Current uses of asbestos exceed exposure limits

Airborne fibers from asbestos cement are 50 times permissible level

2023-11-14

(Press-News.org) San Francisco, November 14, 2023 – A new study summarizing exposures to asbestos during the installation and removal of asbestos cement products demonstrates that these construction activities almost always exceed U.S. occupational limits. The study focused on airborne asbestos exposures from existing uses of asbestos that are still allowed in most countries.

Average task-specific asbestos exposures during the cutting of asbestos cement pipe were more than 50 times the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) short-term limit. Cutting asbestos boards and corrugated roofing result in average exposures that are 24 times the limit.

Asbestos cement products including pipe, siding and roofing account for more than 90% of global asbestos use.

“We found that exposures from asbestos cement products could be alarming high and certainly disproves the asbestos industry’s contention that these materials can be used in a ‘safe and responsible’ manner” said Perry Gottesfeld, Executive Director of Occupational Knowledge International (OK International) and the author of the study.

“The study demonstrates that there is an immediate need to ban all asbestos cement products that are sold in many countries as these are still being installed in millions of homes and commercial buildings,” Gottesfeld added.

The study Exposure Hazards from Continuing Use and Removal of Asbestos Cement Products published online in the Annals of Work Exposures and Health, documents that all uses of asbestos cement pipe and the great majority of installation tasks for asbestos cement roofing and sheets exceed the current OSHA short-term exposure limit. The results also indicate that the use of water to reduce airborne fibers is insufficient to protect workers during most tasks involving power tools.

Although more than 60 countries have banned the use of asbestos, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is only now considering a total ban on asbestos cement and other existing uses. Currently, the EPA only requires companies to notify the agency before manufacturing or importing asbestos cement produts.

Russia and Kazakhstan account for 80% of global asbestos production and they export this material to more than 25 low and middle-income countries. India, China, Indonesia, Uzbekistan, Sri Lanka, Vietnam and Thailand are the largest importers and account for approximately 90% of global asbestos sales.

In 2021 more than 1.2 million metric tons of asbestos was mined primarily for asbestos cement applications. Russia is by far the largest beneficiary of this hazardous trade, earning $185 million in 2021.

Thousands of workers are exposed to airborne fibers during the manufacture of asbestos cement products in hundreds of small factories in India, Vietnam and other countries. Tens of thousands of construction workers are exposed to airborne asbestos in excess of the short-term OSHA excursion limit while installing asbestos cement roofing, siding, cooling towers and pipes.

Even intermittent short-term exposures to asbestos are associated with significant health risks. Asbestos has been shown to cause lung cancer, asbestosis and mesothelioma.

The U.S. has approximately 600,000 miles of ageing asbestos water pipe with a typical lifespan of 50 years. Water utilities are often replacing asbestos water main sections as pipes burst or as part of ongoing systems improvements.

In many countries older asbestos-cement pipe and roofing are reaching the end of their service life and will need to be removed while creating hazardous conditions for workers while cutting and breaking up this material. Few countries have occupational limits or other safety regulations governing procedures for asbestos abatement.

----------------------------------------

About Occupational Knowledge International (OK International)

OK International is a U.S. based NGO that works to build capacity in developing countries to identify, monitor, and mitigate environmental and occupational exposures to hazardous materials in order to protect public health and the environment. For more information: www.okinternational.org.

Contact OK International:

Perry Gottesfeld, Executive Director
Occupational Knowledge International

www.okinternational.org
Email: info@okinternational.org
+1 415-221-8900

END

[Attachments] See images for this press release:

ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:

Einstein Foundation Award 2023: The Einstein Foundation Berlin awards €500,000 prize to enhance quality in research

2023-11-14

The €500,000 Einstein Foundation Award for Promoting Quality in Research honors researchers and institutions whose work helps to fundamentally advance the quality and robustness of research findings. The award is bestowed jointly with the QUEST Center for Responsible Research at the Berlin Institute of Health (BIH). “The Einstein Foundation Award is the first of its kind in the world to recognize efforts to improve research quality. Now in its third year, the award shines a spotlight on individuals and projects that exhibit outstanding dedication, but also the ...

Shedding new light on sugars, the “dark matter” of cellular biology

2023-11-14

Scientists at Université de Montréal’s Department of Chemistry have developed a new fluorogenic probe that can be used to detect and study interactions between two families of biomolecules essential to life: sugars and proteins. The findings by professor Samy Cecioni and his students, which open the door to a wide range of applications, were published in mid-October in the prestigious European journal Angewandte Chemie. Found in all living cells Sugar is omnipresent in our lives, present in almost all the foods we eat. But the importance of these simple carbohydrates extends far beyond tasty desserts. Sugars ...

