A specific protein family known as serum mesothelin could help to effect earlier diagnoses for mesothelioma patients, says a new study produced by Australian cancer researchers. The proteins, demonstrates the study, are present in higher concentrations than normal in many mesothelioma patients. While the conclusions thus far don’t point to any immediately usable screening standard, the research could contribute to developing an effective screen for the disease in the future.

Mesothelioma is an aggressive and terminal cancer which has been conclusively linked to asbestos exposure. The disease can take as much as twenty to fifty years to develop after exposure to the dangerous substance, which seriously complicates and delays diagnosis leading to limited treatment options. Researchers have been looking for better ways to diagnose the disease for decades, but so far no one discovery has proven groundbreaking.

While modern asbestos exposure in the United States is somewhat under control, millions of individuals were exposed to the deadly mineral throughout the twentieth century owing to unscrupulous industrial employers. Mesothelioma’s long latency period, or the amount of time it takes to present after exposure to asbestos, means that diagnoses continue to rise annually even while exposure is diminishing. Mesothelioma claims some 3,000 American lives each year and around 90,000 worldwide. Some researchers estimate that to date nearly 10 million have died of the disease.

The Australian researchers worked to uncover the relevance of serum mesothelin by measuring its persistence and changes in concentration among several individuals who had been exposed to asbestos. The concentrations of the protein were measured over time and any fluctuations were recorded. The study stated that of those exposed to asbestos who later developed mesothelioma, about 15% were recorded with drastically higher serum mesothelin levels than normal. At the time of those patients’ diagnoses, some 40% of the individuals in the study underwent similar rises of serum mesothelin whether or not they went on to develop mesothelioma.

While the serum mesothelin study does not point to an immediately usable new method of diagnosis, it increases the medical community’s understanding of the body’s relationship with and reaction to asbestos contamination and mesothelioma development. This study and others like it could contribute to more effective screens for the disease in the future.

The House of Energy and Commerce Subcommittee held a hearing recently to consider the Toxic Chemicals Safety Act, H.R. 5820, which would further shape the Toxic Substances Control Act, a federal measure enacted in 1976. If passed, the new law will require manufacturers to prove that their products are safe to use in the way they’re intended to be before being permitted to market them to the public. The Toxic Chemicals Safety Act would also empower the Environmental Protection Agency to better protect the public from known toxins.

The proposed law, sponsored by both Rep. Bobby Rush (Democrat, Illinois) and Rep. Henry Waxmen (Democrat, California), would change the way in which dangerous products are dealt with, shifting responsibility away from consumers and back onto manufacturers. Presently, manufacturers cannot be held responsible for creating dangerous products if they aren’t aware of the product’s dangerous properties. This law could change all of that.

The necessity for improvements to the Toxic Substances Control Act, and more specifically, the necessity of granting the EPA more power over manufacturers of potentially dangerous products, is clear. Laws which are currently in place are insufficient for protecting the public from toxic substances. The EPA, for example, attempted to ban asbestos use in the United States during the 1980′s, reacting to reports that the substance caused a terminal cancer known as mesothelioma after mild to heavy exposure. The law which disallowed the substance, the Asbestos Ban and Phase Out Rule, was later overturned when Corrosion Proof Fittings, an asbestos advocating business superpower, successfully sued the EPA for, in effect, crippling its profits. Asbestos, now conclusively linked to several fatal diseases, remains legal in the United States to this day, even while asbestos related illnesses claim some 100,000 lives every year.

Asbestos isn’t the only threat to American health that’s available “off the shelf.” Pesticides, cleaning products, building materials, adhesives, medicines and even processed foods contain chemicals whose effects are unknown and potentially dangerous.

The Toxic Chemicals Safety Act could help to protect consumers by forcing manufacturers to do their homework before releasing their products to the public.

“This process is well worth the additional investment of time,” said Bobby Rush, Chairman of the Subcommittee on Commerce, Trade, and Consumer Protection, “[the law will enable] the EPA to better regulate, understand the properties of, and manage the health and environmental risks associated with the tens of thousands of chemicals that we find in our communities, homes, personal and work spaces, food and our bodies.”

