• Remote Area Medical offers free healthcare to impoverished Appalachia

    Mark Makela / Reuters

    People wait to receive a wristband number for medical treatment at the Remote Area Medical (RAM) clinic in Wise, Va. on July 20. RAM clinics bring free medical, dental and vision care to uninsured and under-insured people around the world.

    Mark Makela / Reuters

    RAM founder Stan Brock calls patients wristband numbers at the RAM clinic in Wise, Va. The Wise clinic was the 647th RAM expedition since 1985 and drew 1,700 patients from 14 states, organizers said.

    Mark Makela / Reuters

    A patient has an eye exam at the Wise, Va. RAM clinic on July 20.

    Mark Makela / Reuters

    Dentists work on patients at the RAM clinic in Wise, Va.

    Mark Makela / Reuters

    Joe Roberts, from Sutherland, Va., intending to have ten teeth extracted, waits for his wristband number to be called at the RAM clinic on July 20.

    By Jon Sweeney, NBC News

    Remote Area Medical clinics bring free health, dental and vision care to uninsured and under-insured people across the country and abroad. The Wise, Va. clinic held on July 20, was the 647th RAM expedition since 1985 and drew 1,700 patients from 14 states, organizers said.

    Reuters photographer, Mark Makela wrote in his blog: Witnessing horrific health cases, one after the other, was a heartbreaking experience.

    A 20-year-old had 20 teeth extracted. A mother of two who lost her job due to poor eye sight came for eye care and glasses. A three-year-old had to undergo oral surgery for a root canal and front teeth extraction. These were just a few of the heart-wrenching health cases I observed.

    There was a chronic pattern of poor oral hygiene and due to patients’ extreme dental pain they asked for teeth extraction instead of teeth repair. Continue reading

    Photos in this blog post were taken on July 20, but made available to NBC News today.

     

    Mark Makela / Reuters

    A dentist displays extracted teeth at the Wise, Va. RAM clinic, and drops them in a gallon jug of distilled water.

    Mark Makela / Reuters

    A board lists the variety of medical talks offered at the RAM clinic.

    Mark Makela / Reuters

    A chihuahua named Bella leans on her owner the night before the RAM clinic opens in Wise, Va. on July 19.

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  • Miners eat into the Appalachians

    Mario Tama / Getty Images

    An explosive is detonated at an A & G Coal Corporation surface mining operation in the Appalachian Mountains on April 16, in Wise County, Va. Critics refer to this type of mining as 'mountaintop removal mining' which has destroyed 500 mountain peaks and at least 1,200 miles of streams while leading to increased flooding. The Appalachians are some of the oldest mountains on Earth.

    Mario Tama / Getty Images

    An explosive is detonated at an A & G Coal Corporation surface mining operation in the Appalachian Mountains on April 16, in Wise County, Va.

    Mario Tama / Getty Images

    A & G Coal Corporation surface mining operations continue in the mist in the Appalachian Mountains on April 18, in Wise County, Va.

    By Katie Cannon, Senior Multimedia Editor

    These frames reminded me of a 2009 piece by Yale Environment 360 and MediaStorm entitled Leveling Appalachia: The Legacy of Mountaintop Removal Mining.

  • Former steelworker hopes $2 billion chemical plant will revive Appalachia city

    Jason Cohn / Reuters

    First year apprentice ironworker George Vacheresse pauses during a class at Ironworkers Local 539 in Wheeling, West Virginia. Vacheresse was a steelworker for 17 years but decided to retrain after watching layoffs erode the workforce at his machinist shop over 17 years. He hopes his new skills will lead to a much higher-paying job.

    Jason Cohn / Reuters

    The town of Wheeling, West Virginia is emblematic of the economically struggling region it sits in, and could get a big boost from a new Shell chemical plant planned for the area. Real estate agents, restaurants, banks and others report a business jump that they expect to be made permanent by the arrival of chemical plants.

    Reuters reports from Wheeling, West Virginia — In George Vacheresse's lifetime, Appalachia has fallen from its prime when steel mills and coal mines anchored middle-class communities and offered hope there always would be enough work to go around.

    In this historically poor region nestled in the misty mountains of the eastern United States, most steel mills shut down long ago and the coal workforce has shrunk by 90 percent in the past 40 years.

    Now Vacheresse and other residents are counting on cheap natural gas from the massive reserves in the Marcellus and Utica shale rock formations to reinvigorate the region's economy.

    In the Northern Appalachia area alone, where West Virginia, Ohio and Pennsylvania converge, billions of dollars of investment is planned by major companies, including most recently Royal Dutch Shell, to recover the gas and build new chemical plants.

    "I hope it gives us jobs for everybody," said Vacheresse, 39, who last fall joined an apprentice scheme at a Wheeling, iron workers' labor union to learn how to work in steel construction. He made the move after watching layoffs erode the workforce at his machinist shop over 17 years. He expects his new skills will lead to a much higher-paying job building Shell's planned new $2 billion cracker, industry slang for a chemical plant.

    "Something like this could carry our region for years and years," he said. Read the full story.

    Jason Cohn / Reuters

    Charles Comas, owner of Comas Family Barber Shop on Main Street in Wheeling, West Virginia, finishes giving a hair cut to regular customer John Oliver on March 6, 2012. Oliver, who has lived in Wheeling his whole life, remembers when the now sparsely occupied downtown was so packed with people "you couldn't walk down the street without bumping into someone." He is skeptical that the burgeoning shale gas industry or the rumoured Shell cracker plant will help the city.

    Jason Cohn / Reuters

    A community garden is seen in a vacant lot left over from one of few demolished buildings on Main Street in Wheeling, West Virginia. The city is struggling to find creative ways to deal with their down economy while waiting for new investment.

    Jason Cohn / Reuters

    First year Ironworker apprentices (left-right) Ian Welshhans, Daniel Truax and Jason Taylor practice their welding skills during a class at the Ironworkers Local 549 training facility in Wheeling, West Virginia on March 6, 2012.

    Jason Cohn / Reuters

    An old Ohio Edison electric plant, rumored to be the site for the first new U.S. chemical cracker plant in more than 20 years, is seen across the Ohio river from Moundsville, West Virginia.