NIOSH Pauses Federal Black Lung Screening Program for Coal Miners

The National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) announced it will not be accepting new patient requests related specifically to the Coal Workers’ Health Surveillance Program (CWHSP).  The agency’s website states:

“Notice: Due to the reduction in force across NIOSH, the NIOSH Coal Workers’ Health Surveillance Program (CWHSP) is not providing any new medical screenings to coal miners or accepting any new requests for review of medical information to determine coal miners’ rights for transfer to low-dust jobs.”

The CWHSP was established by the Federal Coal Mine Health and Safety Act of 1969 to provide black lung screenings without cost to miners. The program is among occupational surveillance programs and activities that use physician B Readers to perform International Labour Organization (ILO) classifications of pneumoconiosis in chest radiographs. Since 1970, the CWHSP has provided more than 500,000 classifications to more than 300,000 coal miners and monitored nearly 22,000 coal miners with black lung.  

Certified physician B Readers are critical for monitoring the respiratory health of workers in several occupations in addition to coal miner surveillance by the CWHSP. The American College of Radiology® (ACR®) provides a course to prepare radiologists and other physicians for the B Reader certification exam.

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services announced a restructuring plan March 27, including a plan to consolidate NIOSH into a new HHS agency/office called the Administration for a Healthy America (AHA). HHS reduced its workforce April 1, which impacted CWHSP and B Reader certification staff within NIOSH. It is unknown if the future AHA will reestablish these activities. 

ACR continues to monitor this situation. If you have questions or are able to share more information, contact Michael Peters, ACR Senior Director, Government Affairs.