Partnership for Occupational Health

Our plain-English summary of Partnership for Occupational Health, by I.J. Selikoff (1969).

The study

• Author: I.J. Selikoff
• Published: The American Industrial Hygiene Conference, Denver. May 13th 1969
• Type of article: Conference paper
• 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 a badly scanned transcript of a 1969 conference talk by Irving J. Selikoff, not a formal research paper. The author described all members of two insulation workers' union locals in the New York and New Jersey area: 632 men who were members on January 1, 1943, and 890 who joined later. Among the 632, 255 died over twenty years where 200 were expected from U.S. white male rates, although an earlier passage gives 262 deaths. These included 12 asbestosis deaths where none were expected. By the end of December 1968, 380 of the 632 had died: 72 of bronchogenic carcinoma, 6 of pleural mesothelioma, 16 of peritoneal mesothelioma, 37 of GI cancer and 30 of asbestosis. The author reported that every cancer death but one occurred at least 20 years after first exposure. Among the 1522 workers followed, no mesothelioma had yet been seen in a man who began work after 1930. Many of 113 tile setters had also done direct asbestos or shipyard work. The author said judgement on non-occupational risk should be withheld.

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: Transcript of a conference presentation describing the speaker's mortality data on union insulation workers, together with discussion of other researchers' reports and a union-industry hygiene program
• Who was studied: All members of two Insulation Workers Union locals in the New York and New Jersey area: 632 men who were members on January 1, 1943, plus 890 who joined after that, 1522 in all. A separate group of 113 tile setters in New York was also examined.
• Exposure: Work as asbestos insulation workers. The talk does not name the fiber type for this group.
• Main results:
  • Among the 632 men who were members in 1943, 255 died over the following twenty years, where 200 were expected had their experience matched that of all U.S. white males. An earlier passage of the transcript instead gives 262 deaths among the original 632 by January 1, 1963.
  • In that same twenty-year period, the 632 men had 12 deaths from asbestosis, where none were expected
  • In that same period, the 632 men had about three times the expected 9 or 10 deaths from cancer of the colon and related sites
  • In a later analysis of the remaining 370 men of the original 632, there were 94 deaths where 47 were expected, and 27 deaths from cancer of the lung or pleura where 2 or 3 were expected (three of these were mesothelioma)
  • In that later analysis, there were 7 deaths from peritoneal mesothelioma, where none were expected
  • In that later analysis, there were 15 deaths from asbestosis, where none were expected
  • By the end of December 1968, 380 of the original 632 men had died, 72 of them of bronchogenic carcinoma
  • Of these deaths among the original 632 by the end of 1968, 6 were from pleural mesothelioma and 16 from peritoneal mesothelioma
  • Of these deaths, 37 were from GI cancer and 30 were from asbestosis
  • Among the 632 men, all cancer deaths except one occurred after 20 years from first exposure
  • Among the 1522 New York and New Jersey insulation workers under observation, none of the 22 mesotheliomas seen had occurred in a man who began work after 1930, at the time of the talk
  • Among the 890 men who joined after 1943, almost nothing had been seen. The few lung cancers were in men who had done non-union insulation work before 1943.
  • Of 113 tile setters with more than 30 years since starting tile work, 21 had also worked as insulation workers, 3 had other direct asbestos work, and 51 had worked in shipyards in World War II. Only 38 had done neither. Disease findings for this group were not reported.
  • The 852 insulation employers in the United States employed on average about 17 men each
  • Examined men reported seeing only 8 dust counts across about 4 and a half million days of employment
• The authors' conclusion: The author concluded that the long interval between first exposure and disease, small employers, rotating employment and small union locals explain why the hazard was not detected earlier. The author also concluded that, because past work exposure is hard to identify, no significant non-occupational risk can be accepted until it is defined, and judgement should be withheld.
• Limitations the authors state:
  • Not all members were examined. The others in general refused examination or had gone elsewhere.
  • The author said that the difficulty of identifying past direct asbestos work makes apparent family, neighborhood or indirect exposure cases hard to interpret

Topics

Medical terms in this study, explained in our Lexicon: Insulator, Bronchogenic Carcinoma, Pleural Mesothelioma, Peritoneal Mesothelioma, Mesothelioma.

Browse return to medical research.