In order to contract an asbestos-related lung disease, one must be exposed to asbestos. Because asbestos fibers are microscopic in size, the fibers can travel into the lungs when you breathe. Unfortunately, once the fibers are in the lungs, they remain in the lung tissue for a very long time and can cause scarring and inflammation. The scarring and inflammation caused by the asbestos fibers can lead to pleural plaques, pleural thickening, pleural effusions, asbestosis, lung cancer or mesothelioma. These asbestos-related disease processes do not develop overnight, but can take ten to forty or more years to develop in a person who was exposed to asbestos.
Sources of Exposure
Occupational Exposure
Throughout most of the twentieth century, asbestos was widely used in a variety of industries in the United States. As a result of this widespread use of asbestos in industry, the most common method of exposure was workplace exposure. Anyone whose work required them to be in the presence of asbestos material potentially put them at risk for asbestos disease. Individuals who worked in industrial settings such as shipyards, steel mills, power plants, chemical plants and refineries were at risk of encountering asbestos in their workplace. In addition, aircraft and auto mechanics, construction workers, carpenters, plasterers, drywall workers, electricians, plumbers, pipefitters, welders, steamfitters, insulators, and boiler operators are just some of the types of occupations that would put workers at risk for asbestos exposure.
Not only were the individuals who worked directly with asbestos products at risk for contracting an asbestos-related disease, the bystanders in the workplace who may have been in the vicinity of individuals working with asbestos are also at risk for disease. Basically, regardless of whether you were directly working with asbestos or were around somebody working with asbestos, if an individual was in an area where there was asbestos dust in the air, that person was at risk.
Take-Home Exposure
Unfortunately, it was common practice for individuals to go home after work wearing their work clothes that were covered in asbestos dust. The workers would unwittingly bring the asbestos dust into their home on their clothes, shoes and bodies. That asbestos dust would permeate the household and expose spouses and other family members to asbestos and put them at risk for asbestos-related disease as well.
Non-Occupational Exposure
There were a wide variety of asbestos-containing products that were available commercially for consumers to use in and around their home up through the 1980s, and even later for some products, like automobile brakes. Unfortunately, most of these products contained no warning regarding the hazards of asbestos. Some of the more commonly available products were floor and ceiling tiles, car brakes and clutches, gaskets, roofing shingles, siding, wall-patching material, joint compound for drywall, furnace cement and caulking materials. Homeowners finishing a basement or putting an addition on their house using sheetrock and joint compound would have put themselves and their family at risk for an asbestos disease. Likewise, a shadetree mechanic performing brake work in his driveway is also at risk for asbestos exposure as a result of the asbestos contained in brake shoes.
Any mesothelioma lawyer Washington, DC residents trust knows that while the types of exposures discussed above may have occurred ten, twenty or thirty years ago, asbestos diseases typically do not present themselves until many years after the exposure. That is why we are still seeing today individuals being diagnosed with asbestos diseases that resulted from exposure years ago.
Thanks to our friends and contributors from Brown, Gould, & Kiely LLC for their insight into asbestos lawsuits.