Janice Martell discussing the use of McIntyre Powder in mines.

A TV Ontario documentary broadcast Friday July 4 looks at the history of the mining community in Elliot Lake, Ontario. The town was built in the 1950s to house men who worked at the uranium mine and their families, and a prosperous community sprouted up quickly. The mines closed forty years later, and the city became a "ghost town."  With its beautiful natural setting and cheap real estate, Elliot Lake found new life as one of Ontario's top retirement communities. But the aftermath of life in the mines and limited health resources for the city's aging population poses problems that have not been sufficiently addressed.

Janice Martell, Occupational Health Coordinator at OHCOW, appears in the documentary. She started the McIntyre Powder Project more than ten years ago to investigate the mandatory use of McIntyre Powder by miners and its long-term health effects. Inhaling aluminum powder was believed to protect the lungs from silicosis, but it caused illnesses including Parkinson's Disease in those who were forced to use it. A former miner, her father Jim Hobbs was diagnosed with the disease and died in 2017.  After years of investigation and advocacy work, Martell was instrumental in WSIB Ontario's decision in January 2022 to recognize Parkinson's as an industrial disease, and a compensation program has been started for effected miners and their families.

The Elliot Lake community still feels the effects of the mining industry to this day. The entire documentary is available to view: