Asbestos dust--a community hazard?

Our plain-English summary of Asbestos dust--a community hazard? (JAMA, 1969).

The study

• Journal: JAMA
• Published: 1969;209(8):1216-7
• Read it: PubMed
• In J-M's library: Johns-Manville's company medical library held a copy (J-M no. 004355).

In plain English

This was an unsigned editorial in JAMA, not an original study. It asked whether ferruginous (iron-coated) bodies found in the lungs of city dwellers mean the general public has inhaled asbestos. The editorial reported that studies from Cape Town, Miami, Pittsburgh, Montreal, Milan and Finland found such bodies in 30% to 70% of people. Utidjian and co-workers, using a tissue-digestion technique, found them in nearly all lungs examined (97%). It cited Gross and co-workers as showing that man-made fibers can form bodies indistinguishable from asbestos bodies. Two reports had tried to identify the fiber at the center of these bodies. One, in shipyard workers, found amphibole types of asbestos. The other examined 28 bodies from as many Pittsburgh city dwellers and excluded chrysotile, though it did not identify the cores. The editorial stated that no published report had linked these bodies with more pulmonary fibrosis or lung cancer. It concluded that generalizing would be premature, that amphiboles were not excluded, and that bodies from many more city dwellers needed study.

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: Editorial (unsigned commentary discussing other published reports; no original data)
• Who was studied: No population of its own. It discussed reports on city dwellers in Cape Town, Miami, Pittsburgh, Montreal, Milan and Finland, a report on shipyard workers, and a report on 28 ferruginous bodies from 28 Pittsburgh city dwellers
• Exposure: Inhaled asbestos dust or other fibrous dust, as shown by ferruginous ('asbestos') bodies in the lungs. Chrysotile and the amphiboles (crocidolite and amosite) were discussed
• Main results:
  • Reports from several cities and a survey in Finland, as cited by the editorial, suggested that 30% to 70% of people had ferruginous bodies in their lungs
  • As cited, Utidjian and co-workers, using a tissue-digestion technique, found one or more ferruginous bodies in nearly all lungs examined (97%)
  • As cited, Gross and co-workers reported that artificially produced fibers of respirable size can form ferruginous bodies indistinguishable from those formed by asbestos
  • In a cited report on shipyard workers, the central cores of the bodies were identified as amphibole types of asbestos
  • In the cited report on 28 bodies from Pittsburgh city dwellers, chrysotile was excluded as a constituent, but the cores were not identified
  • The editorial stated that no published report had associated these bodies with increased prevalence of pulmonary fibrosis or lung cancer
• The authors' conclusion: The editorial concluded it would be premature to generalize from the exclusion of chrysotile, and that ferruginous bodies from many more city dwellers must be investigated in the same way
• Limitations the authors state:
  • Excluding chrysotile does not exclude amphibole types of asbestos as the cores of the bodies
  • The 30% to 70% range was thought to reflect differences in search technique and diligence rather than true differences in prevalence
  • Identifying the central fibers of ferruginous bodies is difficult and complicated

Related studies

• Respiratory effects of exposure to dust in taconite mining and processing — T.C. Clark, V.A. Harrington, et al. (1980)
• Pulmonary mineral dust. A study of ninety patients by electron microscopy, electron microanalysis, and electron microdiffraction — J.P. Berry, P. Henoc, et al. (1976)
• Ferruginous bodies and the histologic evaluation of dust exposure — E. Crouch, A. Churg (1984)
• The ability of mineral dusts and fibres to initiate lipid peroxidation. Part I: parameters which determine this ability — M. Gulumian (1999)
• Environmental epidemiology. 3. Community effects of nonoccupational environmental asbestos exposure — I.J. Selikoff, E.C. Hammond (1968)
• Developments in dust sampling and counting techniques in the asbestos industry — S. Holmes (1965)

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