Author: Nancy Meredith
Higher Mortality Among Chrysotile Asbestos Miners in Italy, Study Says
Italian researchers found an elevated incidence of mesothelioma in a study of more than 1,000 miners who worked at an asbestos mine near Turin, Italy. Their findings were reported in the scientific journal Occupational and Environmental Medicine.
The Balangero mine, located near Turin, Italy, used to be Europe’s largest open pit asbestos mine. By the 1970s, the mine produced 130,000 to 160,000 tons per year of chrysotile asbestos. It closed in 1990, two years before Italy banned the mining, marketing and use of all types of asbestos including Chrysotile because of the human health hazards.
Medical researchers have been tracking the mine’s former workers to understand better the long-term health effects of breathing asbestos dust. Asbestos-related diseases such as malignant mesothelioma, a cancer of the lining of the lungs or abdomen closely linked to inhaling asbestos fibers, typically don’t appear until decades after exposure.
In the 2009 study in the scientific journal Occupational and Environmental Medicine, researchers from four Italian medical institutions reported a significantly higher than expected death rate from pleural and peritoneal mesothelioma among the Balangero miners. All of the cases of mesothelioma occurred more than 30 years after exposure, and two occurred more than 50 years later. Four of the five cases involved miners exposed to asbestos dust for more than 20 years.
The study expands on earlier published research that found an increased risk of oral, laryngeal and pleural cancers among the Balangero asbestos miners, based on health information and mortality data through 1987. The new research tracks 1,056 miners for 16 additional years —through 2003.
The researchers computed expected mortality rates from certain cancers and other causes of death in the province of Turin and throughout Italy. They then compared the expected rates to the actual mortality among the workers employed at the mines starting in 1946 and later. They found four times as many deaths from pleural mesothelioma as expected and increased mortality for pleural and peritoneal cancer combined.
The study also supports a recent conclusion by the U.S. Institute of Medicine that there is sufficient evidence to support an association between asbestos and laryngeal cancer. The study found a greater than 80 percent increased number of deaths from larynegeal cancer above the norm.
Overall, the researchers found excess mortality among the Balangero mine workers from asbestos-related diseases including mesothelioma, lung cancer and asbestosis as well as other alcohol-related conditions such as cirrhosis of the liver.
New York Attorney Discusses How To Pinpoint Asbestos Exposure
People who get diagnosed with mesothelioma fall into two categories, said New York attorney Joseph Belluck.
There are those who know automatically how they were exposed to asbestos, the toxic fibers that when inhaled can cause respiratory diseases such as mesothelioma, an incurable cancer of the lining of the lungs or abdomen.
“They worked in a Navy ship, or they worked in a factory,” said Belluck, noting occupations commonly associated with asbestos exposure. “They were an automobile mechanic. Their father was a plumber.”
Then there are other people who are diagnosed with mesothelioma who have no idea how they were exposed. They’re looking for answers.
“In almost every case like that, we are able to find an exposure to asbestos,” said Belluck, a partner in Belluck & Fox, a nationally-known law firm that specializes in representing victims of asbestos-related disease. “We’ve represented dentists, veterinarians, physicians, laboratory technicians, teachers. A lot of times people have worked with asbestos, for example dentists or jewelers, and they’re not even aware that they did.”
A Life History
Belluck said it’s important to keep in mind that if someone has mesothelioma, then they were exposed to asbestos at some point. Identifying the exposure is a matter of thoroughly examining their background.
“We start by meeting with our client and taking a very, very thorough life history of the client that includes their occupational history, any military service that they had and any work with asbestos that they would have done at their home or on their automobiles,” Belluck said.
“A lot of times the clients aren’t even aware that certain things they did exposed them to asbestos,” Belluck said. “So that interview is very, very important.
“We have dealt with people in all walk’s of life so we have a good idea of what questions to ask,” he said.
In addition, the lawyers gather information about the occupations of their client’s parent, children and spouses to see if there might have been second-hand exposure to asbestos through other family members.
“If the person served on a ship in the Navy or the Merchant Marine, we would get records from the Coast Guard or the Navy as to the design of the ship and what equipment was on the ship,” Belluck said. “We would hire a researcher in Washington to go to the Naval archives or the Coast Guard archives and actually pull the drawings and documents related to the specific ship that our clients were on.”
“There is a lot of investigation that goes into the case prior to filing it so we know who the proper defendants are,” he said.
New York Work Sites
For many work sites in New York, Belluck & Fox has already conducted extensive investigations and document reviews and is familiar with the equipment and types of boilers on site and possible ways workers could be exposed to asbestos.
