A lung cancer case-control study was conducted in a Slovenian asbestos-cement factory for which unusually good records of asbestos exposures were available. The cohort consisted of all 6714 workers employed at the Salonit Anhovo factory after 31 December 1946 who worked there for at least one day between 1964 and 1994. Fifty-eight histologically confirmed cases of primary lung cancer and 290 co...

A systematic review of the literature on the surveillance of workers at presumed increased risk for respiratory cancer because of their exposure to asbestos revealed surveillance programs at the national, population, industrial, and factory (workplace) levels. Furthermore, 3 randomized chemoprevention trials involving workers exposed to asbestos were found. The nationwide programs to survey pro...

This study supports the theory that asbestos exposure may be implicated in a recent upsurge of terminal lung cancer cases in Kure, Japan. The number of asbestos bodies found in the lung during autopsy of 158 subjects from 1984 to 1986 suggests that 70.4 percent of the 51 diagnosed lung cancer cases could be attributed to asbestos exposure. Of the 107 subjects in whom death was not caused by can...

BACKGROUND Although asbestos in general is well known to cause a range of neoplastic and non-neoplastic human health effects, not all asbestos fiber types have the same disease-causing potential, and the mode of action (MOA) of specific types of asbestos and related fibers for various health outcomes are not well understood. OBJECTIVES A workshop was held to discuss the state of the science o...

Mesothelial cells, the progenitor cells of the asbestos-induced tumor mesothelioma, are particularly sensitive to the toxic effects of asbestos, although the molecular mechanisms by which asbestos induces injury in mesothelial cells are not known. We asked whether asbestos induced apoptosis in mesothelial cells and whether reactive oxygen species were important. Rabbit pleural mesothelial cells...

In 2009, Korea banned the import, transport, and use of asbestos, and the Asbestos Injury Relief Act (AIRA) was promulgated in 2011. Two environmental health centers for asbestos (EHCA), including Pusan National University Yangsan Hospital (PNUYH) and SoonChunHyang University Cheonan Hospital (SCHUCH), were adapted to find environmental asbestos-related diseases (ARDs) and to support the purpos...

To demonstrate the correlations between the concentrations of ferruginous body as well as uncoated fiber both of which can be observed with phase-contrast microscope and the concentration of various inorganic fibers including asbestos which requires the observation with TEM or SEM, we measured those indices among Japanese and Korean cases. Though the concentration of ferruginous body in lung ti...

Asbestos-containing products have been utilized extensively in home and building construction during the first eight decades of 20th century. While substantial literature exists regarding occupational asbestos exposure, limited information is available concerning exposure residential settings. In addition to containing homes, exposures may also result from use which occurs as a contaminant. Des...

An epidemiological and environmental study was carried out in Shubra El-Kheima city, greater Cairo, of the exposure-response relationship between asbestos and malignant pleural mesothelioma. Radiological screening was done for 487 people occupationally exposed to asbestos, 2913 environmentally exposed to asbestos and a control group of 979 with no history of exposure. Pleural biopsy was done fo...