2 years later: northern Ontario woman's McIntyre Powder Project signs up 370 miners

An Elliot Lake woman, and daughter of a former miner, says her project to help labourers exposed to McIntyre Powder has seen a large number of people sign up over the past two years.

Janice Martell's father was one of many miners forced to inhale the substance a dust made up ground-up aluminum as a condition of employment between 1943 and 1979. The powder was believed to protect miners from silicosis, an incurable lung disease, but concerns are now being raised about the practice's effect on neurological health.

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"I think that I had five miners on my voluntary registry [two years ago], and since that it's just exploded; I'm up to 370 mine workers who have been exposed to aluminum dust on the registry," she told CBC Sudbury's Morning North.

Martell was in Sudbury Wednesday to speak at the Mining Health and Safety Conference underway in the city.

There is no proven scientific or medical link between neurological disorders and McIntyre Powder, but more research is being done. Martell said her father was diagnosed with Parkinson's Disease in 2001 other anecdotal evidence has found high rates of ALS or Lou Gehrig's disease, she said.

The McIntyre Powder Project aims to find help for miners like her father by seeking scientific correlation between McIntyre Powder and neurological disorders, and allowing the miners to receive compensation through Ontario's Workplace Safety andInsurance Board.

When Martell applied for compensation for her father, she was told that necessary correlation doesn't exist.

"My absolute end game is to overhaul the Workplace Safety andInsurance Board system because it's broken," she said.

"Basically, the workers are a liability for them."

More specific research on miners exposed in Ontario to the powder needs to continue, Martell said, adding that researchers have begun to take notice, including scientists at McMaster University and the University of British Columbia

'Time is running out'

"It's been about 37 years since the last documented use [of McIntyre Powder] to my knowledge," Martell said. "There's been one study in Ontario during that time period of these miners."

"Time is running out."

Martell said she attended an international symposium on aluminum research and was struck by a demonstration that showed a rat struggling with simple tasks after being exposed to the element.

Those rats have had more study than our miners- Janice Martell

"I started bawling 'cause I looked at that rat and I knew it was my dad," she said.

"I saw those same struggles and we see our miners struggling to breathe and to remember," she continued.

"Those rats have had more study than our miners."

More money needs to be made available for researchers to pore over data and to forensically examine closed mines to try and quantify how much McIntyre Powder miners were exposed to, she said.

"I think it's a human justice issue at this point," she added.