Corporate corruption of medical literature: asbestos studies concealed by W.R. Grace & Co

Our plain-English summary of Corporate corruption of medical literature: asbestos studies concealed by W.R. Grace & Co, by D. Egilman, W. Wallace, C. Hom (Accountability in Research, 1998).

The study

• Authors: D. Egilman, W. Wallace, C. Hom
• Journal: Accountability in Research
• Published: 1998;6(1-2):127-47
• Cited by: 7 articles, as counted by NIH iCite
• Read it: PubMed · Publisher

Abstract

In 1959, an X-ray survey of 130 mine workers in Libby, Montana found that 48 had evidence of asbestos-related lung disease. The ore they were mining contained up to 30% tremolite, an asbestiform mineral. In 1963, W.R. Grace acquired the mine and employee health problems at the mine became known to W.R. Grace executives and to Grace's insurance company, Maryland Casualty. In 1976, in response to tighter federal regulation of asbestos and asbestos-containing products, W.R. Grace funded an animal study of tremolite toxicity. They hoped to prove that tremolite did not cause mesothelioma, the cancer uniquely associated with asbestos exposure. However, the study showed that tremolite did cause mesothelioma. W.R. Grace never disclosed the results of this animal study, nor did they disclose their knowledge of lung disease in the Libby workers, either to the workers themselves or to regulatory agencies. These actions were intentional, and were motivated by Grace's conscious decision to prioritize corporate profit over human health.

PubMed has no abstract for this study. This is the authors' abstract, copied from the article.

In plain English

This article was not a new study. It reviewed internal W.R. Grace & Co. memos, letters, state inspection reports and court depositions, most produced during litigation, about the Libby, Montana vermiculite mine, whose ore contained up to 30% tremolite asbestos. The authors described a 1959 X-ray survey in which 48 of 130 Libby employees had "abnormal chests," and a 1964 survey reporting definite signs of lung disease in 21% of employees. They described a Grace-funded hamster experiment begun in 1976. By 610 days, each of two groups injected with Libby tremolite (alone or mixed with vermiculite) had developed 5 mesotheliomas, and the saline control group had none. That result was never published. The authors stated that Grace left this study out of a 1983 filing to the EPA and delayed a planned NIOSH study by over a year. The authors concluded that nondisclosure agreements that prevent critical information from reaching the people whose lives are adversely affected are unethical in medical research. An editor's note stated that the first author serves as an expert witness in lawsuits against Grace.

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: Review of historical documents (mostly unpublished company memos, reports, letters and depositions produced in litigation) describing the concealment of medical and animal studies; not an original epidemiological or laboratory study
• Who was studied: Workers at the vermiculite mine and mill in Libby, Montana, owned by Zonolite and, from 1963, by W.R. Grace, plus company, insurer and government records from about 1959 to 1985; also a Grace-funded hamster experiment (group sizes not given)
• Exposure: Dust from Libby vermiculite ore containing fibrous (asbestiform) tremolite asbestos; in the hamster experiment, intrapleural injection of 100% Libby tremolite, or equal parts Libby tremolite and Libby vermiculite, compared with saline
• Main results:
  • In the 1959 X-ray survey of Libby workers, 48 of 130 employees had "abnormal chests"; local physicians put the expected rate in the area at 5%
  • In the 1964 X-ray survey, which also included 21 salaried supervisory personnel, 21% of Libby employees had definite signs of lung disease
  • In the Grace-funded hamster study, at 371 days two mesotheliomas had developed in the tremolite-exposed hamsters and one malignant tumor in the tremolite/vermiculite group, with no cancers in the control group
  • At the end of the hamster study (610 days), each tremolite group had developed 5 mesotheliomas, and the control group had none
  • The study's 1978 final report to Grace called the tumors evidence that tremolite fibers in the sizes tested are carcinogenic; this finding was never published
  • Grace's 1983 Toxic Substances Control Act Section 8(e) filing to the EPA omitted the hamster study results
  • Grace told the EPA that mortality data on Libby employees showed 2 mesotheliomas and 16 lung cancer cases among 109 known deaths; the authors stated that a third mesothelioma death had been recorded by 1983
  • The authors' own calculation from Grace's figures (16 of 109 deaths): lung cancer was 2.4 times the expected value for U.S. working males of the same age group
  • The authors' own calculation from Grace's figures (2 of 109 deaths): mesothelioma was roughly 2,000 times the expected value for North American males
  • A 1982 consultant's report for Grace on the death certificates of 66 Libby employees counted 2 mesothelioma deaths, 11 lung cancer deaths and 1 mediastinal cancer death. Respiratory cancer was 2.8 times the expected value (95% confidence interval 1.4 to 4.5)
  • Grace's own job-site tests recorded asbestos exposures above OSHA standards from handling packaged vermiculite products
  • The authors stated that Grace delayed a planned NIOSH cohort mortality study of Libby by over a year. A 1980 internal memo listed options including delay and favored a combination of them
• The authors' conclusion: The authors concluded that Grace presented vermiculite publicly as hazard free while internally knowing it presented serious health risks. They concluded that researchers and corporations have an ethical obligation to publish results showing products are hazardous. They also concluded that nondisclosure agreements that prevent critical information from reaching the people whose lives are adversely affected are unethical.

Topics

Medical terms in this study, explained in our Lexicon: W.R. Grace, Tremolite, Asbestiform, Mesothelioma, Asbestos Exposure.

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