Philippines | Rights group says child miners risk lives in gold mines

Thousands of Filipino children, some as young as 9 years old, risk their lives by working in illegal, small-scale gold mines under terrifying conditions and the government has not done enough to protect them, a human rights group said yesterday.
A Human Rights Watch report said the children work in unstable 25-meter deep pits or underwater along coastal shores or rivers, processing gold with mercury, a toxic metal that can cause irreversible health damage. Those who dive for gold stay underwater for several hours at a time in 10-meter- deep shafts, receiving air through a tube attached to an air compressor.
The New York-based group says it interviewed 135 people, including 65 child miners from 9 to 17 years of age, in eastern Camarines Norte and Masbate provinces during field research in 2014 and 2015.
The Philippines had nearly 5.5 million working children in 2011, according to government statistics, with 3.2 million of them considered child laborers because they worked long hours or in hazardous environments. AP