As time goes by,  it is growing harder for the nuclear industry to hide the toxic effects and legacy of uranium mining. But, uranium mining still disproportionately affects people who can be marginalized in some way by governments. The case against uranium mining is not only a public health and environmental issue, it is also a human rights issue.

Indian Country l Tristan Ahtone January 19, 2012

Kenny Slattery has lived on the Wind River Reservation for 51 years, and just across the street from the old Susquehanna-Western uranium mill tailings pile for that entire period of time. “They say there’s a cancer cluster in this area,” says Slattery. “I don’t know, but my mother died of lung cancer, and my father died of prostate cancer. My cousin’s husband died of esophageal cancer just a half-mile from here, and other people have died from cancer around this area too. Dogs have died of cancer. It’s strange.”

The site is just a few miles southwest of Riverton, the ninth-most-populated city in Wyoming. It has a long history of contamination, as well as a cloud of rumors. “People say there’s a one-eyed fish over here,” says Slattery as he points to the pond in question. “Just one eye,” he says again, then laughs.

It sounds funny, but over the years, officials have begun taking these kinds of stories very seriously. “We know of some of our tribal members down there who have suffered some real serious cancers,” says Wes Martel, Shoshone and Arapaho Joint Business Council co-chair. “Thyroid disorders and nerve disorders and respiratory disorders and babies being born with deformities and things like that.”

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