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Asbestos News: November, 2007
For 34 years between 1952 and 1986, Ernest Rymaszewski worked as a welder, trucker, lineman, and laborer in various locations across the U.S. In addition, he did his own auto repairs and home maintenance and remodeling.
Last summer, Rymaszewski was diagnosed with pleural mesothelioma.
Union Carbide has gained an unsavory reputation as being one of the biggest corporate polluters on the planet. It has also demonstrated an ability to drag its feet in taking responsibility for its actions: many people who survived the release of toxic gases from Union Carbide’s plant in Bhopal, India, in December of 1984 and are still suffering from its effects continue to await compensation.
While many Americans would like to forget the 2004 presidential “election”–with its fenced “free speech zones” and numerous arrests of dissidents–it seems that the legacy will be with us for decades.
Mary Ann Gruzs of Lower Windsor Township, Pennsylvania, has filed suit against her former employer on grounds that she was terminated because of her complaints of asbestos-containing materials in the building where she worked.
Ms. Gruzs was a beautician employed in the salon of a York County nursing home until June of 2006.
For over half a century, Richard Hawley worked on farms and ranches throughout the American heartland, maintaining the machinery used in the industry that fed the country–and people around the world.
On 1 July 2007, Hawley was diagnosed with mesothelioma, to which he attributes his employment as a mechanic and in construction. Last week, Hawley filed suit in the “judicial hellhole” of Madison County, Illinois, where corporations are generally held accountable for their crimes against people.
When corporate defendants settle lawsuits, it is often for one or more of three reasons:
1) The corporation realizes it can’t win.
2) The corporation may very well win, but the cost of litigation would make it a Pyrrhic victory.
3) The corporation is concerned about its public image.
The Dana Corporation is a manufacturer of auto parts that has used a fair amount of asbestos in its day. This is not unusual; many automotive components, particularly gaskets and brake linings, made use of asbestos-containing materials (ACMs).
In Florida last week, there was yet another case in which a contractor dropped the ball, when in the course of renovations on the old Fort Walton Beach Hospital in Okaloosa County, officials from the state Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) discovered no fewer than five “possible violations” related to asbestos.
Although Australia acknowledges health care as a right of all its citizens, the Ministry of Health in that country must still contend with the greed of big pharmaceutical corporations.
The latest controversy in Australia has centered on a drug manufactured by U.S. pharmaceutical giant Eli Lilly, marketed under the brand name Alimta.
Not long ago, we reported on an asbestos scare in Connecticut in which talc used in children’s art clay was found to contain asbestos (see “Asbestos-Laden Art Supplies,” 6 November 2007). The tremolite asbestos was actually a contaminant in the talc used to manufacture the clay. Talc miners in upstate New York suffer from some of the highest rates of mesothelioma in the nation.
We’ve had numerous stories here of contractors here in the U.S. who attempt to cut corners on asbestos abatement (or attempt to ignore it altogether) and wind up paying big bucks in fines and other penalties. Sometimes, these can amount to ten times or more what it might have cost to simply have had the job done properly and legally in the first place; fines of between $200,000 and $350,000 are not unusual. In some cases, violators serve prison time.
Missoula, Montana, is about 150 miles south of Libby, which is arguably “Ground Zero” in the war on asbestos. It is where the corporate executives who headed W.R. Grace and Company will be held to account for the deaths they allegedly caused in Libby.
It is a major city in which people are (or should be) acutely aware of asbestos issues.
In this morning’s post we brought you a story about how Senator Patty Murray’s Ban Asbestos in America Act has been severely compromised because of pressure from high-paid lobbyists working on behalf of multi-billion dollar corporate interests.
Last month, a bill called the “Ban Asbestos In America Act” passed the U.S. Senate. Originally, the bill called for a complete ban on asbestos, as has happened in the European Union. It is now becoming clear, however, that the bill has been watered down to appease the corporate interests who ever more frequently attempt–all too often successfully–to dictate national policy.
Despite the fact that the U.K. has traditionally had more and stronger protections regarding asbestos than the U.S., mesothelioma has become a veritable plague in that country; asbestos has now become the largest single cause of occupationally-related deaths.
Recently, we brought you a story about asbestos concerns among students at the State University of New York’s New Paltz School, where asbestos abatement projects are being carried out on some of the residence halls (see “Asbestos Danger at SUNY” posted on 6 November).
In September, we brought you a story on an asbestos removal project in Cayuga County, New York, in which two county employees were indicted on federal charges for failure to follow regulations and engaging in illegal asbestos abatement procedures (see “And Yet Another Asbestos Scandal”). Earlier this month, an attorney in Auburn has filed the fourth asbestos-related lawsuit against the county government on behalf of citizens who were exposed to asbestos in the Board of Elections Building.
Australia has some of the highest rates of mesothelioma and asbestos disease in the world. Unlike the United States, such victims needn’t worry about medical care, since like most industrialized countries, Australia acknowledges health care as the right of every citizen
However, asbestos victims in Australia suffer the same physical pain and life issues as their counterparts anywhere else in the world–and the emotions surrounding asbestos issues run just as strong.
Sometimes it seems that the same corporate greed that is damaging American democracy is spreading to other parts of the world as well.
Large sea-going vessels are considered old at age 20, although many survive into their 40s. Eventually, however, all but a few great ships of historical interest wind up at the scrap yard. Often, this is Bangladesh, where there are few regulations governing labor and poverty insures a ready supply of men willing to risk their health and lives for the equivalent of a dollar or two a day.
North of San Francisco Bay is San Pablo Bay, and east of that, through the Mare Island Strait, is Suisun Bay, where the U.S. Navy stores the old and obsolete vessels of its “Ghost Fleet”–mothballed battlewagons, merchant and reserve ships that date back to the Second World War. One of the most famous and most venerable of that fleet is the U.S.S. Iowa, sister ship of the “Mighty Mo” and one of the last of the U.S. Navy’s full-sized battle ships.
Because asbestos litigation is in large part due to the fact that the U.S. government refuses to provide the same free, universal health care that citizens in every other major industrialized nation enjoy as a right, health care issues are frequently addressed in this column.
Last month, students at the State University of New York’s New Paltz School received a scare over asbestos removal projects currently being carried out on some of the 40-year-old campus buildings. The project began 1 October and is scheduled to last possibly until 1 December, although campus officials say the work may be done by mid-November.
Parents in Connecticut were understandably upset when they received notice in the mail from their children’s’ school that clay being used in their art classes contained asbestos.
A recent series of articles by reporter Mark Tapscott currently running in the Washington Examiner suggests that tort litigation in the U.S. is out of control.
A study carried out at the National Cancer Institute in Bethesda, Maryland, has confirmed what many in the maritime industries have known from experience: such employees are at a significantly higher risk for mesothelioma than the general population.
Recently, we brought you news about the “Forgotten Cancer Cure” that is now illegal in the U.S., though still produced in Canada and allowed for use by doctors in Germany under that country’s laws.
Those who are technically minded or interested in how medications work may be interested to know more about how Coley’s Toxins actually destroy many kinds of cancer.
There is much to admire about Canada. Canadian society is far less violent; people in Canada often leave their doors unlocked while running errands during the day.
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