Cynthia Robinson, Richard Lemen and Joseph K. Wagoner, Mortality Patterns Among Asbestos Textile, Friction and Packing Workers, Sent to J. H. Marsh (1977)

A letter of November 29, 1977, from Cynthia Robinson, an epidemiologist at the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH), to J. H. Marsh, director of environmental affairs at Raybestos-Manhattan, enclosing a draft marked "Not for Publication" of her paper with Richard Lemen and Joseph K. Wagoner, "Mortality Patterns, 1940-1975, Among Workers Employed in an Asbestos Textile Friction and Packing Products Manufacturing Facility." The paper studied 3,277 workers at a plant where "99% of the asbestos used" was chrysotile, and found 17 deaths from mesothelioma. It concluded that the findings "once again lend support to the conclusion that occupational exposure to chrysotile poses a severe carcinogenic risk of malignancies of multiple sites." The 22 pages end with I. H. Weaver's memo of December 2 disputing the paper.

What it shows

Robinson thanked Marsh and "Mr. Weaver" for information "on asbestos usage by fiber type" and asked for Raybestos-Manhattan's comments before the paper was presented in Washington on December 5, 1977. The plant is not named in the paper, but the letter and Weaver's reply show it was Raybestos-Manhattan's. The study found excess deaths from respiratory tract cancer, from nonmalignant respiratory disease and from mesothelioma among both men and women. Weaver's memo argued the mesothelioma cases might all have come from the plant's small use of crocidolite or amosite.

In Johns-Manville's index

Johns-Manville's legal department indexed the Motley 1,000 in 1984. Its index describes this document as follows:

Cynthia Robinson (Epidemiologist, Department of HEW) letter to J.H. Marsh, 11/29/77, enclosing a copy of her paper entitled "Mortality Patterns, 1940-1975, Among Asbestos Workers Employed in an Asbestos Textile, Friction and Packing Products Manufacturing Facility." This paper is to be presented at an SOEH meeting on "Occupational Exposures to Fiberous and Particulate Dust and their Extension into the Environment," 12/5/77, in Washington, D.C. Paper entitled "Mortality Patterns, 1940 - 1975, Among Workers Employed in an Asbestos Textile and Friction Products Manufacturing Facility," by Cynthia Robinson, Richard Lemen, and Joseph K. Wagoner. Robinson, et al. conclude that "a study among a group of textile, friction and packing products asbestos production workers exposed to over 99% chrysotile asbestos (except during war years) demonstrated an excess risk for nonmalignant respiratory disease, suicide, heart disease, respiratory tract cancer and mesothelioma among males; and an excess risk for nonmalignant respiratory disease, respiratory tract cancer and mesothelioma among females. An increased risk for lymphoma and lymphosarcoma among male asbestos workers was also indicated. These findings once again lend support to the conclusion that occupational exposure to chrysotile poses a severe carcinogenic risk of malignancies of multiple sites." Also attached is a duplicate of Motley Document #709.

Related documents

• I. H. Weaver to J. H. Marsh on the NIOSH Mortality Study of Raybestos-Manhattan Workers (1977)

About this copy

This is document 720 of the Motley 1,000, from the set the Manville Personal Injury Settlement Trust's records facility certified as true copies, pages CRMC-Motley1000-Subj-002900 to CRMC-Motley1000-Subj-002921.