Document N2kejeb5dvkOq1a4ZbQmKk2b8

FILE NAME: General Dynamics (GED) DATE: 1978 July 14 DOC#: GED018 DOCUMENT DESCRIPTION: ABC News Transcript . RDIO TV REPORTS, inc. } 31.185 435 WISCONSIN AVENUE, N.W WASHINGTON, D C. 244-3S- -- \ 'FOR THE ASBESTOS INFORMATION ASSOCIATION PLAINTIFF'S fc EXHIBIT I 1SBCA..50.5.1.. 125 program ABC News Closeup STATION WJL A - T V A8C Network DATE Ju ly It, 1978 10:00 PM city Washington, D.C. SUBJECT Asbestos: The Way to Dusty Death JU LES BE RG MA N: A s b e s t o s is a common miner a l , easily mined, to make textiles, cement, insulation, and hundreds of co mme rcial pr od uc ts . The d arker side is t h e dust. When inhaled, it can start the body t o w a r d s cancer or i r r e v e r s i b l e lung d i s e a s e years later. MAN: Sometimes i t 's so dusty like a foggy day. And one time I asked he said to me, "V/eli, we know that i t 's but it w o n 't hu rt no bod y." t h e r e t h a t It was just my s u p e r v i s o r , and all a little uncomfortable, BERGMAN: Before this century ends, asbestos will kill or c a u s e ser io us d i s e a s e in hundreds of t h o u s a n d s of people. MAN: The real e ffect of t h e d i s ease is the living death. The person is cr ip pl ed. He Is a r e s p i r a t o r y cripple. MAN: asbestos to any iated c a n c e r . Fifty p e r cent of those p eople w h o 1ve worked around degree will die of lung cancer or some other re- MAN: l t fs the same as putting a gun to your head and pulling the trigger, and the bullet has 20 years to get there, what you b r e a t h e to day is going to kill you 20-30 years from now. WOMAN: My m o t h e r died !0 years ago fr om p I e u r o m e s o t h e * lioma. And my father died last year of metastatic edene passa- noma (?), a form of cancer. And 1 was stricken last May with p I a r u o n e s o t h e I i o m a . I directly a t t r i b u t e it to as bestos exposu re. MAN: Coughing3 0=rlCHSIM- NEW YORK LOSANOSLES CHICAGO DETROIT AND OTHER PR IN C IPA LITIES 2 BE RGM AN: T h e real t r a g e d y Is t h a t this need not have h a p p e n e d . T h e r e w e r e cl ea r w a r n i n g s , but t h e y w e r e Ignored by industry, by a negligent government, and by the medical profes sion. All faile d to warn m i l l i o n s of w o r k e r s in time. MAN ain't no need just short of Cslnging]: of tryin'. dyin'. T h e y tell me ! c a n rt w o r k at all, there B u t livin' like some u s e d-up thing Is BERGMA N: In T h i s p r o g r a m we'll look aT what happened to the workers and other victims, and who allowed this human dis aster to take place, who led them on the way to a dusty death. * * * BE RGM AN: G e o r g i a Tech had some g r e a t football tea ms In the early '50s, and Franklin Brooks was part of them. The Yellow Jac ke ts p l a y e d in four c o n s e c u t i v e bowl games, and Fr anklin B r oo ks p la ye d in all of T h e m . T h a t ' s him, number 60, m aking the tackle. This is the Su gar Bow! ga me of 1956. Fr anklin Brooks was voted the most valuable player.. .v S u m me rs, he worked in an insulation plant, like this, with a s b e s t o s board and pipes. It was dusty. N o - o n e told him it was d a n g e r o u s . coach. Football was his life. First as a player, then as a By age 42, he was back at Georgia T e c h , an assistant coach. Then he got sick: asbesTos cancers. mesothelioma, the most deadly of F R A N K L I N BROOKS: I'd say i t 's w o r s e n e d lately, because I have the most severe pain that I've had and 1 have a real short ness of b r eat h. I've had to get an oxygen t a n k in my room. And I h a v e n ' t used it yet, but it w o n 't be long b e f o r e I t h i n k I'll have to use oxygen. I c a n ' t w a l k fast or w a l k up s teps. If I do, I g e f o u t of breath. T h a t 's a n indication that things are not as good as they were, the shortness of breath and the severe pain that I have. BERGMAN: The asbestos dust that does the damage has to be magn i f i e d t h o u s a n d s of times b e f o r e you can see it. Two hundred and fifty thousand of these specks laid end to end would equal one inch. it was ju st such s p e c k s t h a t c h a n g e d F r a n k l i n Brooks' life. BROOKS: I was just about a 200-pounder, and that's what l weighed when 1 became ill. I'm down now to about 140. I wear my turtleneck to hide the loss of my muscles. 