Archive for March, 2008
Federal Agency Finally Protects Miners from Asbestos
The Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA) has established stringent new rules designed to protect miners from exposure to asbestos. Over the last thirty years, research has proven that asbestos can be the cause of mesothelioma, a lethal form of cancer that usually attacks the lungs. The MSHA regulations were published in the Federal Register on February 29th of 2008.
The new rules are the direct result of a report from the office of the Inspector General, another federal agency that conducted a study of deaths from asbestos exposure among miners and their families in the town of Libby, Montana. The Inspector General’s report and suggestion to the MSHA occurred in 2005, and has prompted the MSHA to reduce allowable airborne asbestos exposure for miners by 95%.
The Toxic Disaster at the World Trade Center
From September 11, 2001 to the present, the evidence of toxic materials impacting World Trade Center responders and volunteers has been overwhelming. During the early stages of the disaster response, the New York Fire Department developed a WTC screening program, which documented a substantial proportion of respiratory symptoms among emergency workers.
The Environmental Protection Agency reported enormous density figures for airborne particles in the hours after the initial disaster. Lesser amounts of pollutants continued to rise from the site for weeks to follow. Exposures from smoldering fires continued until December 2001. The EPA determined that WTC dust “contained pulverized (alkaline) cement, glass fibers, asbestos, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), and polychlorinated furans and dioxins.”
Criminal Asbestos Removal
Many of the people who are now suffering from asbestos-caused mesothelioma came into contact with the potentially lethal substance while removing it from buildings or industrial sites. Over the years, the EPA and other agencies have developed a protocol for asbestos removal that recognizes the danger from exposure to asbestos for workers who are charged with cleaning buildings contaminated with it.
Those safety guidelines, developed to avoid further asbestos-related disease, are also built into state and local laws. Recently a New Jersey school maintenance superintendent was convicted of a felony and a misdemeanor for providing false information to a federal agent and preparing a false report involving asbestos in district buildings.
World Trade Center Diseases
There is overwhelming evidence that people who were among the emergency response crews to the 9/11 disaster, and people who live and work in the neighborhood of the World Trade Center site have suffered enormously high rates of respiratory difficulties. The near-term symptoms of these diseases include coughing, wheezing, reduced lung capacity and other pulmonary abnormalities.
Approximately 40,000 people were either first responders to the disaster or were involved in the subsequent search for survivors and remains, and the site cleanup that followed. Virtually all of them were exposed to caustic dust and toxic pollutants in the process. There is concern in the medical community that the continuing symptoms of lung-related disease or injury could lead to development of malignancies such as mesothelioma, the lethal lung cancer directly connected to asbestos exposure.
American Asbestos and Canadian Mesothelioma
The link between asbestos and the lethal cancer mesothelioma has long been established and in the United States, the firms who manufactured and used asbestos in their products have in many cases settled thousands of asbestos related lawsuits and/or established a fund to provide compensation to victims.
Those bankruptcies have created a barrier for at least one Canadian who feels she has a valid mesothelioma lawsuit that she cannot pursue. The plaintiff, Raven Thundersky, is blocked from suing the U.S. manufacturer according to Canadian law because that firm filed for bankruptcy. According to Canadian law, that protects the American manufacturer of the insulation, W.R. Grace. While W.R. Grace did file bankruptcy because of its asbestos liability, it has emerged and is once again in operation.
