“Miners who get black lung, a debilitating and incurable disease caused by breathing in coal dust, are entitled by federal law to compensation, often from their former employer. But the series, which was the result of a yearlong investigation, revealed two ways that coal companies undermined miners’ claims to benefits: Lawyers for coal companies withheld evidence that miners had the disease, and doctors consistently failed to diagnose black lung. One installment detailed how Wheeler had read X-rays in more than 1,500 cases decided since 2000 without finding a single case of severe black lung, even as other doctors saw the disease in hundreds of cases and other evidence repeatedly proved him wrong. The Senate subcommittee on Employment and Workplace Safety invited Wheeler or a representative from Johns Hopkins to testify at Tuesday’s hearing but was told no one would be available, a staff member for subcommittee chairman Sen. Robert Casey said.”
— Black lung claims by 1,100 coal miners may have been wrongly denied | Center for Public Integrity