The Most Dangerous Black Market You've Never Heard Of

Mercury is crucial to small-scale gold mining in South America, but growing scrutiny of its impact on health and the environment in the Amazon is leading to its ban across the continent. Unfortunately, mercury can affect the neurological system, the brain and the nervous system, but if trading in the Fast silver is prohibited. Economies that depend on gold mining risk collapsing. You are doing all this hard work and just because of silver and its components, one of the last countries to legally import mercury is Guyana, making it the nexus for smuggling mercury to neighboring countries. countries where poultry work is banned is very good because it is the only job I have and I have taken care of my family this way since I ratified an international treaty in 2014 aimed at reducing mercury known as the minimum convention, the government of Guyana must phase out its use, putting miners who depend on mercury at odds with the government they can't stop it no matter what they do they have a little close up in the river our investigation delves into the underworld of mercury following its path from Guyana Next Door exploring the health and environmental implications of what a mercury ban would mean for the livelihoods of children and communities along the Amazon.

Twenty thousand kilos of mercury are legally imported into the Guyanese capital of Georgetown from the United States, Russia, the United Kingdom and other countries each year. Increasing quantities are also imported. by Chinese

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businessmen representing a multi-billion dollar industry of legal boating in the illicit mercury trade in downtown Georgetown dozens of gold shops and mining supply stores split up and sell mercury under the table in small quantities From here minibuses and charter planes distribute the mercury to small gold mine buyers throughout the interior of Guyana and traffic it to neighboring countries where it is sold at 10 times the price.

Talking about mercury is taboo for

most

traders who lack the documentation to move the liquid legally. metals None of the mercury traders were willing to speak in public or on camera, so our investigation first takes us to Madia, a historic center of gold production in the interior of Guyana, surrounded by mines scattered throughout the lush forests. , we came across an operator who requested that his identity be concealed. prevent it from being associated with an illegal method of mercury extraction, you're not coming to see this, charge me if I see them coming, they have to hide it or something, but they don't want this here early in the morning, sometime at five pm. watch you have to get up and get in cold water you have to go overboard and start pumping this water let's be honest from six to six every day something like ten cents we had five cents we had six but it goes so well without the money you can No you drop it, yes, silver mercury, drop it on the silver leaf in the pond or it will bother you right here.

You see the money still working. Not without the money. You can't catch it. Don't go this morning, but I like the key to this car. Barry Youngsta. silvo useful more key cardigo as dust very fine dust fine fine mercury joins with flecks of gold to form an amalgam that is easier to collect without it, the miners would go home empty-handed and targets for the children of the same way they got food, grass, i in their Minds forget that Goldman will get salad and get this money, so let them go to school. Yes, it is very important that if the government does not want money and it is legal, we have to go look for it, so we would do it if it goes underground. it will be more expensive if I'm wrong here let's punish our smile my name is crying until now the bustling trade of madia embodies the free spirit of the Guyana hinterland the gold rush has a firm grip on the people here demanding a A constant flow of Mercury miners who work hard for weeks go to the city to sell their gold and spend their money in bars under the supervision of women, al

most

all of them fleeing the humanitarian crisis in Venezuela.

Madian buyers and jewelers burn off excess mercury from turning gold from fresh mines. a shapeless mass in refined bars while exposing themselves to an invisible danger, no problem, I wouldn't have someone who made 20 or 30 a goal and came to sell here, they would go to Georgetown, but someone who came with a one, two, three . four pennyweight ten pennyweight these are the people who support the business here so basically you smelled or you're dealing with a lot of mercury you're supposed to be prepared you definitely do your whip this is the last stage what I'm I'm going to burn the mercury out of the goal now you can see I'm doing it without gloves.

Someone might look at it and say it's definitely wrong, yes, but I trust the pump I bought now. No, I feel 100% safe. with the system now, what I used to use before, I didn't have the power to do that, there would be more curry floating everywhere, everyone would have been affected by it, so here it comes true, the mercury come true is here directly in the impeller. here and it is captured with a shower head with water, there is a water system that passes through a water pump here also at the same time, so at the same time the water keeps rotating from the bottom towards the shower head hitting the mercury dome, but before I was Definitely exposed and was in education Why is it happening around me if we don't have mercury?

You are saying what is going to happen to mining. I think large scale miners would benefit more small miners. The ones I depend on here right now. they will fade away they will definitely be put aside, it would create I'm thinking if this is what I'm doing to support my family alone, what else am I going to look at? What am I supposed to do? Gold mining has been the dominant economy in communities like Maria for generations, but for many in the industry who have worked with toxic mercury, the long-term health effects can be devastating, it is important to get treatment and get the mercury out. into your system and then let it sit around and build up and cause organ damage.

Damage, let's see what's happening with your blood, the pressure you left at home was 129. Okay, the patients I've seen are miners, jewelers, people who burn mercury along this chain legally and illegally. Unfortunately, mercury can affect the neurological system, the brain and the nervous system. it can also affect the muscles the liver can cause some impotence the kidney and urinary system can affect the genital system their people were employed by foreign companies and their job description is simply to handle mercury handle and burn mercury and they are having the levels higher mercury, the mercury test is somewhat expensive compared to a person's urn in this country, so most people didn't go at all.

There are quite a few rumors even in Georgetown and beyond Georgetown about what treatment means, does mercury treatment carry side effects, etc. and that's another deterrent in terms of treating people who have mercury contamination those rumors are incorrect. I have now treated over 400 people, the side effects the way the protocols I have set up are extremely minimal, I know patients I have had for about 10 years, jewelers etc. whose mercury kept rising and they didn't go because they didn't even know where to go and the cost of the ticket and then the cost of the treatment which seems to be a deterrent sometimes during the course in the morning you just start feeding it, often the males and minors, etc.

