“Asbestos in Toys and Tools” By Paul Zygielbaum, ADAO Product Testing Project Manager
United States law and regulation allow commerce in products containing asbestos either as an ingredient or as a contaminant. The public lacks awareness of where asbestos might be found in our everyday environment. Inadequate regulation and awareness combine to pose a dangerous potential for undisclosed asbestos content in everyday products on American store shelves.
Call for the Americas – Ban Asbestos Now! By Laurie Kazan-Allen, Co-Founder, International Ban Asbestos Secretariat. Translations in English, Spanish, Portuguese and French.
Countries in the Americas are important stakeholders in the asbestos industry. From 1900 to 2008, asbestos consumption in the Americas was 43+ million tonnes. As a result of the widespread use of thousands of tainted products, human beings, infrastructures and environments were contaminated. Epidemics of asbestos disease have been documented in the United States, Canada, Brazil and Mexico; elsewhere the situation is unclear due to lack of data. The mesothelioma death last year of Hollywood columnist Army Archerd attracted much media attention; the same cannot be said for thousands of other asbestos deaths throughout North, South and Central America. Current high-profile examples of the residual problems stemming from asbestos pollution include remediation work ongoing at iconic buildings such as the U.S. Capitol, the Canadian Parliament and the United Nations headquarters.