Asbestos consumption, asbestos exposure and asbestos-related occupational diseases in Germany

Our plain-English summary of Asbestos consumption, asbestos exposure and asbestos-related occupational diseases in Germany, by O. Hagemeyer, H. Otten, T. Kraus (International Archives of Occupational and Environmental Health, 2006).

The study

• Authors: O. Hagemeyer, H. Otten, T. Kraus
• Journal: International Archives of Occupational and Environmental Health
• Published: 2006;79(8):613-20
• Type of article: Historical article, Review
• Cited by: 32 articles, as counted by NIH iCite
• Read it: PubMed · Publisher

Abstract

Like in most industrial countries, asbestos is a leading cause of occupational diseases, especially malignant diseases, in Germany. Following the increased consumption of asbestos after World War I, the recognition of asbestos related diseases developed. At the end of the 1930s, Germany was the first country to accept lung cancer in combination with asbestosis as an occupational disease and to initiate the endeavor for reduction of asbestos dust exposure. Nevertheless after World War II the usage of asbestos increased dramatically. The ban of asbestos first came into force in 1993. Until this time several hundreds of thousands of workers had inhaled asbestos and the number of asbestos related diseases increased. In this review the history and current status on asbestos consumption, asbestos exposure and asbestos related occupational diseases in Germany is presented.

In plain English

This article was a review of the history and current situation of asbestos consumption, asbestos exposure and asbestos-related occupational diseases in Germany. It covered both the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG) and the German Democratic Republic (GDR). The authors noted that Germany had no known asbestos mines, so exposure came from industrial use. Using accident insurance data, they described a continual decrease in workplace asbestos dust in the FRG from the 1950s to 1990, with higher levels in the GDR. A ban on production, use and marketing came in 1993. From 1978 to 2003, 25,729 occupational cancer cases were recognized in the FRG, and 18,487 (72%) of these were attributed to asbestos. Recognized mesothelioma cases rose from 9 in 1976 to 735 in 2002. By the end of 2004, a central registry listed 497,133 people, and 242,028 of them were offered post-exposure medical examinations. The authors concluded that smoking cessation remained the major way to reduce asbestos-induced lung cancer deaths. They noted that the different measurement methods gave only limited comparable data.

We wrote this plain-English summary from the full article with the help of AI, and a second AI model checked each sentence against the article. It is not the authors' wording; the abstract and the article are their own account.

What the study did and found

• Design: Narrative review of history and current status
• Who was studied: Asbestos-exposed workers and recognized occupational disease cases in Germany (FRG and GDR), from the first asbestos-processing company in 1870 through 2004, drawing mainly on statutory accident insurance data
• Exposure: Industrial asbestos use (e.g. textiles, gaskets, cement, brake pads, insulation, ship building). Threshold values were set first for chrysotile (0.15 mg/m3), later extended to amosite and crocidolite.
• Main results:
  • Workplace asbestos dust levels in the FRG decreased continually from the 1950s to 1990
  • Some FRG work processes released very high fiber concentrations, for example asbestos spraying at 400 fibers/cm3
  • The FRG banned the production, use and marketing of asbestos in 1993
  • FRG, 1978 to 2003: 25,729 occupational cancer cases were recognized, of which 18,487 (72%) were caused by asbestos
  • FRG mesothelioma: in 1976, 19 cases were identified and 9 recognized; in 2002, 735 cases were recognized
  • Mesothelioma, 1978 to 2003: among 8,166 deaths, mean age was 65 years (plus or minus 9.9) and mean time from diagnosis to death was 1.7 years
  • In men, the mesothelioma rate was increasing, while asbestosis and asbestos-induced lung or larynx cancer remained high or were slowly decreasing
  • As of 31 December 2004, 497,133 persons were registered with the central registry (ZAs) and 242,028 were offered post-exposure medical examinations
  • At the end of 2004, about 61,000 employees were registered because of asbestos exposure during demolition and reconstruction work
  • In 2004, calculated mesothelioma incidence for all of Germany was up to 1,094 cases, and claims numbered 1,023 (industrial accident insurance institutions only)
• The authors' conclusion: The authors concluded that, with no validated methods for better diagnosis and treatment, smoking cessation remained the major way to reduce asbestos-induced lung cancer mortality. They also stated that asbestos had been handled well in most cases in Germany.
• Limitations the authors state:
  • The different measurement methods used over time provide only limited comparable data
  • Exposure data before 1970 are of limited validity because few measurements were made
  • Germany has no national cancer register, so cancer incidence is not known exactly
  • Underreporting of occupational diseases exists, but its extent is unknown

Topics

The National Library of Medicine indexes this study under subjects our site covers: Asbestosis, Lung cancer.

Medical terms in this study, explained in our Lexicon: Asbestos Exposure, Occupational Disease, Lung Cancer.

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