Black lung likely linked to Qld deaths

The mining union says a black-lung "cover-up" is about to be exposed, as a Queensland parliamentary inquiry is told a similar disease could be affecting more workers.

Nineteen cases of the illness, otherwise known as coal workers' pneumoconiosis and caused by long-term exposure to airborne coal dust, have been recently confirmed in Queensland.

Stephen Smyth from the CFMEU told Channel Nine's Today Show the problem has been overlooked for a long time.

"The departments within the government is where the real issues lie," Mr Smyth said on Thursday.

"They are the ones that have been asleep at the wheel not enforcing the law and not providing the appropriate health services to our coal miners."

The inquiry also revealed thousands of X-rays of coal workers' lungs had been stored in a shipping container next to a Queensland Health facility at Ipswich, while others were kept in a broom closet.

Dr Robert Cohen, an international expert on black lung who gave evidence at the inquiry on Wednesday, expressed his concern that the lack of diagnoses over recent decades in a state with 30,000 coal miners didn't ring alarm bells.

"It sort of beggars the imagination," he said on Wednesday.

"You would wonder if there was something wrong with the surveillance as opposed to congratulating yourself that you've eliminated the disease."

Dr Cohen also said it was "very likely" former coal miners who have died in the intervening decades were suffering from undiagnosed black lung.

He also insisted workers on Brisbane's Legacy Way and Airport Link should undergo silicosis testing, and described exposure to silicone as "probably more dangerous" than coal dust, The Courier Mail reported.

Dr Cohen seemed unsettled when asked by chairwoman Jo-Ann Miller if workers on the projects should be tested, replying: "I hope you don't mean to tell me that they're not being tested."

A report is due back to parliament in April.