this deadly disease. In the last decade alone, 10,000 miners have died from black lung, compared with fewer than 400 from mine accidents."
"The ICU mortality rate for patients with coal worker’s pneumoconiosis with their first episode of respiratory failure requiring mechanical ventilation was 40%, and the in-hospital mortality rate was 43%."
Also look at the treatment tab. Basically, the only treatment is preventative: change jobs (at least get away from the dust!), stop smoking, vaccinations for common lung infections, etc. Oh, yeah, you get put on oxygen, too. It doesn't help your dead lungs, though.
"However, in lesser developed countries and some developing countries, many miners continue to die annually, either through direct accidents in coal mines or through adverse health consequences from working under poor conditions. China, in particular, has the highest number of coal mining related deaths in the world, with official statistics claiming that 6,027 deaths occurred in 2004.[19] To compare, 28 deaths were reported in the U.S. in the same year.[20] Coal production in China is twice that in the U.S."
So counting deaths of coal mining from countries were human lives are considered to be expendable resources sounds a bit dishonest. Not that I want to promote coal mining, but I don't trust these PR pieces, sorry.
I think that article also counts accidents from people colliding with coal transporting trains? How is Uranium transported, are there never any collisions?
Also, abandoned mines seem popular for storing nuclear waste. Were the deaths for creating those mines counted towards the nuclear power toll, too?
As for "we don't care about deaths in China", strange enough nuclear power plants tend to be built next to country borders, so that possible pollution has a good chance of blowing into the neighbor's land, not your own. At least that is a story I heard about french nuclear power plants.