Journal
NEW SOLUTIONS-A JOURNAL OF ENVIRONMENTAL AND OCCUPATIONAL HEALTH POLICY
Volume 31, Issue 4, Pages 422-433Publisher
SAGE PUBLICATIONS INC
DOI: 10.1177/10482911211037007
Keywords
aluminum; occupational disease; occupational hygiene; McIntyre Powder; Parkinson's; silicosis
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From 1943 to 1979, miners and factory workers in over two hundred work sites globally were subjected to mandatory medical treatments involving inhaling McIntyre Powder, an aluminum dust, blown into their change rooms each shift. However, the health impacts of these treatments were rarely studied, and the affected miners' story remains largely unknown.
From 1943 to 1979, miners and factory workers in more than two hundred work sites globally were subjected to mandatory medical treatments by their employers as an unproven, and ultimately ineffective, treatment to prevent the lung disease silicosis. The treatments involved inhaling finely ground aluminum dust known as McIntyre Powder, blown into miners' change rooms each shift using compressed air systems. Tens of thousands of industrial laborers were exposed to McIntyre Powder, yet their story is scarcely known, and the possible health impacts of their aluminum treatments were rarely studied. This paper integrates the history of the aluminum prophylaxis program and its control by the northern Ontario mining industry with the lived experience of one of the affected miners, whose daughter created a voluntary registry which documents health issues in exposed miners, and stimulated research that found a link to her father's Parkinson disease.
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