3 I 'm not talk to it, you I ha ve tw o ch ildren, one y o u n g s t e r 20 and a d a u g h t e r 16. sure t h a t t h e y r e a l i z e how s e r i o u s it is. I 've tried to th em at tim es ,, but t h e y 're ve ry r e l u c t a n t to t a l k about know, and my wi fe is r e l u c t a n t to t a l k about it. MRS. and i t ' s going for a miracle. BROOKS: I think one day i t 's going to all disappear. But ! guess not. Well, maybe. Because we love him. to get better I 'm hoping CIip of woman saying prayers with Frank Cullen^ B E R G M A N : F r a n k C u l l e n is too s i c k to go to chur ch , so the church comes to.him. Ce Ii p of p r a y i n g ! BERGMAN: I t 's been more than 30 years since Frank Cullen last w orke d with a s b e s t o s . T h a t was d u r i n g World War 1!. C C 1 ip of pray ing! BERGMAN: Frank Cullen was a boilermaker during the war, serving on destroyers like the U.S.S. Davidson. -- F R A N K C U L L E N : Every ti me you did 2000 hours y o u 'd have to remove the asbestos on the lines. While they were doing this, y o u 'd be w a l k i n g in all this g a r bage, a s b e s t o s all ov er the place,, soot. You name it, it was all there. MAN Csinging]]: 1 did my part in W o r l d War II, got for the nation. Now my lungs are all shot down, there ain't pensation. I 'm going to go to work on Monday one more time. going to go to work on Monday one more time, one more tine. going to go to work on Monday one more time. wounded no com I 'm , I 'm BERGMAN: Frank Cullen never worked with asbestos again. He left the Navy, married, had eight children. Now he has eight grandchildren as well. T hen , In 1977, he started to cough u n c o n t r o l l a b l y . DR. IRVING SE LIKQFF: T h e s e are Mr. C u l l e n 's X-rays. This first film in 1975 was normal. A c t u ally, his lung at t h e time was not normal, but we c o u l d n 't see it on the X - r a y . A little over a - year or a year and a half later he began to have some problems. And th is fi lm is in April of 1977, and you begin to see s o m e thi ng growin here on the lining of his chest. And t h a t 's unhappy news. That turned out to be a mesothelioma. BERGMAN: Hosp it a I . Dr. Irving Selikoff of Mew York's Mount Sinai 4 DR. S E L I KO FF : Our t r e a t m e n t for m e s o t h e l i o m a is not very e f f e c t i v e in m o s t cases. B E R GM AN: M e s o t h e l i o m a Is caused by what? DR. SELIKOFF: for it i.s a s b e s t o s . Well, so far the only cause that we know CUL LE N: My s t r ength Is all gone; I h a v e no s t r engt h a n y mo re . I c a n ' t even t a k e the top off a c a t s u p bottle. All I know Is t h a t I'm 60 yea rs of age r i g h t now, and my whole life has taken a complete turn. 1 was figuring on retiring at 62. Now -- I'm not going to be a bed case, but I'm not going to be ab le to do a n y t h i n g like I used to do. I used to do a lot of woocworking and stuff like that. I'm restricted now. i d o n ' t sle ep in a bed; I sleep in t h i s chair. And I have t o e l e v a t e t h i s chair. I c a n ' t 'lay in a flat bed. 1 have to sit up. Otherwise I -- once I lay down, the coughing starts. ' " - "v I'm at the point now when I have four children married, and these are the times when you should enjoy your family. But the wa y it is now, you c a n ' t even have to o m a n y In your house at the same time. You've got to be every mindful' of coids and disease en d e v e r y t h i n g t h a t co m s In. B e c a u s e any kind of a r e s p i r a t o r y disease that you get, you have a problem. And the biggest danger is p n e u m o n i a . If you ever g o t pneumo n i a , f o r g e t it. You don't* ha ve a c h a n c e In he!! to get over it. BERGMAN: About every month, Frank Cullen goes Into Mount Sinai for a week of chemotherapy. CUL LE N: If this d o e s n ' t work, t h e n t h a t ' s it. nothing else open for me at the present time. There's S o m e t i m e s I feel t h a t my lung is pulled up golf ball, and I get a little pain, but'not anything then it goes awa y. Y o u ' r e never c o m p l e t e l y f r e e of, where you can see you were really feeling good. tight as a too -** and you know, B E R G M A N : F ran k C ullen is d e e p l y In debt. T h e V e t e r a n s Administration has denied his claim for compensation, saying he can't prove that his Illness came from his service during World War 11. He ls t h e v i c t i m of an i n d i f f e r e n t Navy, a Navy that for too many years deliberately ignored the dangers of asbestos. And we'll look at that next. * * * with than B E R G M A N : In a sense, It all began back in the frnatic effort to build enough ships to win a million men and women worked around the clock