Community Health, Social, and Ecological Impacts of Mine-Waste Exposures
A special issue of International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health (ISSN 1660-4601). This special issue belongs to the section "Environmental Health".
Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (30 September 2023) | Viewed by 2263
Special Issue Editors
Interests: abandoned mine waste; uranium; metal mixtures; indigenous health; community-partnered research; team science
Interests: environmental anthropology; Science and Technology Studies (STS); Native American and Indigenous Studies; political ecology; environmental justice
Special Issue Information
Dear Colleagues,
The exploration and exploitation of mineral resources have produced a legacy of environmental degradation as well as risks to human health, ecosystems, societies and cultures in some of the most vulnerable communities around the globe. In the United States, the discovery of minerals often resulted in the abrogation of existing treaty rights to land for Indigenous tribes, followed by decades of extraction, exposure and loss of critical resources that sustained communities [1]. These impacts were exacerbated during the Cold War, following the prioritization of uranium as a critical mineral for nuclear weapons development. The legacy of uranium mining has impacted Indigenous peoples not only in the US, but in Africa, Australia, Japan, Canada and elsewhere. The geology of ore bodies ensures that in all of these regions, regardless of the target metal mined or mining process, the waste contains a broad spectrum of toxic metals that weather with age, creating finer particles of varying chemistry and mineralogy that can readily redistribute in the environment. This introduces the potential for broad exposure pathways, which can be exacerbated with climate change. The complexity of these exposures, the remoteness of many of the affected populations and the often-low population density in these rural areas have limited the development of a comprehensive understanding of the impacts on these populations. In this Special Issue, we aim to include research which studies the complex effects on human health and ecosystems, as well as the resulting social and cultural disruptions. We are seeking articles that examine how the changing climate can alter exposure and innovative strategies to reduce risk. While this issue is focused on the impacts of metal mixtures from uranium mining on Indigenous populations around the world, these issues cannot be separated from the impacts of other hard-rock mine waste and exposure in other, non-Indigenous rural communities. We hope a broader global perspective will shed light on both the risks and the integrated impacts on health, ecology, society and cultures in ways that will advance novel interventions and create more informed policies and regulatory practices that reduce those risks.
- Lewis, J.L.; Hoover, J.; MacKenzie, D. Mining and Environmental Health Disparities in Native American Communities. Curr Environ Health Rep. 2017, 4, 130–141. Available online: https://doi.org/10.1007/s40572-017-0140-5.
Prof. Dr. Johnnye L. Lewis
Dr. Thomas DePree
Guest Editors
Manuscript Submission Information
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Keywords
- metal mixtures
- mine waste
- Indigenous health
- rural health
- one health
- mining policy
- vulnerable communities
- socio-economic risk
