Asbestos Legislation

Our plain-English summary of Asbestos Legislation, by M. Fenwick (1979).

The study

• Author: M. Fenwick
• Published: Science, Volume 205 (1979)
• Type of article: Letter
• Our copy: from Johns-Manville's own medical library. The article is still under copyright, so we describe it here rather than post it.

In plain English

This is not a research study. It is a letter to the editor of Science from Representative Millicent Fenwick about the author's bill to compensate asbestos-exposed workers, with a reply from Science writer R. Jeffrey Smith. The author disputed a Science article's statement that the Johns-Manville Corporation drafted the bill. The author wrote that a member of the author's staff drafted it with a lawyer for the International Association of Heat and Frost Insulators. The author said workers cannot afford years of delay from broader legislation. The author noted that Representative Edward Beard was the first cosponsor and said the author had never accepted political action committee contributions. Science replied that it had three sources for its statement, but none could offer documented proof. A Johns-Manville lobbyist denied that the company wrote the bill. Science reported that the author had also credited Irving Selikoff with a drafting role, but Selikoff told Science that Selikoff had nothing to do with it. Union attorney Larry Cohen said Johns-Manville presented the first draft, which went through eight or nine drafts.

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.

What the study did and found

• Design: Letter to the editor (correspondence) with an editorial reply; not a research study
• Who was studied: No study population. The letter concerns asbestos-exposed workers who live in the author's congressional district.
• Exposure: Asbestos exposure, discussed as the subject of proposed compensation legislation; no fiber types, doses or health measurements are given
• Main results:
  • The author stated that the bill was drafted by a member of the author's staff, not by Johns-Manville
  • The author stated that the staff member worked with a lawyer for the International Association of Heat and Frost Insulators
  • The author argued that workers cannot afford the many years' delay that comprehensive legislation covering all work-related diseases might involve
  • The author noted that Representative Edward Beard, Democrat of Rhode Island, was the first cosponsor
  • The author stated that the author had never accepted contributions from political action committees, labor or corporate
  • In its reply, Science said none of its three sources for the authorship claim could offer documented proof
  • The top Johns-Manville lobbyist in Washington, John Autry, denied that the firm wrote the bill
  • According to Science's reply, the author claimed that Irving Selikoff had a role in drafting the bill
  • Selikoff told Science that Selikoff had nothing to do with planning or drafting the bill
  • Union attorney Larry Cohen said Johns-Manville presented the first draft, that the bill went through eight or nine drafts, and that the union got some figures changed to make the bill more liberal from the workers' standpoint
• The authors' conclusion: The author stated that requests for help from workers in the author's district were the reason for the author's interest in the legislation

Topics

Medical terms in this study, explained in our Lexicon: Johns-Manville, Insulator.

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