A recently obtained state prison report suggests a Chillicothe, Ohio prison was filled with dangerous asbestos despite an official’s claims otherwise.

According to an article in the Lancaster Eagle-Gazette, a May 2007 survey recently acquired by The Columbus Dispatch newspaper shows that prison officials voiced concerns about the presence of asbestos in floor tiles and pipe insulation at the Chillicothe Correctional Institution (CCI) but nothing was done to address the situation.

The article notes that a recently-filed federal lawsuit accuses the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction of “lying about efforts to remove the asbestos” and says officials showed “a deliberate indifference to a known health risk at the prison.”

The suit was filed on behalf of 33 inmates and four former inmates, who say they found powdered asbestos on the floors on the prison. The inmates suggest they were exposed to the material on a regular basis which, in its powdered state, presents a serious health risk.

Prisons spokeswoman JoEllen Lyons said the state has spent $375,920 since 2005 to remove or contain the asbestos at the prison and maintains that there are no asbestos hazards in the dormitory or common areas at this time. The only known asbestos, she states, is in the tunnels under the complex.

Prisoners still disagree with the findings, even though a January 2007 inspection by the Correctional Institution Inspection Committee stated that the last remnants of asbestos in a CCI housing unit was removed two years ago.

“At the time, all above ground asbestos in this area was encapsulated,” says Warden Robin Knab.

The family of a British woman who literally served as a “poster girl” for a large asbestos products manufacturer in the United Kingdom was recently awarded compensation for her pain and suffering, more than 5 years after the woman died from exposure to the very products she helped promote.

According to an article in the Manchester News, Martha Charlson helped promote the acceptable image of Turner and Newall Manufacturers at its heyday during the 1950s and 60s, when her photo appeared in a booklet detailing the firm’s history.

”She was pictured working at a spotless-looking asbestos spinning machine on the factory floor at Turner Brothers premises in Rochdale in 1957,” the article points out. “But the photo was hardly a reflection of the real conditions she and hundreds of fellow workers endured.”

Mrs. Charlson retired in 2002 at age 64. She died just a few short months later. She had been employed at Turner and Newall – once the world’s biggest asbestos producer - since the age of 16, handling asbestos-treated yarn.

“My mum died while waiting for this compensation. She knew she would not see the money in her lifetime but it was important to her to fight for a sense of justice,” said Charlson’s daughter, Louise Keefe.

“She felt very angry that she had worked with such a dangerous substance but had never been warned about the consequences.”

“My mum retired on Saturday and became ill on the Sunday. She did not get a retirement and she was very angry about that - we all still are. She became ill because of her work. At the time she was on good money, but when she realized she was ill she said it was danger money,” Keefe added.

The article notes that all compensation claims against Turner and Newall were frozen in 2001 after the company went into bankruptcy in the UK.

”Claims were suspended while administrators reached agreement with the company’s insurers and parent company Federal Mogul. The payouts now come from a trust set up by the administrators after the High Court approved a deal which allowed claimants to receive a share of their entitled awards,” the article explains.

More than two years after Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans, officials are still trying to determine the most efficient way of demolishing storm-damaged homes containing asbestos. Thus far, the process has been costly and tedious, notes an article in The Times-Picayune.

However, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has recently determined that the most cost-effective way of ridding the city of these eyesores is to incinerate them while monitoring the air to make sure that no toxic emissions escape into the atmosphere.

The article points out that EPA officials convinced parish council members during three months of negotiations that a test of the procedure poses no health risks for residents. However, approval of the plan is contingent on the renewal of a waiver exempting the parish from strict asbestos abatement procedures for demolished homes.

According to Parish President Craig Taffaro, without the waiver, the parish would have to remove all asbestos from the 5,000 remaining homes slated for demolition before they could be torn down.

“That’s a monumental task,” Taffaro said at Thursday night’s council meeting. “If we don’t get an extension, it will cripple our recovery.”
The waiver, however, allows asbestos to be left in homes that are scheduled for demolition, as long as the structures are wetted while being torn down and the debris is sealed in plastic-lined trash bins for proper disposal. The process of wetting means dangerous asbestos dust won’t escape into the air during demolition.

Lab tests have shown that burning asbestos at high temperatures transforms it into a harmless material, said Bob Olexsey, an EPA program manager in Cincinnati.

Environmental groups in India allege that the federal government is attempting to tamper with a study on the safety of white (chrysotile) asbestos, a toxic mineral that is still widely used throughout the country.

According to an article in the Calcutta Telegraph, the Ministry of Chemicals and Fertilizers is trying to influence the study in question, hoping to maintain its position that India should continue using the mineral despite the fact that 40 countries have already banned its use.

India is home to about 30 companies that produce asbestos-containing products, says the article. More than 90 percent of the material is used in asbestos-cement pipes, flat sheets and corrugated roofing sheets and the rest goes into brake linings, pads and industrial gloves.

“The Ministry of Chemicals and Fertilizers is colluding with the asbestos industry to influence the findings of safety studies,” said Madhumita Dutta, an environmental activist based in Chennai who had filed the application under RTI seeking study documents.

The ministry had asked the National Institute of Occupational Health (NIOH) to conduct a study on the health hazards of asbestos by examining workers in the asbestos industry. But, say concerned environmentalists, the findings are being vetted by the ministry as well as industry representatives before they are either peer-reviewed by independent scientists or made public.

“The ministry wants to influence the findings of this study to shape domestic policy on asbestos,” said Gopal Krishna, an activist with the Ban Asbestos Network of India.

Various members of the medical and scientific research community are drafting and signing a petition that will go to the House of Representatives, asking them to pass legislature that will totally ban the importation and use of asbestos-containing products.

