Hazards of residential exposure to household asbestos

Our plain-English summary of Hazards of residential exposure to household asbestos, by N. de Klerk, A. Reid (The Lancet. Public Health, 2017).

The study

• Authors: N. de Klerk, A. Reid
• Journal: The Lancet. Public Health
• Published: 2017;2(11):e490-e491
• Type of article: Comment
• Cited by: 3 articles, as counted by NIH iCite
• Read it: PubMed · Publisher

In plain English

This is a short commentary, not a new study. The authors discussed a separate study by Rosemary Korda and colleagues of people exposed to asbestos at residential properties in the Australian Capital Territory (ACT), where the most common asbestos type used was amosite. According to the commentary, that study reported increased incidence of several cancers. These included colorectal cancer in women (standardised incidence ratio, SIR, 1.72, 95% CI 1.29 to 2.26) and prostate cancer in men (SIR 1.29, 95% CI 1.07 to 1.54). They also included mesothelioma in men who had lived in an affected house, compared with unexposed males (SIR 2.54, 95% CI 1.02 to 5.24). No mesothelioma cases were reported in exposed women, who had comparatively few person-years of follow-up. The authors noted that one case would have raised the women's SIR above the men's. They noted that earlier attempts at remediating affected ACT houses were unsuccessful. They argued against a rush to remove asbestos and called for research measuring exposure from asbestos in the built environment.

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: Commentary (Comment article) on another published study; no new data collected by these authors
• Who was studied: No population of its own; the commentary discusses Korda and colleagues' study of individuals exposed to asbestos at residential properties in the Australian Capital Territory, Australia
• Exposure: In-home (residential) exposure to asbestos in affected houses in the ACT; the most common asbestos type used there was amosite
• Main results:
  • As reported in the commentary, Korda and colleagues found increased colorectal cancer incidence in exposed women: SIR 1.72, 95% CI 1.29 to 2.26
  • As reported in the commentary, Korda and colleagues found increased prostate cancer incidence in exposed men: SIR 1.29, 95% CI 1.07 to 1.54
  • As reported in the commentary, men who had lived in an affected house had a mesothelioma SIR of 2.54 (95% CI 1.02 to 5.24) compared with unexposed males
  • No mesothelioma cases were reported in exposed females in Korda and colleagues' study
  • The authors noted that earlier remediation attempts in affected ACT houses were unsuccessful
  • The authors argued against a rush to remove asbestos
• The authors' conclusion: The authors concluded that future research should concentrate on the risks of living around, working on, and removing asbestos from the built environment
• Limitations the authors state:
  • The authors noted that women in Korda and colleagues' study had comparatively few person-years of follow-up, so one mesothelioma case would have raised the women's SIR above the men's

Topics

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

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