Mesothelioma Risk Prevention With New Asbestos Fibre Count System

Jan. 13, 2012 - PRLog -- New research experiments are greatly improving methods of asbestos detection but there has not always been the concern rigorously enforced today to correctly monitor for risk levels of asbestos fibres present among airborne dust particles.

Throughout much of the twentieth century, there was often a lack of asbestos awareness and wilful disregard for the growing evidence of the deadly health risk posed by asbestos exposure, which still continues to this today in the continuing rise of mesothelioma fatalities and asbestosis diseases.

At least 2,000 cases of mesothelioma are diagnosed every year in the UK, and a further 45,000 mesothelioma deaths are predicted by 2050 as a result of the widespread use of asbestos as an insulation and fire retardant material in past manufacturing, engineering, construction industries.

Exposed workers who inhaled the asbestos fibre dust would be subject to a long gestation period of between 15 to 50 years before the first signs of mesothelioma or asbestosis symptoms would appear. However, confirming diagnosis would require a forensic counting of fibres still present to qualify as proof that the disease is asbestos-related and a case for mesothelioma compensation can be allowed to proceed.

Unfortunately, diagnosis is often only made at a very late stage in the spread of the incurable cancer tumours and life expectancy is little more than 4 to 12 months.  

Formerly, medical research stipulated that the number of asbestos fibres required to be still present in the linings of the lungs or stomach tissue would need to be at least 20 million to qualify as asbestos-related. However, this number was arrived at by the examination of the most heaviest of asbestos exposure figures from the 1940s to the 1960s, in key ‘blackspot’ industries such as shipbuilding and asbestos production itself.

In addition, a longer gestation before asbestosis symptoms emerge could often mean a greater number of asbestos fibres would have actually vacated the body. More recent evaluations accept a fibre count calculation that can be as low as approx. 7 million.

One of the most commonly used procedures to determine fibre count in monitoring airborne dust particles is ‘phase contrast microscopy’ (PCM). By this method, a mixed sample is collected and filtered by a chemical solution and the collected fibres counted under 400x magnification.

However, the process requires highly skilled and experienced technicians, and this method is also unable to distinguish between asbestos and non-asbestos fibres. Consequently, all the fibres that meet the counting criteria are included as asbestos.

Recently, a new automated system has been developed in South Korea, which uses ‘high-throughput microscopy’(HTM), which claims by the automation of large scale repetition involving high numbers, asbestos fibres can be distinguished from other particles on a sample slide more quickly and accurately than the former method.

The researchers conclude that the new technique should be “considered as an alternative to conventional PCM” in monitoring of airborne particles in future risk prevention, This is especially relevant in industries such as building renovation and demolition where the presence of hidden asbestos is highly probable in premises built up to the mid-1980s, before white asbestos began to be banned from use in common building materials.

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