'They said she had asthma. I was thinking: why? She was not born with asthma.'
SA’s coal industry, the world’s fifth largest, employs 90,000 miners, generates 80% of the country’s electricity, and supplies the feedstock for about a quarter of the country’s liquid fuel for vehicles, all at a time of soaring unemployment and frequent blackouts.
“We understand that there are serious health challenges facing communities,” she said, adding that the government considers improving air quality “absolutely imperative”. Eskom's green push, however, has put the company in conflict with energy minister Gwede Mantashe, who has called ditching coal “economic suicide”.
Then, in May 2018, as she approached her fourth birthday, Princess started struggling to breathe. They rushed her to the hospital, where a doctor put a mask on Princess's face attached to a nebuliser.Towards the end of that year, they had a second child, Asemahle, who soon also developed breathing problems.Hospital visits became routine, and the medical costs started to mount.
The region’s sulphur dioxide levels, meanwhile, are off the charts. The non-profit Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air this month found that Eskom alone emits more SO2 than the entire power sector of the US and China combined.
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