VHeadline Venezuela News reports: Writing in today's (Friday) edition of Nueva Prensa de Guayana, Jose Garcia reports that southern gold miners are putting their lives at risk in clandestine efforts to eke out an existence while central government officials dither on remedies to environmental damage and the urgent necessity of attracting much-needed employment opportunities to the under-developed region of southeastern Venezuela.Garcia says that large groups of small-scale and artesanal miners in the Sifontes municipality, especially in areas where transnational companies are waiting to exploit massive gold reserves near El Callao, are digging for gold in restricted areas and that they are totally unaware of the terrible consequences that their illegal activities can have on their lives and those of their families and friends. The chemicals they work with and encounter are exceedingly toxic and can have severe ... sometimes lethal effects ... causing burns, respiratory conditions, brain damage, slow or sudden poisoning of the skin and blood and multiple organ failures.
The major problem is cyanide pollution where the noxious chemical is mainly found as hydrogen cyanide gas with smaller amounts as fine dust deposits. Much of the cyanide in the air, water and soil comes from natural processes and industrial activities. Found in surface water, it forms hydrogen cyanide and will evaporate into the environment. In high concentrations, cyanide is toxic to microorganisms and remains stable until it reaches groundwater or other forms of moisture such as workers' sweat or drinking water and food. Cigarette smoke and smoke from fires are also important releases of cyanide and extreme danger is implied in breathing air close to hazardous waste sites containing cyanide.
Health officials say gold workers are exposed to high enough quantities of cyanide in the environment to cause adverse health effects, depending on the type of compound of cyanide, hydrogen cyanide gas. Exposure can lead to brain and heart damage and can cause coma and death in many cases.
Some of the first signs of cyanide poisoning are deep and rapid breathing and shortness of breath followed by convulsions and loss of consciousness. The symptoms can occur rapidly, depending on the amount of cyanide ingested. Health effects after breathing, eating or drinking large quantities of chemicals are similar, entering the body more slowly through the skin than when you breathe or swallow it for any reason. It can also cause irritation and blistering in the skin. Once in the bloodstream, cyanide forms a stable complex that promotes the transfer of electrons to mitochondria of cells during the synthesis of adenosine triphosphate (ATP) and cells can fail to take oxygen from the bloodstream leading to the accumulation of lactate in the blood. The combined effect of hypoxia and lactic acidosis causes a depression in the central nervous system that can cause respiratory arrest and prove fatal. At higher concentrations, cyanide poisoning can affect organs and body systems including the heart.
Cyanide is poison to all living beings and is combined with 28 periodic table metals, including gold and silver, heavy metals and iron ... the lethal dose for a human adult is very small and ranges from 150 to 300 grams. It is used in gold mining processes for leaching since it easily combines with mercury, arsenic, lead etc.
The unfortunate situation close to the giant Las Cristinas and Las Brisas del Cuyuni industrial workings is that small-scale and artesanal miners who work clandestinely on gold mine tailings are completely unaware of the risks they run with their lives and those of their relatives and friends.
VHeadline Venezuela News
vheadline@gmail.com
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Venezuela is facing the most difficult period of its history with honest reporters crippled by sectarianism on top of rampant corruption within the administration and beyond, aided and abetted by criminal forces in the US and Spanish governments which cannot accept the sovereignty of the Venezuelan people to decide over their own future.
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