They take a long time to arrive unless something serious is happening to them despite the consensus among medical professionals about the health impacts of mercury. many minors prefer to turn a blind eye to me when I look at more stream it is not as

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as the impression they give to people they say that you would be impotent they would make the children deform my father's 84 currently they did not use half a bucket of mercury as my father earns 17 shares with my mother 17 children I have 17 siblings and 16 with me 17. and my mother and father are still alive and strong while challenges persist around health awareness in mining communities mercury is too profitable to abandon trafficking of the element in neighboring countries where it is banned has become big business.

Now we're heading to Carriveton to meet up with the fast-moving silver smugglers on the Guyana-Suriname border, it's illegal yes, but you're not going to like the extra cholesterol, it's not like you. You're bringing uranium or you're bringing it, you know what I'm saying. The beaches and the Caribbean are popular places for partying on weekends during the day, but they are also key traffic points between Guyana and Suriname at night. It is an open beach. You know, most fisheries, but you can't tell what on our night we're not out there, you know, saying one thing, get ready for the show.

Mercury is often trafficked with gold and drugs through the same networks by the same smugglers. This combination of illicit economies creates opportunities. to multiply the profits of anyone willing to take the risk, mercury is illegal there but it is legal here so you will find the demand there is crazy it is very high so it doesn't matter what you say about their laws and everything I still have to survive because at the end of the day I have to try to get the person to get it for me. It's a way out of this because it's just a revelation.

I'll tell you so that things can always move forward. You have to make sense in the water all the time and that's they don't make sense, you know, saying they can't stop that no matter what they do, but maybe governments or whoever you are a legal trader don't give a damn. cumin because at the end of the day they don't give us anything you know what I'm saying you have to make a living at dawn a boat smuggler agrees to take us through a way back a series of informal river crossings from Guyana to the last name facilitating smuggling the country's borders and greasing the wheels of the local economy the mercury is moving out of place but without the eyes of the people we are now adding this is the river channel are you there?

Do you know what happens if we don't travel like the day? At times like this, the night closes, take it, yeah, and they load it on the boat and they're going to apologize now, like this, then show a big class like this guy, it's very

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, they charge you money if the police catch you and the last name you go to. imprison the guy who bought it goes the other way again we leave equality on the last name side of the river we are introduced to a former ship captain who knows about the trade as demanded by the metal fuel spill dementor has filters Mercury fast foreigners on the last name through the back trail and hidden in vehicles at the ferry crossing controlled by customs where it passes invisible real barter checkpoints our investigation now takes us to Brownsville in the heart of Suriname, while the former Dutch colony has not legally imported mercury since 2004 remains of gold mining the engine of the tsunami economy more than half of the gold is mined using mercury bought and sold on the

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to maroon communities of African descent in Brunswick and others parts of the interior of Suriname.

Gold mining is the most lucrative industry available, but its community mining operations are being criminalized due to dependence on mercury large foreign companies favored by the government use a toxic chemical cyanide to put locally run operations out of business b Quick is the most densely forested country in the world, more than 90 percent of its territory is covered by jungle, but once the mercury is burned in mines or smelters, the trade winds transport it hundreds of kilometers and deposit it in rain, which eventually contaminates pristine ecosystems, even when you stop the mercury tomorrow it is still there, the mercury that is already in the system will be there for centuries to which it binds. small particles of sediment that settle to the bottom a fish gets into the mud and the mercury is released again and is available for organisms to absorb annumara imara sometimes called in English is the giant wolffish which is a fish that grows Piganyas of this size are also often eaten and also have a high mercury content and of course that is a problem because people like to eat big fish, which of course is not the whole story as biologist, I also have to think about other organisms, many fish that eat animals that are also fish. impacted and we don't know anything about what the impact is like waters many birds that depend on fish we don't know because we don't measure five centuries ten centuries I don't know but it is very persistent stopping the market is what you have to do because things get worse every once again in the surname capital of Paramariba.

Professor Dennis Whip has been collecting air samples that show levelsextremes of mercury pollution in the heart of the booming Belain gold district, once considered a problem in Far- Out of mind, this new research suggests a major threat to the public health of urban populations. We have a big problem due to the high concentration of mercury in the air. The wind will take the mercury vapor and deflect it, and it depends on what kind of miracle you have it. It only vaporizes and we know that it is transported in 10 20 kilometers, even 100 kilometers can be transported and in Paramaribo we have seen measurements that are 6 to 12 times higher than what we have measured in the gold fields that means that in the city We have We have to take care of the gold business we have in Paramaribo.

They purify the gold at a higher temperature than they did. They do it in the field, so the emissions are quite high due to the fact that the retorts are not working properly. We have a big problem due to the high concentration of mercury in the air. We have measurements in some places in the city of around 30,000 nanograms per cubic meter. A microgram is very, very, very high. We have not done medical tests on the surface. We have not taken blood or urine samples we have not taken those samples and we have not examined the body, we need more medical tests and in fact a large medical survey in paramedics to observe this our investigation has come to an end in paramaribo, the key center mineral trade from the Guyana Shield region, gold from Guyana and Suriname makes its way to refineries in countries such as Switzerland, Canada and the Middle East and then to the international market as long as demand remains high, communities near the Mines such as Madia and Brunswick will continue to depend on and suffer the consequences of the use of mercury.

Trafficking routes are as fluid as mercury itself adapting to law enforcement like any black market while miners fear a stricter ban could destroy their livelihoods, traders and traffickers anticipate millions of dollars in profits from new restrictions as the mercury continues to leave its mark on the Amazon, so you