Environmental asbestos contamination: What are the risks?

Our plain-English summary of Environmental asbestos contamination: What are the risks?, by V.L. Roggli (Chest, 2007).

The study

• Author: V.L. Roggli
• Journal: Chest
• Published: 2007;131(2):336-8
• Type of article: Comment, Editorial
• Cited by: 10 articles, as counted by NIH iCite
• Read it: PubMed · Publisher

Summary of the article

This editorial discussed the risks of environmental asbestos contamination. It responded to an expert panel convened by the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry and to a follow-up study by Reid et al, published in the same issue of CHEST, of residents of Wittenoom, Western Australia, where crocidolite (blue) asbestos was mined from 1943 to 1966. Mine and mill tailings had been used on roads, school playgrounds and yards. Among 4,768 residents who never worked in the mine or mill, there had been 67 mesotheliomas, 31 in women. Twenty-seven of these women reported laundering workers' clothing. Risk rose with duration of exposure, estimated dose and latency. Women had a steeper dose-response than men, which was just significant at the 0.05 level. There was no evidence of greater susceptibility in children. The author calculated that, assuming a background rate of one case per million person-years and a linear no-threshold dose response, Wittenoom blue asbestos would double background risk at 0.015 fiber/mL/yr. That is about 2 months at the OSHA limit of 0.1 fiber/mL. He noted that most asbestos used in the United States was chrysotile, which would require a dose several hundred times higher for similar risk. The youngest cases at Wittenoom (26 years), in Turkish erionite villages (26 years) and in the author's consultation files (28 years) led him to conclude that mesothelioma in people under 25 is unlikely to be asbestos-related. He recommended dust suppression and avoidance of exposure.

PubMed has no abstract for this study, and the article doesn't print one. We wrote this summary from the full article with the help of AI. It is not the authors' wording.

In plain English

This was an editorial, not an original study. The author commented on a follow-up study by Reid et al, in the same issue, of residents of Wittenoom, Western Australia, where crocidolite (blue) asbestos was mined from 1943 to 1966. The author reported that Reid et al found 67 mesothelioma cases among 4,768 residents who had never worked in the mine or mill nor been exposed at work elsewhere. Of these, 31 were women; twenty-seven of them reported laundering workers' clothing. Risk rose with duration of exposure, estimated dose and latency. Women had a steeper dose-response than men, only just statistically significant; there was no evidence of greater susceptibility in children. Assuming a background rate of one case per million person-years and a linear, no-threshold dose-response, the author calculated that Wittenoom blue asbestos would double background mesothelioma risk at 0.015 fiber/mL/yr cumulative exposure. The youngest confirmed asbestos-related mesothelioma in the author's own files was diagnosed at 28. The author suggested mesothelioma in people under 25 is unlikely to be asbestos-related, and recommended dust suppression or avoiding exposure. The author disclosed testifying in asbestos litigation for both plaintiffs and defendants.

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 commentary on another study (Reid et al, Chest 2007) published in the same issue; not original research
• Who was studied: As described from Reid et al: 4,768 residents of Wittenoom, Western Australia, who never worked in the mine or mill and were never exposed occupationally elsewhere
• Exposure: Environmental (residential) exposure to crocidolite (blue) asbestos from a mine operating from 1943 to 1966. Mine and mill tailings were used on roads, parking, school playgrounds, a race course and yards.
• Main results:
  • Reported from Reid et al: 67 cases of mesothelioma among Wittenoom residents, including 31 in women
  • Reported from Reid et al: twenty-seven of the 31 women with mesothelioma reported laundering the clothing of mine or mill workers
  • Reported from Reid et al: relative risk of mesothelioma increased with duration of exposure, estimated dose and latency interval
  • Reported from Reid et al: women had a steeper dose-response curve than men. The difference was only just significant at the 0.05 level.
  • Reported from Reid et al: there was no evidence of increased susceptibility to mesothelioma among children
  • Reported from Reid et al: estimated mesothelioma death rate of 710 cases per million person-years in this population, with mean cumulative exposure of 5.5 fibers/mL/yr
  • The author's own calculation, assuming a background death rate of one case per million person-years and a linear dose-response with no identifiable threshold: Wittenoom blue asbestos doubles background mesothelioma risk at a cumulative level of 0.015 fiber/mL/yr. The author said this is about 2 months of exposure at the OSHA permissible exposure limit of 0.1 fiber/mL.
  • In the author's consultation files of mesothelioma cases, the youngest age at diagnosis of a mesothelioma case confirmed to be asbestos-related was 28 years. The youngest Wittenoom case was 26 years old.
• The authors' conclusion: The author concluded that mesothelioma in people under 25 years of age is unlikely to be related to asbestos. The author noted that a threshold of exposure below which mesothelioma will not occur has not been identified. The author recommended any means of dust suppression or avoidance of exposure, especially for fiber types as dangerous as Australian blue asbestos.

Topics

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

Medical terms in this study, explained in our Lexicon: Wittenoom, Crocidolite, Tailings, Mesothelioma, Latency, Dose-response relationship, Background Rate, OSHA.

Related studies

• Observations on environmental asbestos exposure in a high risk area — U. Sahin, O. Ozturk, et al. (2009)
• Malignant pleural mesotheliomas: an environmental health risk in southeast Turkey — K.M. Müller, M. Fischer (2000)
• Environmental policies, politics, and community risk perception: case study of community contamination in Casper, Wyoming — M. Tajik, K. Gottlieb, et al. (2007)
• Pet dogs as sentinels for environmental contamination — L.C. Backer, C.B. Grindem, et al. (2001)
• Increased risk of malignant mesothelioma of the pleura after residential or domestic exposure to asbestos: a case-control study in Casale Monferrato, Italy — C. Magnani, P. Dalmasso, et al. (2001)
• Pleural mesothelioma and occupational and non-occupational asbestos exposure: a case-control study with quantitative risk assessment — D. Ferrante, D. Mirabelli, et al. (2016)

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