World VIar II the war. More in these s h i p 5 yards, and the use of asbestos jumped dramatically. Part of what w e 're see ing today, a sharp Increase in a s b e s t o s disease, goes back to those days. A s b e s t o s is safe and useful as an in sulator and fIamer e t a r d a n t as long as it r e m a i n s intact or is s a f e l y covered. T h a t 's why so much of it is used on s h i p s ' boilers and pipes. But when it b re ak s down or Is d i s t u r b e d , the s u b - m i c r o s c o p i c a s b e s t o s dust is released, can be inhaled, and ultimately cause cancer. In t h e rush to build t h o u s a n d s and t h o u s a n d s of ships, no one really considered the health hazards. Ships to carry goods to our fighting men and allies around the world, and warships, a huge fighting fleet, all using large amounts of asbestos. A'/ C H A R L E S --- (-2L) : The Navy, d uring the early war years, they built a tremendous armada to rain havoc and hell on the whole world. And we did that. BERGMAN: Charles Eye of the Asbestos Workers Union at the Long Seach Naval Shipyward. -EYE: And to day we have w o r k e r s w h o are dying as' a r e s u l t of t h a t t r e m e n d o u s N a v y . T h e on l y t h i n g t h a t h a p p e n e d is the guns quieted but the disease that we built Into that ship now has turned on t h e person w h o b uil t it. And we c o n t i n u e to kill our own at the -- actually, at a rate faster than we did -- or, numbei-- wise, more than what we did during the war. ABC News tell the BER GM AN: T h e Navy could have a v o i d e d t o d a y 's d i s a st er. has obtained Navy documents never before made public that behind-the-scenes story. ItrfSL9:4>7^fetsr=v:awrisrsa te-tyzf'ev few:;wa rnecfjo :z:the-.ltfa n.ge r si o if `asbestosVd.us.tVT.rBut-'^Ltrtpok- a lnost~-30 y e a r s - for the Navy to act ^ Fi na 51 y:>vrrt'U.97'4:7~ the' Navy sa id' it- w o u l d limit the use of asbestos' aboard its,.shipsj3 At about the same time, shipyard unions at the Electric B o a t Company, in Gro to n, C o n n e c t i c u t , which m a k e s nuclear s ub ma ri nes , b e c a m e c o n c e r n e d . They called in Dr. S e l i k o f f 's s p e c i a l i s t s from Mount Sinai Hospital. DR. SELiKOFF; We examined a thousand men who were actu ally in th e yard at the time. We d i d n ' t e x p e c t to find too much, becaus e, in g e n er al, when you e x amine p e o p l e w h o are working, well, t h o s e are the h e a l t h y people; and the f e llows who are sick a r e n 't there anymore. And we were rather surprised to find that about half of them had changes on their X-rays which were rather typical of what we find with asbestos. BERGMAN: Half of them? 6 DR. SELIKOFF: Yes, And mind you, we tended to examine on ly t h e men who we re t h e r e 15 or m o r e years. We examined c a r p e n ters and electricians and riggers and machinists, radiation tech n i c i a n s , g u ard s, t r u c k e r s , all sorts of men who worked in the yard, welders, for example, b o i I e r m a k e r s , painters. And among them, 502* had abnormal X-rays. BERGMAN: The Navy and Electric Boad , did they help you? Did they let you see worker records? DR. S E L I K O F F : No. T h e E l e c t r i c B o a t Company, in any case, d id n' t s e e m to t h i n k it was wi se to s h o w us any records. BERGMAN: Did they.help you at aii? DR- S E L I K O F F : W e i !, no. B E R G M A N : Even today, Navy yards a r e n 't as clean, and t h e r e f o r e not" as sa fe for t h e worker, as t h e y s hould be. The Navy did take some positive steps at the Philadelphia Navy Yard, with high-powered vacuum cleaners and protective clothing for the asbes tos workers. This was a demonstration put on just for us, using an asbestos substitute. The Philadelphia yard was the only one the Navy would would let us film. But ABC News has obtained internal Navy reports which show that its own inspection of that same yard found numerous violations: damaged asbestos insulation, Inadequate vacuum cleaners and protective masks, and loose asbestos scrap around the yard. And t h e r e is the same patt ern of v i o l a t i o n s at o t h e r yards. Norfolk: personnel protection Inadequate, new workers 1 not properly trained. And at Puget Sound: lack of proper protective clothing, improper use of respirators, and a weak enforcement program. Th e c o n c l u s i o n is inescapable. jeopardi zed. Workers are still being John Cleary of the Metal Trades Council at Puget Sound. JOHN CLEARY: So th ey get