The Cancer Society Relay for Life fund raiser raised almost $1,000,000 this year. The Relay for Life is a twenty-four hour event in which teams of participants walk or run around tracks, parks, athletic fields and other public places in relay for one day and one night. The events are intended to raise public awareness of various cancers as well as raise money to assist in research and treatment for cancer patients.

Students, volunteers and other participants take part in the event for various reasons, but many have had some form of personal brush with the disease. Doug Swain, a senior at the University of New Hampshire, walked the track with his team the UNH Superfriends Against Cancer. Doug’s late girlfriend was an inspiration for his part in the event. She passed away last year while suffering from two separate forms of cancer, one of which was mesothelioma.

Mesothelioma generally strikes victims that are much older. The disease is thought to be caused by exposure to asbestos, and generally takes decades to develop from the time of exposure. In the case of Doug’s late girlfriend Jess Fubel, doctors did not comment about the role mesothelioma played in her declining health, or about whether she may have been exposed to asbestos containing products.

The fund raising event at the University of New Hampshire was bolstered by bake sales, t-shirt sales, and other support efforts to increase the total raised. Groups of students took it upon themselves to make a real difference, working hard to raise significant funds and promote awareness in a real, lasting way. A group of young women who were students at the school organized a booth for taking hair donations, which will help in the production of wigs for cancer patients.

This year’s Relay for Life is the 25th of its kind. The events aim to inspire hope in those who are dealing with the affects of the disease personally, as well as increase public awareness of the disease’s prevalence in spite of decades of research.

While some forms of cancer such as mesothelioma can be linked with specific circumstances like asbestos exposure, many remain completely unexplained and appear to strike at random. Further research into the causes and possible treatments of cancer could help to discover medicines or treatment therapies for effectively combating one of least understood diseases of the twenty first century.

To learn more about the fight against cancer or what you can do to help, visit the American Cancer Society’s web page.

This Wednesday the 28th of April 2010 will mark the 26th annual commemoration of those who were injured, disabled, made unwell or even killed by their work. Known as Workers’ Memorial Day, the 28th of April is a day of remembrance honored by cultures across the globe from Canada and the United States through much of Europe, Asia and Africa. Workers’ Memorial Day is more than just a day of respecting the memory of the ill used and mistreated, it’s a day of revitalizing the efforts of labor unions, justice coalitions, and all of those working for fair, safe, healthy work environments for people throughout the world.

Union activity, litigation, and privately, federally and state funded employee education efforts have gone a long way in the past years and decades. Whether it’s the development of regulations and restrictions regarding the use of asbestos products, the banning of lead in consumer products, or any of the other hundreds of advances in employee safety, public outcry and participation has always made a difference.

Employee’s rights have certainly come a long way. The West Virginia branch of the AFCL-CIO, an international federation of labor unions, states that since the establishment of OSHA (Occupational Safety and Health Administration), “job fatalities, injuries and illnesses have been reduced significantly as have exposures to toxic substances such as asbestos, lead, benzene and cotton dust.”

While progress is definitely something to celebrate, the fight to secure the rights of workers continues every day. Every year approximately 270 million occupational accidents occur worldwide and more than 150 million incidents of work related illness are reported. Almost half a million people are killed annually from hazardous industrial substances alone, and more than one fifth of those are due to asbestos exposure.

While asbestos contamination is beginning to decline in many developed nations, its use continues with little or no restriction in developing countries. Mesothelioma, a fatal cancer caused by asbestos, as well as an array of other diseases linked to the dangerous substance will continue to claim innocent people’s lives as long as restrictions aren’t tightened and the responsible organizations aren’t held accountable.

“As vividly demonstrated by worker safety disasters that recently occurred, too many workers remain at risk, and face death, injury or disease as a result of their jobs,” said the AFCL-CIO spokesperson in West Virginia. “A workers’ right to have a safe work environment will require further workplace safety regulations and enforcement. It is our hope that Workers’ Memorial Day will help focus greater attention on workplace conditions and further our efforts to enact safety and health legislation.”

With April 28th right around the corner, there’s no better time to keep the Workers’ Memorial Day slogan in mind: “Remember the dead, fight for the living.”

