Comments on "Mortality Patterns Among Hard Rock Gold Miners Exposed to an Asbestiform Mineral" and "Asbestos Fiber Exposures in a Hard Rock Gold Mine" (1976)

This was not a research study but a critique by Paul Kotin and Gerald R. Chase of the Johns-Manville Corporation, included in the company's April 1976 comments to OSHA on a proposed lower asbestos standard. It reviewed a manuscript by Gillam and colleagues that was later split into two reports. One covered deaths among hard rock gold miners exposed to an asbestiform mineral, compared with South Dakota rates. The other covered asbestos fiber exposures in the mine. Kotin and Chase argued that the death counts were small and that smoking and other exposures were not adequately considered. One column of the mortality report's Table II, whose label is unreadable in the scan, showed 7 observed and 2.18 expected respiratory cancer deaths, including two non-lung cancer deaths. Removing those two and counting only ICD codes 162-163, Kotin and Chase calculated 2.0 expected deaths and a P-value above 0.10, rather than the manuscript's lower value. They said the nonmalignant respiratory excess depended on including four silicosis deaths. They also objected that air measurements used the 25 highest of 200 samples. Kotin and Chase concluded that the claimed excesses rested on poor and incomplete analyses and that data incriminating asbestos were lacking.

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From J-M's medical library

This copy comes from the Johns-Manville medical library. It is a copy from J-M's medical library.