in t h e r e with saws, saber saws sometimes, which blow air around; and they just- chop it away, s o m e ti me s with h a m me rs, even. And it looks like a s n o w s t o r m when y o u ' r e in there , p u l l i n g t h e s e v a l v e s and t hese s t e a m lines out to take them back to the shop to work on them. BERGMA N: T h e N a v y ' s medical p r o g r a m is also defic i e n t . A l t h o u g h it m a d e a big show of exami n i n g 5000 w o rkers at the P h i l a delphia yard, the medical procedures were inadequate. You cannot do a proper study for asbestos disease without using specially 7 qualified doctors to read the X-rays. They're called B readers. The Navy did not bother to hire B readers for the Philadelphia medical survey. The result was that the Navy found only five per c ent of its shipyard w o r k e r s had a s b e s t o s - r e la t e d lung changes, a figure far below any other such study. Nor were there any B readers at the Long 8each Shipyard several years ago when Charles Eye became suspicious of the Navy exams being given. AV *&T: Everyone was told the same thing: " E v e r t h i n g 's all right. E v e r y b o d y ' s in good shape." We d i d n ' t believe it. We started getting suspicious after looking at some mortality rates. And so my local sent 22 X - r a y s to Dr. S e l i k o f f , which is a cross- s a m p l e , a g e - w i s e , d u r a t i o n of trade, t h a t s o r t of thing. And 17 of the 22 came back with asbestos-related disease. BERGMAN;. S o m e of those 17 have a l r e a d y died. C h a r l e s Eye's father, also a shipyard worker, has died of asbastosis and cancer. And Eye himself now has a problem. A*f EYE: I h a v e about 25 of my lung c a p a c i t y is gone as a result of asbestos disease. I tire very easily going up and down stairs, doing any type of physical, hard physical work. I become .very fatigued very rapidly. C But o n c e you get it, it's irreversibIe. t i n u o u s thing , and u l t i m a t e l y I'll die from it. It's a con BERGMAN: Finally, the Navy has started using qualified doctors to interpret the X-rays. In t h e s t u d y just c o m p leted at Long B e ach, covering 6640 e m p l o y e e s , th ey found th at 1061, a l most 16* -- t h a t ' s I out of 6 -- with asbestos-related abnormalities. That was for the whole yard. But for o l d e r w o r k e r s , t h o s e wh o have work ed at Long Beach for more than 22 years, the figures doubled. One out of every three of th em has a s b e s t o s d i s e a s e , and were told t h e r e Is no cure. At Pearl Harbor the Navy seems more concerned about-bad publicity than about the health of its workers. Four years after the asbestos-control program began, only 237 out of 3000 workers have been examined, and only 72 of them have been X-rayed. A record so bad, the yard's commander wrote other yard commanders urging they m ove more rapidly to, quote, get ahead of the power curve before the media m ake us look like we are being dragged k i c k i n g and s c r e a m i n g into doing wh at is legal and the right thing, end quote. At the Mare Island Navy Yard, the unions, not the Navy, arranged for a study by Dr. Poiakoff, an occupational health s p e c i alist from Berkeley, California. Dr. Poiakoff examined 359 shipyard 8 workers, and found that 59$ had lung abnormalities, was one of them. John Morris JOHN MORRIS; Hey, when you're down there, this stuff exposed, you know. It's laying there, it's d o r m a n t - 1 i k e , you know. And once you hit it or tear it, it's going to fly on people, it's going to get on them; and it's going to kill them, you know. And there's nothing that they ' r e doing about it right now. MAN: it's not the government that has to answer to the widow. The widows c a 1J me up and say, "Where do we go from here?" It's not the government that has to answer to the worker who's coughing and short of breath. it's not the g o v e r n m e n t who has to try to file a claim so workers who worked for the government or In p r i v a t e I n d us fry for 30 years can get s o m e c o m p e n s a t i o n , whethe.