The Asbestos Ban in Korea from a Grassroots Perspective: Why Did It Occur?

Our plain-English summary of The Asbestos Ban in Korea from a Grassroots Perspective: Why Did It Occur?, by Y.R. Yoon, K.M. Kwak, Y. Choi, et al (International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 2018).

The study

• Authors: Y.R. Yoon, K.M. Kwak, Y. Choi, K. Youn, J. Bahk, D.M. Kang, D. Paek
• Journal: International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health
• Published: 2018;15(2)
• Type of article: Historical article
• Cited by: 12 articles, as counted by NIH iCite
• Read it: PubMed · Publisher · Free full text

Abstract

In 2009, asbestos was finally banned in Korea, about 70 years after the first opening of asbestos mines under Japanese control. After having presented the history of asbestos industry, together with its regulations and health effects over time, we constructed narrative analyses of how the asbestos issue under the prevailing risk system was managed by whom and for what purpose, to provide context for the change. We could identify five different phases: laissez-faire, politico-technical, economic-managerial, health-oriented cultural, and human rights-based post-cultural risk systems. The changes leading to the asbestos ban evolved over different phases, and each phase change was necessary to reach the final ban, in that, without resolving the previous issues by examining different categories of potential alternatives, either the final ban was not possible or, even if instituted, could not be sustained. An asbestos ban could be introduced when all the alternatives to these issues, including legitimate political windows, economic rationalizations, health risk protections, and human rights sensitivities, were available. We think the alternatives that we had were not in perfect shape, but in more or less loosely connected forms, and hence we had to know how to build solidarities between different stakeholders to compensate for the imperfections.

In plain English

This article is a historical and narrative analysis, which the authors also describe as a review, of how Korea came to ban asbestos in 2009. The authors traced Korea's asbestos industry from mining that began in the 1930s through the manufacture of construction materials, friction products, textiles and gaskets. Drawing on earlier sources, the article reported several milestones. The workplace exposure limit was set at 2 fibers/cc in 1986 and lowered to 0.1 fibers/cc in 2003. Crocidolite and amosite were banned in 1997, asbestiform tremolite, anthophyllite and actinolite in 2003, and chrysotile in 2009. The first work-related mesothelioma was diagnosed in 1993 in a female asbestos textile worker. By December 2017, 2801 cases had been compensated under the Asbestos Injury Relief Act. The authors grouped this history into five phases: laissez-faire, politico-technical, economic-managerial, health-oriented cultural, and human rights-based post-cultural. They concluded that a ban could be introduced when legitimate political windows, economic rationalizations, health risk protections and human rights sensitivities were all available, even in loosely connected form.

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: Historical narrative analysis (described in the author contributions as a review) of asbestos industry, regulation, health effects and stakeholders in Korea
• Who was studied: The asbestos industry, regulations, workers, environmental victims and stakeholders in Korea, from mining in the 1930s to after the 2009 ban (compensation data up to December 2017)
• Exposure: Asbestos mining and raw asbestos use in manufacturing of construction materials (including asbestos cement slates), friction products, textiles and gaskets; later environmental exposure near old mines and factories
• Main results:
  • The authors divided the history into five phases: laissez-faire (up to 1980), politico-technical (1981–1987), economic-managerial (1988–1994), health-oriented cultural (1995–2009), and human rights-based post-cultural (2010 onward)
  • The occupational exposure limit for asbestos in Korea was set at 2 fibers/cc in 1986 and lowered to 0.1 fibers/cc in 2003
  • Crocidolite and amosite were banned in 1997, when no use of them was found; asbestiform tremolite, anthophyllite and actinolite were banned in 2003; chrysotile was banned in 2009
  • The first asbestos-related mesothelioma was diagnosed in a female worker in 1993 and recognized as work-related in 1994, based on 19 years of work at an asbestos textile factory
  • The number of cases compensated for asbestos-related occupational diseases in Korea remained fewer than 20 per year (data shown for 2002–2014)
  • Under the Asbestos Injury Relief Act (environmental victims, from 2011), 2801 cases had been compensated up to December 2017: 914 malignant mesotheliomas, 409 lung cancers, 1474 asbestosis and four diffuse pleural thickenings
  • Citing an earlier study, the article reported that in 2013 the incidence of malignant mesothelioma in Korea's general population was 2.8 per million person-years for men and 1.55 per million person-years for women
  • In countries identified by the International Ban Asbestos Secretariat as having banned asbestos, raw asbestos use had already fallen to an almost negligible level before the ban
• The authors' conclusion: The authors concluded that each phase change was necessary for the ban. In their view, a ban could be introduced when legitimate political windows, economic rationalizations, health risk protections and human rights sensitivities were all available, and solidarity between stakeholders compensated for imperfections in these alternatives.

Related studies

• Estimated future incidence of malignant mesothelioma in South Korea: Projection from 2014 to 2033 — K.M. Kwak, D. Paek, et al. (2017)
• The ghost of public health journalism: past, present, and future — G.S. Cooper, R.C. Brown (2010)
• Transfer of occupational health problems from a developed to a developing country: lessons from the Japan-South Korea experience — J. Park, N. Hisanaga, et al. (2009)
• Mesothelioma, perspective from the industry — U.F. Gruber (2005)
• Banning Asbestos in New Zealand, 1936-2016, an 80-Year Long Saga — W.I. Glass, R. Armstrong, et al. (2017)
• Environmental asbestos exposure sources in Korea — D.M. Kang, J.E. Kim, et al. (2016)

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