Coal miners stuck in years-long black lung benefits fight — SkimNews
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- Josh Armes, a 74-year-old retired coal miner from Grundy, Virginia, has been locked in a 12-year appeals process since a coal operator contested his federal black lung benefits in 2014; he has needed supplemental oxygen for the past four years.
- A May GAO report found that 40% of approved black lung claims between 2013 and 2024 were disputed — typically by coal operators — and that the median length of an appealed claim was three years or more.
- Between January 2013 and mid-August 2024, 390 beneficiaries had their initially approved claims denied on appeal, leaving them responsible for paying back benefits they had already received.
- Research published in the American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine found 32.5% of veteran underground coalminers in central Appalachia have black lung — the highest rate since 1978 — and more than 1,700 U.S. coal miners died from the disease between 2020 and 2023.
- The Trump administration's Mine Safety and Health Administration has indefinitely delayed enforcement of a federal silica dust rule passed in April 2024, with congressional Republicans having blocked its funding in June 2024.
- The United Mine Workers of America is pushing to unfreeze the silica dust rule, with UMWA president Brian Sanson stating that every day of delay means another miner contracts 'an incurable, fatal disease.'
Why it matters: The 390 miners forced to repay benefits after successful coal-operator appeals — while battling a progressive, terminal illness — illustrate the human cost of a system stacked against claimants. With black lung cases at a 50-year high and the silica dust rule frozen, more miners will be exposed to the conditions driving the surge while the backlog of appeals grows.
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