*he's alive or not, to help his children get through school. It's not the government who's answering these questions. BERGMAN: The Navy has been just as law with its ships as it has with its sh ip ya rds. It's older ships w e r e built with asbestos. it's newer ones are supposed to be asbestos-free , whei-- ever suitable substitutes can be found. But these insulating pads containing 80$ asbestos came off two brand-new vessels, the U.S.S. Elliott and the U.S.S. Tarawa. Both ships were built by Litton J n d u s t r i e s at t h i s s h i py ard in P a s c a g o u l a , M i s s i s s i p p i . When we asked, Li tto n to ld us flatly that it used no a s b e s t o s on the ships. Bu t t h e s e pads ca me from t h o s e ships, and t h e r e is a s u i t a b l e s u b stitute. So the Tarawa and the Elliott join the rest of the fleet, still using asbestos insulation. And the Navy can't seem to control asbestos repairs at sea to cut the down the exposure of its own crewmen, * Last October, the Navy again prohibited asbestos repairs at sea unless stringent safeguards were met. The directive com plained that some ships were not complying with the original orders, and they were not because they could not. U.S.S. comply board . Again, unreteased Navy documents. The Commander of the E n t e r p r i s e , r e s p o n d i n g to t h a t d i r e c t i v e , said he coul.d not because the necessary filters and respirators were not on M o r e recently, and m ore damning, a Navy study of the Atlantic fleet found that 85$ of the ships inspected had no controls at all on asbestos repairs performed at sea. happens. And so it goes. The N a v y issues o r ders, and nothi ng much MAN: You have this giant marshmallow Navy, and where' do I 9 you grab the corner to get a marshmallow down on its back? And it's hard to p e r s o n a l l y get mad at -- if you had somebody stan ding t h e r e d e n y i n g it, one sing le person could s ingle out, then the unions could go after that. But we've got the Navy and we've got all their subordinate agencies, and they're contracting this work out. And all of them deny that any of them have an asbestos prob lem, and that they're doing their best. And as Charlie said, they just snow you under with paperwork. BERGMAN: We confronted the Navy with its own reports, s u r v e y s and aud it s. it refused to comment. Why? The m a j o r reason h u n d r e d s of m i l l i o n s of d o l l a r s in u n s e ttled claims. T h e g o v e r n m e n t has fina lly taken a t e n t a t i v e step by a d v i s i n g s h i py ard w o r k e r s to see t h e i r do ctors. it d idn't offer to pay for the exams. now, yard B e f o r e o u r a s b e s t o s e p i d e m i c is over, ma ny years from those Claims will climb into the billions, not only from ship work er s, but o t h e r s as well. And w e ' il look at th at next. * * * BERGMAN: The riverside section of Paterson, New Jersey, a grimy part of an old Industrial town, an area full of small fac t o ries and w a rehouses. Up on the hill, rows of modest houses. All in all, a drab and d e p r e s s e d area. When the h i s t o r y of a s b e s t o s is w r i tten, this building, now a paint w a r e h o u s e , will play a g rimly p r o m i n e n t role. It used to be the Union Asbestos and Rubber Company, UNARCO for short. D u r i n g Wo rl d War II, it m a d e a s b e s t o s p r o ducts for our ships. At the time UNARCO operated here, there were no controls at all. The p l a n t was filthy. And we now know th at as little as half-a-day's heavy exposure can start the deadly cycle. The men who worked here have been studied more thoroughly than any other group of asbestos workers. About 35? o f them have already died of cancer and other asbestos diseases. That's more than three times as many as would normally die of cancer. The study, now 10 ye ars old, Is still going on. WOMAN: Your father worked at Union Asbestos and C o m p a n y in 1944, and we are interested in what he has been si nce then, and to see If the e f f e c t s of the a s b estos dust fest themselves 30 years later. Rubber doing mani BERGMAN: The UNARCO studied. So far, 35? of them, The family c o n n e c t i o n is a new workers' as well, concern. families are also being have lung abnormalities. 