Study sheds light on how Earth cycles fossil carbon

2023-11-14

HOUSTON – (Nov. 14, 2023) – As the primary element of life on our planet, carbon is constantly journeying from living creatures down into the Earth’s crust and back up into the atmosphere, but until recently, quantifying this journey was virtually impossible. To help unravel the mystery of how the Earth cycles fossil carbon, Rice University’s Mark Torres and collaborators studied the chemistry of a river system extending from the Peruvian Andes to the Amazon floodplains. Together with collaborators from five other institutions, Torres helped show that high rates of carbon breakdown persist from mountaintop to floodplain, ...

High lung cancer rates in naval veterans linked to asbestos

2023-11-14

A University of Adelaide and Oxford University study has discovered asbestos exposure led to a higher incidence of asbestos-related lung cancers in British and Australian naval personnel than in other armed forces. The data were collected from 30,085 United Kingdom and Australian personnel who served in the ’50s and ’60s, a time when asbestos-containing materials were present in British and Australian naval vessels. Three of the four cohorts had previously been studied by the University of Adelaide and the UK Health Security Agency to identify the effects of radiation exposure from British nuclear testing; however, a raised incidence of mesothelioma, a cancer strongly linked ...

COP28: New study highlights need to address risk of continued global warming after net zero

2023-11-14

From scorching heatwaves to torrential downpours and devastating storms, the disastrous effects of global warming are sweeping across the world. Being the predicted outcome of burning fossil fuels, our best and only plan to limit warming is to reduce CO2 emissions from human activities to ‘net zero’ – where the amount of CO2 we emit into the atmosphere is equal to the amount we remove from it. To keep within the 1.5°C limit of the 2015 Paris Agreement, this needs to happen as soon as possible. Though the ...

14-hour fasting improves hunger, mood and sleep

2023-11-14

Eating in a ten-hour window is associated with higher energy and mood and lower hunger levels, new results from the largest UK community science study of its kind shows1 . Results from the trial are presented today by researchers from King’s College London at the European Nutrition Conference. Intermittent fasting (IF), or restricting your food consumption to a set window, is a popular weight loss regime. A ten-hour window means limiting your daily eating schedule to ten hours and fasting for the ...

IOP Publishing unveils industry-leading feedback system for reviewers

2023-11-14

IOP Publishing (IOPP) is now offering peer reviewers feedback on their reviewer reports to enhance the quality of peer review and to strengthen best practice in the physical sciences. IOPP have rolled out the new programme on an opt-in basis across all its proprietary journals. Where reviewers opt-in for feedback on their report, IOPP will share a numerical evaluation of how useful the report was to the in-house editors on a scale of 1 to 5, with 5 being outstanding and 1 indicating that ...

Assessing the solvency of virtual asset service providers: Are current standards sufficient?

2023-11-14

The collapse of FTX clearly highlights the importance of being able to evaluate the solvency of cryptocurrency exchanges. Currently, this is only possible to a limited extent. That's why researchers from the Complexity Science Hub (CSH), in collaboration with the Financial Market Authority (FMA) and the Austrian National Bank (OeNB), are now proposing a new approach. Recently, a New York jury found Sam Bankman-Fried, the founder of the cryptocurrency exchange FTX, guilty of money laundering and fraud, among other charges. FTX was one of the largest trading platforms for crypto-assets and was valued at $32 billion before unexpectedly filing for insolvency in November ...

States with legalized medical marijuana see decline in nonmedical opioid use

2023-11-14

Medical cannabis legalization is associated with a decrease in the frequency of nonmedical prescription opioid use, according to a Rutgers study. The study, published in the International Journal of Mental Health and Addiction, examined data from a nationally representative survey of adults who reported nonmedical prescription opioid use – or using prescription medications without a prescription or in a manner other than prescribed. According to the study, when states implement medical cannabis laws, there is ...

Cancer stem cells trigger macrophage aging

2023-11-14

Cancer stem cells cause the aging of macrophages in mice with healthy immune systems, creating conditions for the formation of tumors. Cancerous tumors consist of a mixture of cells, the most important of which are cancer stem cells. These cells are capable of establishing new cancerous tumors by evading the immune response. Research has focused on identifying biomarkers for cancer stem cells and developing therapies that target these cells. Unfortunately, candidate drugs developed from these efforts have so far not been very effective in clinical trials. A research team led by Associate Professor Haruka Wada ...

Identification of chemical constituents and blood-absorbed components of Shenqi Fuzheng extract based on UPLC-triple-TOF/MS technology

Emergency department physicians vary widely in their likelihood of hospitalizing a patient, even within the same facility

Firearm and motor vehicle pediatric deaths— intersections of age, sex, race, and ethnicity

[Press-News.org] Current uses of asbestos exceed exposure limits
Airborne fibers from asbestos cement are 50 times permissible level

Current uses of asbestos exceed exposure limits

ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:

LAST 30 PRESS RELEASES: