Asbestos in Belgium: use and abuse

Our plain-English summary of Asbestos in Belgium: use and abuse, by S.Y. Nay (International Journal of Occupational and Environmental Health, 2003).

The study

• Author: S.Y. Nay
• Journal: International Journal of Occupational and Environmental Health
• Published: 2003;9(3):287-93
• Cited by: 3 articles, as counted by NIH iCite
• Read it: PubMed · Publisher

Abstract

It took 50 years for Belgium to recognize asbestosis; mesothelioma and lung cancer were recognized as occupational diseases caused by asbestos in 1982 and 1999, much later than in neighboring countries. Only salaried workers can claim compensation from the Occupational Diseases Fund. The right to reparation is thus denied to most victims because many have been self-employed: mechanics, electricians, painters, roofers, carpenters, plumbers, etc. Compensation was also denied to people who became ill through exposures to the workclothes of family members or pollution from asbestos factories near their homes. The main obstacles facing asbestos victims are legal and judicial. For instance, an employer is not liable, even for gross negligence. Victims are not allowed to claim if 20 years have passed since their exposures to asbestos. Changes in Belgian legislation are sorely needed.

In plain English

This was a single author's narrative review and commentary on asbestos use, disease recognition, regulation and compensation in Belgium. It did not report new research. The author reported that the Occupational Diseases Fund (FMP) had compensated some 850 mesothelioma victims. Between 1985 and 1992 the national cancer register recorded 630 new mesotheliomas, while the FMP recognized 232 cases, less than 40% of those recorded nationally. Asbestosis was added to the list of industrial diseases in 1953, and mesothelioma was compensated from December 1982. Cancer of the larynx was added to the list in June 2002; six cases had already been compensated under an "open list" system, the victims having proved a causal link. Lung cancer had been considered a complication of asbestosis, with fewer than 20 cases accepted per year; in 1999 it became compensable even without asbestosis. The author described legal obstacles: only salaried workers can claim from the FMP, family members and pollution victims are excluded, employers are immune unless the disease was caused intentionally, and civil claims lapse 20 years after last exposure. The author concluded that the main obstacles are legal and judicial and that Belgian law must change.

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 and commentary on asbestos use, disease recognition, regulation and compensation in Belgium; no new research
• Who was studied: Asbestos-exposed workers and other asbestos victims in Belgium, described through compensation fund records, the national cancer register, earlier studies and individual cases, from about 1905 to the early 2000s
• Exposure: Asbestos used in Belgian industry, mainly at the Eternit asbestos cement plant, which used asbestos mostly imported from Canada, South Africa and Russia (at one time 40,000 tons a year); also asbestos textiles, insulation, maintenance work and buildings
• Main results:
  • The FMP (Occupational Diseases Fund) had paid compensation to some 850 victims of mesothelioma in all
  • The National Cancer Register recorded 630 new mesotheliomas between 1985 and 1992; in the same period the FMP recognized 232 cases, less than 40% of those recorded nationally
  • In 1996 the national register recorded 99 pleural and 21 peritoneal mesotheliomas (120 in all), while the FMP accepted 61 cases that year
  • According to a 1973 article by Dr. Vande Weyer, the FMP recognised 138 cases of asbestosis (107 male, 31 female) between 1953 and 1972
  • Asbestosis was added to the list of industrial diseases in 1953
  • Before 1999, lung cancer was considered a complication of asbestosis and fewer than 20 cases per year were accepted
  • In 1999 lung cancer became a compensable occupational disease even in the absence of asbestosis, and the Fund accepted over 100 claims in the first three years
  • In June 2002 cancer of the larynx was added to the list of compensable asbestos-related diseases
  • Before cancer of the larynx was added to the list, six cases had already been compensated under the open list system, the victims having proved a causal link
  • Tissue analyses at Brussels' Erasmus hospital indicated that 12.5% of lung cancer patients had asbestos body concentrations higher than the general population, and 4% had burdens high enough to ground a claim
  • In a series of 200 consecutive unselected postmortem examinations, 14.5% of subjects (19.7% among males) had pleural plaques, and 15% had more than 1,000 asbestos bodies per gram of dry lung
  • In the case of a worker with mesothelioma who sued his former employers, the appeals court ruled for the employers in 1998 because their faults were not intentional
  • Victims lose the right to bring a civil claim 20 years after their last exposure to asbestos
• The authors' conclusion: The author concluded that the main obstacles facing asbestos victims in Belgium are legal and judicial, including employers' immunity even for gross negligence, and that Belgian legislation needs to change
• Limitations the authors state:
  • The author stated that compensation figures give only an incomplete view of the real number of asbestos-related disease cases
  • The author could not gather information on asbestos-related health problems among railway workers
  • The author stated there is no published information on early asbestos use in Belgium

Topics

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

Medical terms in this study, explained in our Lexicon: Mesothelioma, Lung Cancer, Occupational Disease, Gross Negligence.

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