Indigenous Women in Peru and Nicaragua Face Mercury Contamination from Small-Scale Gold Mining
Contamination by mercury used in small-scale gold mining has resulted in high mercury levels in Indigenous women in communities downstream from gold mining operations in Peru and Nicaragua, according to a new study by IPEN. The study found that almost all women tested (99%) had body levels of mercury above the safety threshold recommended recently by experts, and most (88%) had levels above the current US EPA safety levels. Next month, the Minamata Convention on Mercury holds its sixth Conference of Parties meeting, and today IPEN is co-hosting a pre-COP webinar to highlight the concerns around mercury used in gold mining.
Small-scale gold mining (sometimes called “artisanal” small-scale gold mining or ASGM) continues to rely on the use of mercury, a toxic metal known to impact the developing fetus with potentially lifelong effects on children’s intellectual and physical development. Mercury contamination from such gold mining operations is the leading contributor to global mercury pollution, with toxic impacts on Indigenous peoples, workers, children, and local communities around the world. Previous studies have concluded that mercury contamination of fish in waterways by small-scale mining is the likely cause of high mercury levels found in Indigenous Peoples living even hundreds of kilometers downstream from mining operations.
The Minamata Convention on Mercury provides regulations for some uses of the substance, but the use of mercury in small-scale gold mining continues to be permitted. IPEN and other environmental, Indigenous rights, health, and human rights groups have called for the Convention to be amended to phase-out mercury in gold mining and end the mercury trade. The Convention Conference of Parties (COP) will meet this November 3-7 in Geneva.
As Dr. Marcos Orellana, UN Special Rapporteur on toxics and human rights states in the foreword to the report, "The human rights and environmental injustices caused by mercury use in small-scale gold mining have been widely documented. The ongoing allowable use of mercury in small-scale gold mining is compromising the right to clean food sources of millions of people around the world."
In the new study, 105 Indigenous women of childbearing age from two communities in Nicaragua and four communities in Peru participated by providing a hair sample, which was analyzed at an independent lab to determine each participant’s mercury body burden. Levels of mercury in 92 women (88%) exceeded the current 1 ppm US EPA threshold level beyond which negative effects may be detected in a developing fetus of a pregnant woman, and levels in 104 women (99%) exceeded a more health-protective threshold (0.58 ppm), which has recently been proposed by numerous experts due to evidence of potential harmful effects from lower levels of mercury on the cognitive development of the fetus.
In four Peruvian Indigenous communities, mercury levels among women were especially high. Of the Peruvian participants, 98% had mercury levels above current safety levels, with the average woman experiencing a mercury body burden more than three times higher than the current EPA threshold. One woman from Peru showed a mercury level more than nine times above this threshold.
In the two Indigenous communities in Nicaragua participating in the study, the Li Auhbra and Li Lamni living along the Wangki River (also known as the Rio Coco), 98% of the women participants had mercury levels exceeding the recent proposed health-protective level and 80% had levels exceeding the current US EPA threshold level. The average level for a woman was more than 1.5 times higher than the EPA standard.
In both Peru and Nicaragua, gold extraction using mercury continues, and historical and contemporary mining sites continue to contribute mercury contamination to the aquatic food chain. IPEN has called for mercury-specific medical diagnosis and treatment in all locations where sampling was conducted, noting the situation in the Peruvian communities is especially urgent given the very high body burden of mercury observed.
“Mercury contamination from small-scale gold mining is a global problem that demands a global solution,” said Lee Bell, author of the new study and a Mercury and POPs Policy Advisor for IPEN. “The Minamata Convention can send a strong message that health and human rights come before gold industry profits. This year, we will call on the COP to adopt amendments to end this harmful use of mercury and ban the mercury trade, to protect millions of people from this troubling mercury contamination.”
Read the study and summary here.