Document 0BVa1n2YOrMqao9dZYZRb5JR

FILE NAME: TCA DATE: 1976 OCT 29 DOC#: TCA004 DOCUMENT DESCRIPTION: Letter from National Resources Defense Council  Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc. 15 W E ST 44TH STREET- N E W Y O R K , N .Y . IO O 36 BOARD O r TRUSTEES Stephen P. Duggan Chairman James Marshall Vice Chairman h r .George M. Woodwell V k c Chairman Dr. Denn E. Ahralumson Mm . Louis Auchindou Bois I. Bittkcr Frederick A. Collins, Jr. 813 869-0150 October 29, 1976 Washington 917 15TII STREET. N.U W ASHINGTON, D.C. tOOf ao8 737-50 . j Western Office HAMILTON t. " NT LTO, CAL 345- W -u.'- Dr. Rene J. Dubos James B. Frankel Robert W . Gilmore Lady Jackson, D.B.E. Hamilton Kean Dr. Joshua Lederbcrg Anthony Mazzocchi Faut N . McCloskey. Jr. Michael McIntosh Honorable S. John Byington, Chairnv Consumer Product Safety Commission Washington, D.C. 20207 Eleanor Holmes Norton Oureii Olpin Franklin E. Parker Dear Mr. Byington; Dr. Gifford B. Pinchot Charles JB. Rangel John R . Robinson We are writing to respond to the asbestos industry* comments., on the Natural Resources Defense Council and Laurance Rockefeller Consumers .Union's petition, on drywall....patching.compounds., J. Willard Roosevelt Whitney North Seymour. Jr. which was filed with your.agency on July 15, 1976. David Sise The major thrust of the objection of the Asbestos . . I T T ' 11'"* Information Association (AIA) to our petition to ban asbes * ExecutiveDirector tos m consumer drywall patching compounds is that asbestc adds desirable qualities to these materials. However, the; also note that several manufacturers claim success in de veloping good asbestos-free formulations. It should be noted here that those who claim success in the development of asbestos-free .patching compounds in the construction in 1 dustry include the dominant company in the market, the U.f Gypsum Co., and several other important manufacturers (DAP, Inc.; Handy Products; Red Devil, Inc.) who provide an effective asbestos-free product. The asbestos industry trade association argues that the asbestos levels reported in the petition were obtained during patching operations by commercial drywall workers, 'and suggests that dust concentrations in the home would be less because a smaller scale operation is involved'. This contention is not necessarily so; in fact, the opposite is likely to be true. The measurements obtained by Rohl et a_ were of dust concentrations measured in the breathing zone of a worker sanding asbestos-containing tape joint com pounds. The prdominent contribution to the dust would be from the worker's own activity. Some contribution would arise from the buildup of a general asbestos concentration in the room in which sanding is done. As the enclosed area in offices are often considerably larger than those of the home, it would be expected that a buildup of dust over time would be greater in the confined spaces of a dwelling than ve In i Paper SALDIBAR-TCNA 3503 Honorable S. John Byington, Chairman October 29, 1976 -2- in the spaciousness of a large office building, in which only outside walls and service walls are finished with wallboard, the individual offices being constructed with movable partitions. This type of construction was inclu ded in the sampling by Rohl et al. The Asbestos Information Association (AIA) also lists asbestos concentrations during sanding of. patching substan ces as reported in GDIC/Drywall, an industry trade magazine The origin of the differences between the results of the drywall industry-supported study by Rhodes and Ingalls and that of the independent study of Rohl et al. cannot be pin pointed. Obviously, work conditions and* worker activities can vary considerably, and the work which a researcher chooses to sample has utmost importance in the determination of the results obtained. Petitioners (Natural Resources Defense Council and Con sumers Union of U.S.A.) have no disagreement that the cumula * tive exposure of an individual consumer to asbestos fibers from the use of joint compounds during home repair are less than that of a taper or painter sanding such materials daily However, we are not dealing with a factory or construction situation to which occupational standards are applicable. We are concerned with general population exposures that can occur to millions of "do-it-yourselfers" and to others in cluding infants in-the homes of these individuals. As some asbestos fibers, once inhaled, remain in the lungs thereaftr the period at risk from that exposure can greatly exceed the corresponding time for occupationally exposed adult workers. It should be noted that the EPA emission standard for asbest adr pollution precludes the emission into the ambient air oi any visible quantities of asbestos-containing material. If this criterion were deemed necessary for the protection of general populations living and working about commercial and industrial sources of asbestos, a similar degree of protecti should be afforded the occupants of apartment*, houses, and offices, etc. ' | Petitioners acknowledge that in epidemiological studie. of asbestos workers., there lis a paucity of data on the levei of asbestos to which the xvorkers were exposed decades ago. We do know that the permissible levels of asbestos exposure were much higher in