Silicosis, asbestosis, and cancer of the lung (1955)

This 1955 editorial by W.C. Hueper of the National Cancer Institute reviewed earlier published reports rather than presenting a new study. Citing other researchers' work, the author wrote that lung cancer was not unusually frequent in people with silicosis. In one cited autopsy series of 383 men with silicosis, 7 (1.8 per cent) had lung cancer, against an expected 9.9 to 12 per cent. By contrast, the author called the evidence for a causal relationship between asbestosis and lung cancer "quite substantial." The editorial counted 127 recorded cases of lung cancer with asbestosis: 21 in the United States, 6 in Canada, 12 in Germany and 88 in Great Britain (printed unclearly; 88 is what makes the total 127). Among 738 asbestosis autopsies collected from the literature there were 114 lung cancers (15.5 per cent). Reported asbestos exposure periods ranged from 6 months to 42 years. The author noted that animal experiments had not reliably produced these cancers. The author wrote that the epidemiologic data then available indicated that the increased risk was limited to people with asbestosis and did not extend to asbestos exposure without that disease.

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.

From J-M's medical library

This copy comes from the Johns-Manville medical library. J-M listed it in its medical library index as no. 001863. Barry Castleman cites it in chapter 2, "Cancer", of Asbestos: Medical and Legal Aspects (5th ed., 2005); see Reading Castleman.

We publish an editorial for research and commentary: it shows what the medical literature in a leading asbestos company's own library said on the subject, and when. Our summary above is our own reading of it. The copyright stays with the publisher.