Health costs of environmental pollution faced by underground coal miners: Evidence from Balochistan, Pakistan

Abstract

There is plenty of research on the environmental effects of coal mining. However, the economic valuation of health costs is seldom addressed. To know this, we have estimated health costs faced by miners working in underground coal mines in Balochistan, Pakistan. To compare the cost of illness caused by coal mines' pollution, we took two samples, the control group and the treatment group. The treatment group consisted of 150 underground coal miners working in different mines. The control group consisted of randomly selected farmers, construction workers, and waiters (fifty each). The double-hurdle model was used to estimate the factors affecting miner’ decision to visit doctors in the first tier, while the second tier estimated the costs incurred on the treatment. Results indicate that socioeconomic and demographic variables such as age, education level, age when work started, income or wage rate, frequency of illness, living condition, sources of safe drinking water, and nationality (whether Afghan or Pakistani) of the respondents have significant impacts on the decision of getting treatment, and costs of illness of coal mine workers. Environmental variables, including methane and carbon monoxide, elevate the health cost of coal miners. The cost of illness increases with the narrow size of the coal seam. It is concluded that the coal minerssuffer from different ailments (respiratory diseases, irritation of the body, gastrointestinal problems, musculoskeletal harms, and headache). Their costs of illness are much higher as compared to noncoal workers. Our work addresses coal mining from a cost perspective, which can significantly enhance the pay system by including user fees in the wages. Among the various possible policy interventions, motivational training for miners to use protective measures, improved living environment, provision of nearby health facilities, employing advanced mining methods, and agreeing on a standard procedure correlated to seam size for degasification may be considered critical policy recommendations.