Problems and Perspectives The Changing Hazards of Exposure to Asbestos

Our plain-English summary of Problems and Perspectives The Changing Hazards of Exposure to Asbestos, by J.C. Gilson (1965).

The study

• Author: J.C. Gilson
• Published: Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences (1965)
• Type of article: Journal article
• 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 article was not a new study. It was a perspective paper for a conference on asbestos, in which the author reviewed past knowledge and Conference evidence and set out unsolved problems. The author noted that few studies had related asbestosis to measured dust levels. One older study, by Dreessen and colleagues, reported asbestosis in 27 per cent of asbestos textile workers exposed for five to nine years. Citing other authors, the article reported that the average age at death from asbestosis in the United Kingdom had risen from 41 years to 57. On lung cancer, the author cited Doll's study, in which 16 of 18 lung cancer cases had asbestosis, and asked whether the risk remained without asbestosis. For mesothelial tumors, the author wrote that evidence from South Africa and the United Kingdom strongly suggested crocidolite. The author did not consider the evidence on chrysotile incontrovertible. The author concluded that much greater care must be taken to eliminate unnecessary exposure to asbestos dust, and called for systematic prospective studies of workers.

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: Perspective / narrative review paper (not a comprehensive review) discussing past literature and evidence presented at a conference on asbestos
• Who was studied: No study population of its own. The author discussed published studies and Conference papers on asbestos textile workers, insulation workers and others, mainly in the United Kingdom, the United States and South Africa
• Exposure: Asbestos dust in general. Fiber types discussed include crocidolite, chrysotile and amosite, in textile, insulation and mining settings
• Main results:
  • The author cited Dreessen et al. (1938), who reported an asbestosis prevalence of 27 per cent in asbestos textile workers exposed for five to nine years. This was similar to the 25 per cent found by Merewether and Price (1930) in United Kingdom textile mills.
  • The author cited Mitchell (1961), who reported a 100-fold improvement in dustiness in a U.S. asbestos textile factory between 1936 and 1960, but gave no information on asbestosis prevalence.
  • Citing other authors, the article reported that the average age at death from asbestosis in the United Kingdom had been 41 years according to Merewether (1934). McVittie and Smither (1965) found it to be 57. The author added that deaths from asbestosis still occurred not uncommonly in men in their forties.
  • The author cited Doll (1955), in which 16 of the 18 lung cancer cases reported had asbestosis.
  • Of the 100 cases of lung cancer associated with asbestosis in the world literature, the author stated that 80 per cent were in the United Kingdom.
  • The author cited Selikoff and colleagues' study of insulation workers. It found fibrosis in all 39 of a consecutive series of post-mortems, and nearly four times as many death certificates of lung cancer as of asbestosis. The author said this left unsettled whether lung cancer occurs without asbestosis.
  • The author noted that a few cases of mesothelial tumors from the chrysotile mining areas in Canada suggested chrysotile may also be concerned, but did not think the evidence was yet incontrovertible.
• The authors' conclusion: The author concluded that much greater care must be taken in future to eliminate unnecessary exposure to asbestos dust wherever it occurs. The author called for international agreement on diagnostic criteria and dust measurement, and for systematic prospective studies of workers with measured dust exposures.
• Limitations the authors state:
  • The author stated that the paper is not a comprehensive review of the past.
  • The author stated that adequate quantitative evidence on changes in the asbestosis hazard was lacking.

Topics

Medical terms in this study, explained in our Lexicon: Lung Cancer, Crocidolite, Chrysotile.

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