According to an article in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, physicians, nurses, industrial hygienists, clinical scientists and others who deal with the victims of asbestos exposure are signing the petition. Many of them have worked with Washington senator Patty Murray in her six-year fight to ban asbestos. However, they say that with its current wording, Bill SB742, proposed by Murray last fall, won’t accomplish everything necessary to stop the fatal legacy of asbestos exposure.

These individuals and other lobbyists say that Murray’s original language – which would have ordered a complete ban on asbestos - was watered down to get the bill passed. The new Senate version would not have outlawed asbestos from vermiculite, talc, taconite and other sources of contamination. But most importantly, say Murray’s former backers, are that products containing up to 1 percent asbestos are exempt from prohibition, says Dr, Michael Harbut, co-director of the National Center for Vermiculite and Asbestos-Related Cancers at the Karmanos Cancer Institute.

“What the Senate passed would even allow asbestos fibers to be present in everything from road patch to stuffed teddy bears,” Harbut said. “How is that protecting the public health?” asked Harbut, who is also employed at the Center for Occupational and Environmental Medicine at Wayne State University.

The House expects to hold hearing on “a more inclusive” ban in early spring, committee staffers say. Currently, 40 countries around the world have issued a total ban on asbestos, including almost all the European Union members. The U.S. issued strong warnings about asbestos use in the 1970s but never a total ban.

More than a dozen labor unions and NGOs (non-governmental organizations) in India recently released a report that resulted in a demand for a ban on asbestos throughout the country, which has an extremely high incidence of asbestos-related diseases.

According to an article in Thaindian News, the report, entitled “A Fox in the Hen House: Made-to-order Science and India’s Asbestos Policy,” alleges a suspicious link between the government and the nation’s asbestos industry and calls for an all out ban on the toxic mineral.

Addressing a news conference yesterday, Centre of Indian Trade Unions (CITU) General Secretary P. K. Ganguly, said “When there are alternatives to asbestos, it should be banned.”

“The World Health Organization has got the reports. The reports say that all sorts of asbestos [are dangerous], including the white type called Chrysotile asbestos, [which] is one of the most toxic and widely used in India and some other developing countries,” added Ganguly.

To date, 40 countries have banned the use of chrysotile and other forms of asbestos, but India is one of six countries that are opposing the inclusion of chrysotile on a list of hazardous chemicals. The list is updated annually at a meeting of the World Health Organization. Other countries opposing the listing of chrysotile include Canada and Russia, both of whom continue to mine asbestos.

India’s ship breaking industry is the hardest hit when it comes to asbestos-related diseases such as mesothelioma. Dismantling old ships usually results in exposure to asbestos, which was widely used in shipbuilding until the late 1970s. Often, when the ships arrive in India, the asbestos is already damaged or it becomes damaged with improper removal. Damaged asbestos results in airborne fibers, which can be easily inhaled by shipyard workers.

Newly discovered documents show that at least one Everett, Wash. fire official knew about the presence of dangerous asbestos in homes that the fire company was using to train their new firefighters.

According to an article in the Everett Herald, the Everett firefighters that trained in the old homes were also joined by a number of other companies from Snohomish County in using the homes for training. Those companies were also unaware of the dangers that awaited them in the old houses.

“Although city officials say they have since alerted two fire departments about concerns, some firefighters are raising questions about why they haven’t been notified that there was potential exposure,” notes the article, adding that it appears nothing was said to these departments until recently, even though the state Department of Labor and Industries revealed that Everett firefighters likely were exposed to asbestos when they trained in the houses in July, more than six months ago.

“Our first indication was when it broke in the news. We heard nothing of it, and still to this day, we haven’t received any official communication,” said Troy Smith, union president for firefighters in Snohomish County Fire District 7. “That to me is inexcusable.”

Furthermore, records show that on July 18, less than a week before Everett firefighters trained in the houses, a construction company told a captain with the Everett Fire Department that asbestos and lead paint needed to be removed before the houses could be used for training. The abatement wasn’t planned until after July 30 and the captain was told the training would have to be after that date, according to the minutes from a meeting that included representatives from the construction and engineering companies.

However, less than a week after that meeting, firefighters were training inside the houses in question. In the meantime, a consultant with the Department of Labor has deemed the exposure serious enough to suggest that those firefighters who performed training exercises inside the home be tested periodically for any sign of asbestos-related disease.

“The minutes of those meetings just came out. It was a big surprise to us. We’re very concerned about it. We’re still trying to investigate all the facts,” said Robert Downey, president of the Everett firefighters’ union. “We’ve been in those houses since May. We assumed everything was done and it was safe.”

Two men associated with a general contracting firm based in the town of Chili, New York, near Rochester, have been indicted on charges of illegal asbestos removal and lying to the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA).

According to an article in the Rochester Democrat and Chronicle, Keith Gordon-Smith, president of Gordon-Smith Contracting, and David Vega Jr., a project manager, have been accused of exposing employees to asbestos during a demolition project at the former Genesee Hospital in nearby Rochester.

According to court records, the indictment states that Gordon-Smith, 50, and Vega, 28, both residents of Rochester, demanded employees remove copper piping and other materials from ceilings at the hospital during a project that took place last winter and spring, even though they knew asbestos was present. In addition, Gordon-Smith and Vega are accused of lying to an OSHA inspector about the incident.

Two months ago, Gordon-Smith’s company was ordered to pay $100,000 in federal fines. However, this indictment carries the potential of additional fines of $250,000 for each defendant and a maximum of five years in prison. The company faces an addition half-million dollars in fines as well, according to U.S. Attorney Terrance P. Flynn of the Western District of New York.

Genesee Hospital is currently being redeveloped as a mixed-use urban center.