One of the deadliest chemicals on Earth is being smuggled across Latin America – and it's poisoning the environment along the way.
Mercury is a powerful neurotoxin and its use is banned or heavily restricted throughout the world. But it's "essential" to the illegal gold mining trade, one of the Amazon's "most destructive criminal economies", said The Associated Press.
Once extracted from the Earth's crust, mercury "persists in the environment indefinitely", said The Guardian. Those who drink water and consume food contaminated by it are gradually poisoned. But with the current record high gold prices, selling mercury has become "so lucrative that one of Mexico's deadliest cartels has entered the business".
Mercury trafficking is having a "particularly profound impact" on the health of Indigenous people, said Mongabay, a non-profit environmental media organisation. Communities that live near mining sites in the Amazon have been exposed to high concentrations of the element. In Peru's Madre de Dios region – an "epicentre of illegal mining" – mercury contamination has been detected in drinking water and even breast milk, said AP. Long-term exposure can cause "irreversible damage to the brain and nervous system, particularly in children and pregnant women".
There are equipment and methods that can replace mercury's role in the gold mining process, and reduce the risk of contamination, but there is currently little market incentive to adopt them. The issue is "expected to take centre stage" at the Conference of the Parties to the Minamata Convention in November, where advocates "hope to eliminate legal loopholes" and enforce phase-out timelines. | 
