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A Failsworth, Lancashire woman is the youngest recorded sufferer of a rare asbestos-related cancer. Leigh Carlisle has baffled doctors by catching the fatal disease mesothelioma – a form of lung cancer normally contracted by breathing in asbestos. And the 27-year-old believes she may have caught it on her walk to school as a child by passing a factory yard where asbestos sheets were cut up. Leigh said: "I used to take a short cut across a yard in Failsworth on my way to primary school. "I know that men working there cut asbestos sheets and handled asbestos materials in the yard, but I had no idea that by walking through the yard I could have inadvertently got cancer."
Leigh, who was diagnosed with mesothelioma at the age of 26 after suffering from severe abdominal pains, said: "It took several years for doctors to diagnose me with mesothelioma. I was passed from pillar to post between various hospitals until they realised what was wrong with me." Now she wants to raise the profile of the condition, which attacks a thin membrane coating the lungs and abdomen and is one of the most aggressive forms of cancer. In the majority of cases the cancer takes between 20 and 50 years to develop after exposure to asbestos. Once diagnosed, patients usually survive for only up to 12 months. Leigh has welcomed an announcement by the Department of Health that they intend to organise better NHS services for mesothelioma sufferers.
Adrian Budgen, from law firm Irwin Mitchell, which represents Leigh, said: "Mesothelioma is a very cruel disease, for which there is no cure. Ms Carlisle’s case shows that mesothelioma cannot be regarded as an ‘old person’s disease’ any longer. "We are aware of a growing number of people who have developed mesothelioma after being exposed to asbestos dust on their loved one’s work clothes." It is estimated there are about 2,000 deaths a year from mesothelioma in Britain. This number has doubled since 1992 and is predicted to rise further. Despite the use of asbestos being banned in Britain, past exposure to the mineral fibre means this number has not yet reached its peak. Professor Julian Peto, of Cancer Research UK, has called the use of asbestos in Britain an "extraordinary industrial error". He believes 90,000 more people will die from mesothelioma in Britain and a further 90,000 from other lung diseases related to asbestos exposure. He claims mesothelioma has already killed twice as many people as cervical cancer and those at risk are people born in the 1940s who worked as carpenters, laggers, shipyard workers, metal workers, electricians and in other areas of construction. |
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Workplace Law Network - Sept - 2007
Criminal prosecutions brought under the Control of Asbestos at Work Regulations 2002 more than tripled last year to 37.
In 2003-2004, after the 2002 rules came into force, the HSE launched seven criminal prosecutions. This rose to 12 in 2004-2005, but jumped to 37 in 2005-2006: the most recent year for which statistics are available.
The 2002 rules extended the responsibility for managing asbestos to all workplaces, not just those in “high-risk” industries where workers are most likely to come into contact with asbestos.
An explicit "duty to manage" asbestos introduced under the 2002 rules includes requirements for anyone responsible for managing business premises to:
- Locate asbestos-containing materials and determine their condition;
- Presume materials contain asbestos unless there is strong evidence to the contrary; assess the risk from materials; and
- Plan how to manage asbestos in the future.
- The rules were further strengthened in November 2006 to improve overall worker protection by reducing exposure limits and introducing mandatory training for work with asbestos. Statistics for prosecutions under the 2006 rules are not yet available.
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Eurolag Group are proud to announce that we have been awarded a four year measured term contract, commencing in July 2007 to remove asbestos containing materials from schools throughout Oxfordshire on behalf of Mouchel Parkman.
Despite fierce competition for the contract and after numerous interviews the project was awarded to Eurolag.
The contract expires in 2011 with the possibility of an extension for a further two years, at yearly intervals. |