“If someone worked at the Kodak plant in Rochester (https://www.belluckfox.com/new-york-asbestos-companies/eastman-kodak/) or the General Electric plant in Schenectady (https://www.belluckfox.com/new-york-asbestos-companies/ge-schenectady/), we’ve already done a lot of work on those sites and the products that we were there,” Belluck said.
“We would use a lot of records and documents that we already have in house here, which is really the main reason to hire a firm like ours,” Belluck said. “We already have a lot of the information and knowledge stored here that allows us to prosecute the lawsuit.”
The number of defendants often named in asbestos lawsuits also makes the cases somewhat unusual. “There may be 15 or 20 parties that contribute to a settlement or overall recovery,” Belluck said. “The majority of defendants settle and one or two hang around and we either have to start trial or finish trial against those.”
Fast Track Docket
Belluck said most cases settle out of court, although every case is prepared as if it is going to trial. Because New York courts often grant requests to put asbestos lawsuits on an expedited schedule because of the plaintiff’s declining health, the cases are often resolved in a year or less.
“It’s a very, very fast docket.” Belluck said. “From the time that we get the case until the time that it’s over is usually seven to 12 months.”
The cases typically settle without a trial, which means the plaintiffs receive their compensation more quickly.
“There are a lot of benefits to settlement for everybody in terms of the risk involved, expense of trial, the emotional and time commitment of a trial,” Belluck said.
Residents Near Asbestos Plant at 26 Times Greater Risk of Mesothelioma, Study Says
By Wade Rawlins
Much remains to be learned about environmental exposure to asbestos and the incidence of mesothelioma among people who have only “second hand” exposure such as families of asbestos workers or people who live near asbestos companies. That is a focus of new research in Libby, Montana where vermiculite ore tainted with asbestos has caused a high rate of asbestos-related disease. It’s also the subject of recently completed research from Egypt.
A study published by researchers in Egypt earlier this year examined environmental exposure to asbestos near Cairo, Egypt and the link to malignant pleural mesothelioma, a rare cancer of the lining of the lungs. The study appeared in the Eastern Mediterranean Health Journal, a publication of the World Health Organization.
http://www.who.int/mediacentre/factsheets/fs343/en/
The prevalence of mesothelioma, an incurable cancer, has been increasing throughout the industrialized world with the incidence predicted to peak around 2020, the study said. A number of studies have linked exposure to airborne asbestos fibers in the workplace to increased incidence of mesothelioma among workers employed in mining, textile manufacturing, insulation and asbestos cement factories. Families of asbestos workers and those living near asbestos mines and mills also are at increased risk of mesothelioma from environmental exposure, studies suggest.
The Egyptian researchers focused their study on Shubra El-Kheima, an industrial city at the northern edge of Cairo. For decades starting in 1948, the city had a large manufacturing plant that used chrysotile asbestos to make asbestos cement pipe and reinforced concrete products. In 2004, the Egyptian government decided to ban imports of asbestos and the plant closed.
While the plant was still operating full scale, the researchers obtained air samples inside the plant and in neighborhoods up to about 2 miles away. That allowed the researchers to calculate more precisely the amount of asbestos fibers that workers and residents were inhaling and then to estimate the relationship between levels of exposure and rates of mesothelioma.
Researchers did health screenings including x-rays on 487 workers in the plant and on 2,913 residents living in six communities in the vicinity of the plant. They found that about 3 percent of people exposed to asbestos living near the plant had malignant mesothelioma while about 1 percent of the workers did. Both rates exceed the norm. (Because mesothelioma takes 30 to 40 years to appear, it’s not surprising that the number of workers at the plant with the disease was not larger.)
Researchers said a significant finding of the study was that people exposed to asbestos in the environment were at 26 times greater risk of developing mesothelioma than people in a more distant neighborhood, who had no known environmental asbestos exposure nearby.
The community of El-Wehda El-Arabia, directly downwind of the plant, had the highest concentration of asbestos fibers in air samples and also had the highest incidence of mesothelioma among residents of the six communities studied, the researchers found. Thirty-nine residents had malignant pleural mesothelioma.
Researchers also found a correlation between length of exposure to asbestos and rates of mesothelioma. The more years residents were exposed to asbestos, the greater the likelihood of having the disease with a significant increase for those with 40 years or more of exposure. More than 60 percent of the residents with mesothelioma were women, the researchers. They attributed that to their long residence in the area.
The researchers said the study had an important message: the mesothelioma threat will remain for years to come and doctors should look for early signs of mesothelioma in people who had had environmental exposure to mesothelioma.
- Read the study
http://www.emro.who.int/emhj-list/emhj-volume-15-2009/volume15-issue1.html
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