UK to tighten asbestos controls

Our plain-English summary of UK to tighten asbestos controls, by A. Hay (Nature, 1979).

The study

• Author: A. Hay
• Journal: Nature
• Published: 1979;282(5734):5
• Type of article: News
• Read it: PubMed · Publisher

In plain English

This short news article, not a research study, reported on a UK Health and Safety Commission report by its Advisory Committee on Asbestos proposing tighter workplace limits. It recommended halving the chrysotile (white asbestos) limit to 1 fibre per millilitre, cutting amosite (brown) four-fold to 0.5, and a statutory ban on crocidolite (blue), keeping the present 0.2 removal standard until replacement. These "control limits" were to take effect from 1 December 1980. The report estimated that exposure to one fibre per millilitre of chrysotile daily for 50 years would raise mortality by 0.02 to 1.25 per cent. That estimate rested on three surveys, two North American and one British; the report admitted much of their data came from particle counts, less precise than fibre counts. The report found no evidence of a threshold below which lung cancer or mesothelioma would not occur. It suggested there may be a threshold level below which asbestosis is not detectable. It said UK mesothelioma deaths doubled between 1967 and 1976 and stood at some 320 a year in 1979. An industry committee member called the deadline too tight.

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: News report in Nature describing a UK government advisory committee report on asbestos; not an original study
• Who was studied: No study population. The article concerns proposed UK asbestos exposure standards set out in a report by the Health and Safety Commission's Advisory Committee on Asbestos, published in 1979
• Exposure: Workplace airborne asbestos fibre concentrations, with separate proposed limits for chrysotile (white), amosite (brown) and crocidolite (blue)
• Main results:
  • The report proposed that the amosite (brown asbestos) limit be reduced four-fold to 0.5 fibres per millilitre
  • The report proposed a statutory ban on crocidolite (blue asbestos) in the UK. Until crocidolite is replaced, the existing standard for its removal would remain at the present 0.2 fibres per millilitre
  • The new standards were proposed to take effect from 1 December 1980 and to be called "control limits" rather than "hygiene standards"
  • The report's view was that exposure to one fibre per millilitre of chrysotile daily over 50 years will cause an increased mortality rate of 0.02 to 1.25 per cent
  • The mortality estimate was based on the only three surveys with adequate dose-response data: two North American and one British
  • The report acknowledged that all forms of asbestos will cause lung cancer. It said part of the excess lung cancer mortality was due to the combined (synergistic) action of tobacco with asbestos
  • The report stated there was no evidence of a threshold below which lung cancer or mesothelioma, of the pleura or the peritoneum, will not occur
  • The report suggested there may be a threshold level below which asbestosis is not detectable
  • The report's view was that crocidolite is consistently more dangerous than chrysotile
  • Mesothelioma deaths in the UK doubled between 1967 and 1976 and stood at some 320 per year at the time the article was written in 1979; the report expected the number to rise further before peaking
  • An asbestos industry member of the committee (S D Hardie of Turner and Newall) said the December 1980 deadline for the amosite limit was too tight
• The authors' conclusion: The article gives no conclusion of its own. It reports that the committee chairman, Bill Simpson, believed the new standards would reduce asbestos-related disease in future
• Limitations the authors state:
  • The article reports that the committee's report itself admitted problems with its mortality calculations: much of the asbestos concentration data in the surveys came from particle counts, which are far less precise than fibre counts

Related studies

• Parental occupational exposure and risk of childhood central nervous system tumors: a pooled analysis of case-control studies from Germany, France, and the UK — C. Huoi, A. Olsson, et al. (2014)
• Experience with asbestos disease and its control in Great Britain's naval dockyards — P.G. Harries (1976)
• A multicentre non-blinded randomised controlled trial to assess the impact of regular early specialist symptom control treatment on quality of life in malignant mesothelioma (RESPECT-MESO): study protocol for a randomised controlled trial — S. Gunatilake, F.J. Brims, et al. (2014)
• Quality control of airborne asbestos fibre counts in the United Kingdom--the present position — N.P. Crawford, A.J. Cowie (1984)
• Economics of dust control — D.W. Hills (1965)
• Control of the use of asbestos-containing friction materials — M.L. Bentley (1970)

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