Asbestos in water

Our plain-English summary of Asbestos in water, by R. Murray, K. Browne (Lancet, 1981).

The study

• Authors: R. Murray, K. Browne
• Journal: Lancet
• Published: 1981;2(8243):415
• Type of article: Letter
• Cited by: 1 article, as counted by NIH iCite
• Read it: PubMed · Publisher
• In J-M's library: Johns-Manville's company medical library held a copy.

In plain English

This was a letter to the editor of The Lancet, not a research study, and it reported no new data. The authors, whose listed addresses included Cape Industries Ltd, London, replied to a Lancet editorial on asbestos in drinking water. They argued that evidence from animal experiments, occupational exposure and epidemiology was "beginning to point strongly away from any association" between ingested asbestos fibres and gut tumours. They said they knew of no published ingestion study showing a significant increase in malignant gut tumours, and they described an Edinburgh rat study as finding none. They noted that several cohorts of heavily exposed people showed excess gut tumours, while other cohorts and less heavily exposed groups did not. They said the editorial left out negative results from Connecticut townships. They also criticised a Californian study by Conforti and colleagues, arguing that social class differences could create spurious correlations and that associations found by dredging large data sets should not be taken at face value. They said a full discussion of the Californian data was not possible in the letter.

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: Letter to the editor (correspondence) responding to a Lancet editorial; no original data
• Who was studied: No population was studied; the letter discusses published and pending animal, occupational and drinking-water studies
• Exposure: Ingestion of asbestos fibres, particularly asbestos in drinking water; no fiber types are named
• Main results:
  • The authors stated they were not aware of any published ingestion study that produced a significant increase in malignant gut tumours
  • The authors described a study by the Institute of Occupational Medicine, Edinburgh, as confirming the absence of asbestos-related gut tumours in rats followed for their whole lifespan (another group's study, cited as in press)
  • The authors noted that several human cohorts showed an excess of gut tumours among the heavily exposed, while other cohorts and the less heavily exposed showed no excess
  • The authors argued that the editorial left out negative drinking-water results from Connecticut townships
  • The authors argued that, in the Californian data of Conforti et al., remaining social class differences could cause spurious correlations, and that probabilities from large-scale data dredging should not be taken at face value
• The authors' conclusion: The authors concluded that the evidence was beginning to point strongly away from any association between ingested asbestos and gut tumours
• Limitations the authors state:
  • The authors stated that a full discussion of the problems in interpreting the Californian data was not possible in the letter

Related studies

• Cancer incidence in relation to asbestos in drinking water in the Puget Sound region — L. Polissar, R.K. Severson, et al. (1982)
• A case-control study of asbestos in drinking water and cancer risk — L. Polissar, R.K. Severson, et al. (1984)
• Asbestos in drinking water and cancer — K.D. MacRae (1988)
• Asbestos in public water supplies: discussion of future problems — J.P. Hills (1979)
• Asbestos-contaminated drinking water: its impact on household air — J.S. Webber, S. Syrotynski, et al. (1988)
• "Asbestos in drinking water and cancer incidence in the San Francisco Bay area" — K. Browne (1982)

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