|
Silicosis and Silica News - Return to Menu
Fatal flaws in Chinese gem units
Thousands of workers cramped into rooms without ventilation
BY CHING-CHING NI
HAIFENG (CHINA), DECEMBER 20: The boulders were as big as farm animals, and for $20 a month Feng Xingzhong’s job was to slice them with an electric saw, cutting the hulks into fillets small enough to throw into a bowl. Other workers in the jewelry factory would trim the pieces of jade, turquoise, onyx and other gemstones into little hearts and beads, polish them, drill holes and string them onto earrings, bracelets and necklaces to be shipped off to American shoppers.
Feng thought little about that, or anything else during his earsplitting 12-hour shift.
From age 18 to 26, Feng toiled without so much as a mask, trying to turn himself from an impoverished peasant into a prosperous city worker. He married a fellow employee, had two sons. ‘‘We had a beautiful dream,’’ Feng said. ‘‘To make some money, go home and start a small business.’’
Today, Feng hopes to live long enough to collect money from the factory where he developed silicosis, an incurable ailment known as ‘‘dust lung’’ that kills more than 24,000 Chinese workers each year in professions such as mining, quarrying, construction and shipbuilding. Most slowly suffocate, without protest.
But not Feng. The factory where Feng worked was one of more than 2,000 small and medium such operations near the southern Chinese city of Shenzhen. The area processes about 50,000 tons of semiprecious-stone jewelry a year, 70 per cent of the world’s total, according to the state-run People’s Daily newspaper. When Feng started in the early 1990s, his factory, called Gaoya, had about 50 employees. The crowded workshop had no ventilation system. ‘‘We asked for masks but they said no,’’ Feng said.
Despite the harsh conditions, Feng stayed because there were no jobs in his rural village. In the 1990s, Feng’s chest started to hurt. He felt short of breath and was coughing. Other workers had similar symptoms. The management organised a physical check-up for the employees. Feng and others were told they had tuberculosis. The ailment was contagious, but curable. The sick workers were given $250, told to go home, rest half a year, and when they returned, a less strenuous job would be waiting. ‘‘When I came back, he had packed up the factory,’’ Feng said.
Furious, he tried in 2002 to apply for worker’s compensation from the Labour Dispute Arbitration Committee in Haifeng. His factory had moved there from nearby Huizhou, and changed its name from Gaoya to Gaoyi. He was turned down on the grounds that the factory where he had worked was in Huizhou. Next, he tried to sue. But two courts rejected his case. He borrowed money from friends and relatives for legal fees and living expenses. He’s nearly $10,000 in debt.
Just when things were looking hopeless, a group called the China Labor Bulletin offered to help. They put Feng up in an apartment in Shenzhen and helped restart his case. ‘‘I didn’t believe there could be a group out there willing to stand up for us and fight for our rights,’’ Feng said later. When an international jewellery convention met in Hong Kong in June, Feng and other workers showed up carrying X-rays of their blackened lungs. In a hoarse voice, Feng shouted his boss’ name through a microphone and cried, ‘‘No blood money!’’
The group relaunched his claim against Gaoya through an arbitration committee in Huidong County. In May, the committee ruled in favor of Feng. The factory was ordered to pay him $3,800 for medical expenses, plus $100 a month as long as he lives. It was a hollow victory. Staphany Wong, the Labor Bulletin case worker assisting Feng, said, ‘‘The original factory no longer exists, so there is nobody there to pay anything to Feng,’’ she said. The labour group is trying to appeal. They have been staging more protests in Hong Kong, and trying to make Western firms aware of the factory conditions. —LATWP
Mesothelioma Search Engine to Consolidate Medical and Legal Information
New lung cancer search engine provides information on medical and legal web sites for those researching this asbestos-caused killer cancer
Minneapolis, MN, February 25, 2006 --(PR.COM)-- On the one-year anniversary of the launch of their Vioxx Search Engine, Nielsen Technical Services today announced the launch of their Mesothelioma Search Engine.
Niche search engines or vertical search engines have increased in popularity, but the time and expense of creating and maintaining a search engine for a highly vertical segment of an available search audience is generally not a good investment financially. When asked about the financial viability of such a site, owner Chris Nielsen said, “We have some interested parties that would like to be associated with us and are exploring those options, but will not compromise our values for the sake of making a buck. The massive amount of money the asbestos and mesothelioma lawyers are spending have resulted in a feeding frenzy which has spawned thousands of sites and millions of pages of fluff, trash, and recycled content. I admit our site is expected to carry ads at some point, but that is not the reason for creating the site.”
Nielsen was then asked the reason for creating such a site. “I just could not find a central source to go for information where sites were not bidding or competitively optimizing for position and search engine ranking. Search engines are fighting to maintain relevancy but they are having problems. Many ‘scraper sites’ are only looking to get visitors that will click on ads to reach real content. If you try a search for ‘mesothelioma’ it should be clear what the problem is.”
As with their Vioxx medical and legal search engine, Mesothelioma Search Engine will carry no paid search engine results or paid inclusion of sites. The site has a form for visitors to suggest sites. The list of sites included in the index is posted on the site and available for download, a feature not offered by other search engines.
The company is indexing selected sites for those looking for more information such as patients, researchers, families, doctors, pharmacists, students, and those in the legal profession. This site is offered as a public service for those looking for information related to medical and legal information on mesothelioma lung cancer, or asbestos lung cancer for which there is no cure and is caused by exposure to asbestos fibers or asbestos dust.
About Nielsen Technical Services
The company is based in Minneapolis, Minnesota and has been providing computer and software services since 1988. The Internet has transformed the company from a hardware services company into Internet consulting and specializes in search engine optimization.
Contact:
Chris Nielsen
Mesothelioma Search Engine
952-943-0170
webmaster@Mesothelioma-Search-Engine.com
|