The American Public Health Association, also known as APHA, called on congress for a ban on the use of asbestos products at the end of their annual meeting last month. Almost all of the 12,000 health professionals that were present agreed with the proposed measure.

The United States Environmental Protection Agency issued the Asbestos Ban and Phase Out Rule more than 20 years ago in 1989, but it was overturned just two years later in 1991 by the rich and powerful asbestos industry lobby. Since then, more than 40 developed countries across the world have completely banned the production and use of asbestos products. The United States and Canada remain as two surprising examples of nations that have thus far failed to completely protect the health interests of their populations in regards to asbestos exposure.

In the United States, asbestos continues to be imported for use in consumer products, construction materials, and some industrial and fabrication operations like the manufacture of brake pads. Last year, the USA actually saw an increase of asbestos imports of almost ten percent. Canada, on the other hand, is one of the last remaining developed nations that continues to mine and mill asbestos and holds the status of the world’s second largest asbestos producer, with Russia as the world’s first.

Due to the decades between the 1940′s and 1980′s when asbestos use was in its prime, much of the United States’ infrastructure is inundated with the dangerous material. Concrete, pipes, roofing tiles, flooring, drywall, insulation, vehicle paneling and other materials constructed throughout the 1980′s made extensive use of asbestos as a cheap, effective base for highly insulating, fireproof materials.

Unfortunately, the presence of asbestos fibers poses a serious threat to human health, causing diseases like asbestosis and mesothelioma with consequences ranging from respiratory difficulties to the development of terminal malignant tumors. Asbestos related diseases can take several decades to become diagnosable, which means that an asbestos ban may not visibly reduce their diagnoses for several generations.

The ban of asbestos by the European Union, and strict regulations regarding its use and safe handling in the United States and Canada dictate that the vast majority of asbestos materials are used in poorer, developing nations. India and China are both large scale importers of asbestos products, and continue to use pressed asbestos boards in the construction of homes and other buildings. A total ban of Asbestos in the United States could go a long way not only in protecting the health of our population, but in setting a respectable example for developing nations.

Leigh Carlisle became the UK’s youngest mesothelioma victim in August of last year. It’s still undetermined exactly how or when she was exposed to the deadly asbestos fibers that caused her death. Mesothelioma is often thought of as a disease diagnosed exclusively in the elderly, but the fact is that asbestos was used as an insulator and fire retardant in new construction until around the turn of the century. Asbestos fibers continue to turn up in residences, schools and even hospitals today, and while efforts continue to clean up and isolate asbestos contamination in the workplace and elsewhere, mesothelioma is far from “yesterday’s concern”.

Last year, Leigh Carlisle said “I used to take a shortcut across a yard in Failsworth on my way to primary school. I know that men working there cut asbestos sheets and handled asbestos materials in the yard, but I had no idea that by walking through the yard I could have inadvertently got cancer.”

While the exact source of asbestos that caused Leigh’s mesothelioma was never determined, the fact that the dangerous fibers were being used and even handled like a safe construction material just fifteen years ago is disconcerting.

Mesothelioma has an incredibly long latency, that is, the time it takes between exposure to asbestos fibers and the development of the cancer. With a latency between a few years and a few decades, we can expect to see mesothelioma diagnoses far after asbestos exposure is no longer considered a present danger – which is certainly not the case.

Leigh Carlisle died from mesothelioma when she was just twenty eight years old. Her family and loved ones were shocked and devastated.

“After the shock subsided we were left with the question how did Leigh come into contact with asbestos,” Leigh’s mother said, “we had the massive task of retracing her life. It meant talking to friends, family, neighbors – anyone who had come into contact with Leigh. We did our best to explore every avenue and possibility. That question still hangs over me and the family.”

Investigations never indicated an exact source of Leigh’s asbestos exposure and no one was held accountable for her disease and subsequent death. Her mother is not giving up, however, and says that she will fight to learn the truth about how her daughter contracted mesothelioma.

“We’re being told to get on with our lives and that we might never know how Leigh died,” she said, “we can’t be expected to be satisfied with this. We are a grieving family. We will always be grieving for Leigh. I owe it to my daughter to keep looking for what caused her cancer and I will not stop until my last breath.”