“Amalgamation is one of the various procedures to extract gold in Gebeit from an ore slurry by dissolving it in mercury and forming a liquid mercury-gold alloy. Despite the primitive and dangerous nature of the technique, more than 1000 people in the Gebeit village are daily using it (Fig. 7). Gold recuperates from tailings and impure quartz. By heating the amalgam, Hg releases directly into air, and still impure gold with about 1% mercury is sold nearby. Mercury in the form of vapor is resorbed by the lungs when it enters the body by respiration. This, will cause a chronic mercurial poison, if inhaling occurs over a long period of time.”
Source: “Environmental impact associated with past mining activity at Gebeit gold mine district, Red Sea Hills, NE Sudan” by Hussein, H. A. and Matheis, G.
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