A carpenter at a York, Pennsylvania-area nursing home says he was fired after he blew the whistle about allegedly hazardous levels of asbestos in the building’s flooring.

The York Dispatch reports that John J. Herbst Jr., a former employee at the Pleasant Acres Nursing and Rehabilitation Center, is suing the county for more than $500,000 in damages, attorneys’ fees, lost wages, interest and costs in the suit. Herbst claims that the county and its nursing home violated the state Whistleblower Law and his right to free speech.

Herbst, who was hired in 2002, says that part of his job at the home was to remove floor tiles. The lawsuit claims that the carpenter was warned by a contracted painter in 2003 that the floors contained asbestos. The article states that Herbst then asked his supervisor for safety equipment to remove the tiles and asked that the tiles be tested for asbestos.

His supervisor refused to perform the tests and instead told Herbst to wear a dust mask, the lawsuit says. While Herbst did not believe that the mask would provide adequate protection, he nonetheless continued to remove tiles for fear he would lose his job, the suit contends.

After filing a grievance with his union, Herbst was told that testing would be performed, but it never happened. The carpenter decided to have the tiles tested on his own and the results confirmed his suspicions that hazardous levels of asbestos were present. He was fired shortly thereafter, but was told it was because he “allegedly falsified records by misrepresenting when he had arrived at work on his time clock adjustment form.”

Sue Vento, the widow of the late Bruce Vento, U.S. Representative from Minnesota, appeared before Congress this week to appeal for a ban on asbestos, says an article penned by the Associated Press.

In 2000, Bruce Vento died of mesothelioma, an aggressive form of cancer for which the only known cause is exposure to asbestos. Mrs. Vento talked to the members of a Senate panel about her husband’s struggles with this painful and debilitating disease.

“Your bill will bring hope to all of us whose lives have been touched by this disease,” Sue Vento told the Senate Health Committee’s employment and workplace safety subcommittee. “It will prohibit the use of asbestos and will correct the mistaken belief held by so many that asbestos was banned decades ago.”

Joining in the fight was Senator Patty Murray (D-Wash), who brought visuals with her to the hearing. Murray held up a box of brake pads purchased last week that contain asbestos. While most American automakers stopped using asbestos in the 1980s, it’s still possible to purchase imported brakes that contain asbestos.

“How many more Americans have to die before our government finally does the right thing and bans asbestos?” she asked. “We have to do the right thing, and we have to do it now.” She pointed out that more than 40 countries have already banned asbestos.

Murray has previously introduced bills calling for a ban on asbestos but none have passed. She hopes that with the Democrats now in control, such legislation may be successful.

A recent study conducted at the University of Western Australia reports that after asbestos exposure, men are more likely than women to develop malignant mesothelioma.

Reuters Health recently reported the findings of the study, directed by Alison Reid, which involved people exposed to asbestos at Wittenoom in Western Australia. “This was an asbestos mining and milling town that closed in 1966, but still provides us with a legacy of asbestos-related diseases,” Reid told Reuters.

The study followed 4700 former residents of the town who were not employed in the milling and mining industry but were nonetheless exposed to the mineral by virtue of their residency, says Reid.

The study showed that deaths rates from mesothelioma were higher “with increasing length of residence” and were consistently lower for women than for men.

As a matter of fact, men had more than four times the rate of mesothelioma as women, after accounting for cumulative asbestos exposure and age at first residence.

“People who were at least 15 years old when they were first exposed to the asbestos-laden environment were 2.4 times more likely to die of mesothelioma than those who were younger than 15 years at first exposure,” the researchers noted in their report.

“The asbestos epidemic is almost past its peak in the developed world,” Ms. Reid stressed, “but elsewhere it will just be starting. It is still being used in many developing countries — where they have little or no regulation about its use, worker protection, or means of treatment.”

A sickened Dutch man, who claims his parents used asbestos waste products when he was a child to build a path near the family home, has sued a local cement manufacturer for damages.

According to an article in Dutch News, Harry Jansman has received compensation of 35,000 Euros in a suit against Eternit, a local cement company that, prior to the 1980s, used asbestos in its products.

Jansman was exposed to the waste materials in 1967 when his parents, like many others in his neighborhood, used the products to construct a walkway in front of their home. Jansman is now seriously ill with mesothelioma, an asbestos-caused cancer.

The article points out that Jansman is the first private individual to be awarded damages for an asbestos-related illness though neither he nor his parents worked at the Eternit factory. Attorney Bob Ruers hopes that the Jansman suit will open the door for others who have been affected in the same manner. He expects a considerable number of similar claims to surface because waste-containing asbestos was commonly used to build paths during that period.