Pneumoconiosis

Dust. Fine, invisible, unceasing dust. Breathed in for years — coal dust, silica dust, mineral dust from the rock. Particles so small that they penetrate to the finest branches of your lungs and settle there, layer by layer. The tissue scars. The lungs lose their elasticity. Breathing grows harder — not suddenly, but gradually, over years, sometimes decades.

Pneumoconiosis is an occupational disease. That must be said before anything else is said. The cause is real, physical, measurable: those who work underground, who break stone, who mine coal — their lungs are filled with material that does not belong there. That is not a failure of the body. It is a consequence of the conditions under which people had to work — and in some places still must.