the past than the current standard of 2 fibers per milliliter. We take exception to the industry's claim that people residing .half a mile from a factory or in the home of asbestos workers are exposed to a "substantial number of high average or massive intermittent exposures to airborne fibers." Data available in recent years suggest that such environmental exposures are considerably below the 2 fiber per milliliter occupational standard. SALDIBAR-TCNA 3504 Honorable S. John Byington, Chairman October 29, 1976 a i The statements quoted by AIA from the Johns-Manville submission to the Occupational Safety and Health Adminis tration (on the proposed workplace asbestos standard) sug gesting that a threshold level exists below which biologi cal effects will not be seen has no scientific evidence supporting ito As one reduces the exposure of a group of animals to a carcinogen, the risk may be reduced such that no members of a small group of animals will develop cancer; a larger group so exposed might very well incur some small incidence of the disease, but large groups are not studied because of limitations in cost and facilities. While he was the director of National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, Dr. Paul Kotin, now medical director of Johns-Manville Corporation, stated, (during hearings before the Subcommittee on Research, Development and Radiation of the Joint Committee on Atomic Energy, Congress of the United States, March 17-18, 1969) that; "A very respectable body of opinion maintains that there is no threshold for the action of a carcinogen; therefore, limitation in data are the result of our inadequate models rather than the presence of a threshold. For what it is worth, I belong to that group that maintains there is, at present, no evidence for a threshold, but I would ' say that biological data make such a position re liably speculative." This is best explained in a report co-authored by Dr. Kotin: "Bioassays are always performed on a number of animals which is extremely small when compared with the millions of humans exposed to most environmen tal carcinogens. Such studies can only detect car cinogenic effects'resulting in fairly high incidences. For example, an observed outcome of no tumors in a^ . test group of 100 animals, as well as in 100 negative i controls, only provides assurance, at the 99 percent I probability level that the true tumor risk is under 4.5 percent... or:,r, / "It is important to establish any absolute safe level of exposure to a carcinogen for man. The con. cept of 'toxicologically insignificant1 levels, ... of dubious merit in any life science, has absolutely no validity in the field of carcinogenesis."* * Evaluation of Environmental Carcinogens, a report to the Surgeon General, USPIIS, April 22, 1970, Ad Hoc Committee on the Evaluation of Low Levels of Environmental Chemical Carcinogens, pp. 6-7. SALDIBAR-TCNA 3505 Honorable S. John Byington, Chairman October 29, 1976 -4- ' The asbestos industry trade group has given no scien tific evidence negating the health effects discussed in . our petition. Moreover, the only argument advanced for continuing this use of asbestos is, "the consumer-user.. needs all the help he can get from product performance". . We suggest that this help does not offset an additional health risk from asbestos cancers. We are frankly per plexed by the industry's recalcitrant position, in view of the hazards of asbestos-containing patching compounds and the fact that sale of asbestos for use in patching compounds is only 10,000 tons per year, a mere 1 percent of U.S, asbestos consumption. We submit that the consumer-user needs all the help he or she can get from the Consumer Product Safety Commission, and we renew our plea that the Commission take appropriate and immediate action. Sincerely yours, A. Karim Ahmed, Ph.D SALDIBAR-TCNA 3506 Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc. I >#ST 44T H S T R E E T BOARD OF TRUSTEES Stephen F. Duggan Chairman James Marshall Vice Chairman Dr. Ccoigc M. Woodwell Vice Chairman l)r. Dean E. Abrahamsnu Mrs. Louis Auch in d ou Borii I. Bittker Frederick A. Cnllins. Jr. Dr. Rene J. Dubos James B. Frankel Robert W. Cilmoie Lady Jackson, D.B.E. Hamilton Kean Dr. Joshua Lederberg Anthony Mazzocchi Paul N. McCloskey, Jr. Michael McIntosh Eleanor Holmes Norton Owen Olpin Franklin E. Parker Dr. Gifford B. Pinchot Charles B. Rangel John R. Robinson Laurancc Rockefeller J. Willard Roosevelt Whitney North Seymour, Jr. David Sive Beatrice Abbott Duggan U J J . Representative John II. Adams * Executive Director N E W Y O R K ., N . Y . I O O 36 212 869-0 150 November 2, 1976 Washington Office 97 15T K STREET, K.W WASHINGTON, D.C. SO&(. o* 737-5000 W estern Office G64 HAMILTON AV)' PALO ALTO, C A LiF . l}.< > ; 415 327-1080 t Honorable S. John Byington, Chairman Consumer Product Safety Commission Washington, D,,C. 20207 Dear Mr. Byington: We would like to bring to your attention a typographical error in our letter to you of October 29, 1976. On page 3, the last paragraph, first sen tence, in the cited quotation, should read: "It is impossible to establish any absolute safe level of exposure to a carcinogen for man." Sincerely, A. Karim Ahmed, Ph.D. Staff Scientist ( V .. HU*/. Uri Vi Ini Parti r SALDIBAR-TCNA 3507