10 A week before this interview, one of Mrs. Barbara Gury's lungs was r e m ov ed. Her only e x p o s u r e came fron her father, an in su lat or in a M a s s a c h u s e t t s shipyard. MRS. B A R B A R A G U R Y : When he came home, his clothing was c o v er ed with a s b e s t o s . And i don't know if you know what it looks like. It's a c h a l k y s u b s t a n c e when ft a c c u m u l a t e s and dries on cl ot h i n g , and it forms like a d u s t - l i k e p a r t i c l e when it's tou che d. And that was my exposure to asbestos, being hear his -- near my dad when he came home from work, and when my mother took his work clothes and shipped them over the porch to take off the excess dust before washing them. BERGMAN: You had mentioned you used to run down and meet your father at the bus stop. MRS. GURY: Yes, very often, and give him a big hug. And he was c o ver ed at th at t i m e with t h e a s b e s t o s , and it would d i s s e m inate In the -- you co uld see it flying around in the atmosphe re. REPORTER: How did you react when the doctor told you? MRS. GURY: I was frightened, frightened to death. I knew -- i recalled every day of my mother's illness, recalled my .father's illness, and kriew what was in s t o r e for me. And I was that much more well-read, and I was frightened to death. I'm a 35-yeai-- old mother of two children, a happily married woman with e v e r y t h i n g to live for. It sort of puts a d a m p e r on everythi ng for m e . . R E P O R T E R : Ed, how did you feel when you first heard it? ED GURY: I cried. I -- I wasn't angry, i don't think. 1 I think 1 was very upset and perplexed. I couldn't believe it. I didn't know anything about asbestos or anything at that time. I knew her fat he r had w o r k e d with it, and t h a t ' s w h a t caused his cancer. And I knew that the mother had also had mesothelioma. And I c o u l d n ' t at th at p a r t i c u l a r m o m e n t In t i m e r e l a t e Barbara's m e s o t h e l i o m a with the parent s. But as the year w e n t on, boy, it got mo re b i z a r r e and m o r e bizarre. And I can h o n e s t l y say th at if it hadn't been for God and the gift of faith, that I would have pro bably jumped out a window a long time ago. I have two small children whom l love very, very much. And the other day 1 was -- 1 left the hospital and l went across the street here to Centra! Park, and I sat on the rock over there to get a little fresh air and sunshine, and 1 saw this father p l a y i n g with his f i v e - y e a r - o ld boy and his six- or s e v e n - y e a r - o !d daughter, and they were playing baseball, which I do at home with my two kids. And the girls w a s n 't as good a hitter as nine, but the -- I just sat t h e r e and cried my eyes out, b e c a u s e th at is what it's done to my wife. B E R GM AN: M e s o t h e l i o m a , o n c e very rare, is becomin g almost commonplace. DR. SELIKQFF: From 1930 to I960 we saw three cases, o n e every 10 years. And w e 're a pretty big hospital; we have 1200 beds, we do almost 20,000 operations a year, and so forth. And imagine, we o n l y saw three cases in 30 years. Now, why, Dr. Holland had three cases on his service at any one time. B E R G M A N : It cost Ya le U n i v e r s i t y $ 2 5 0 , 0 0 0 to get rid of its a s b e s t o s pr obl em. Evry c e i l i n g in its n i n e - s t o r y Art and A r c h i t e c t u r e B u i l d i n g had to be removed. T h e y had all been sprayed with asbestos. Two thousand students use this building every day. D e s p i t e all we have known a b o u t a s b e s t o s , it was p e r fe ctl y legal until 1973 to apply it inside build i n g s . Duri ng the '5 0 s a n d '60s, t h o u s a n d s w e r e built t h a t way. Dr. Robert Sawyer- of Y a l e 's Health Ser v i c e set t h e c l e a n up in mot ion. DR. ROBERT SAWYER: What drew our interest was the facts that these open and exposed ceilings, as we found them, had begun to break apart and to disintegrate. .And, for instance, these books t h a t w e r e up near the cell ing were -- if you put t h e book in, it m i g h t s t r i k e t h e c e i l i n g a little bit. It w o u l d be cove red with the asbestos material. The people would blow them clean on opening them. .. BERGMAN: The layer of asbestos dust... DR. SAWYER: The cloud of dust would come up - T h i s we found In persons doing m a i n t e n a n c e work in the building or doing custodial work, dusting. For instance, we found that the custodians would go through the Iibrary area holding a p l a s t i c bag in fro nt of t heir face and dust ing the fallen debris into the bag. And we used personneI-nonitoring devices to find out what the exposures to these individuals were. We were quite s u r p ri se d to find t h a t the levels found in such situat i o n s , npt only in this b u i l d i n g but in many, many m o r e that w e 've looked at since, can be in th e v i c i n i t y of or indeed, on occasion, exceed industrial standards set by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration for industrial exposure. BER GM AN: This Is the World T r a d e C e n t e r in New York. That's asbestos dropping on the worker below. tos. A n o t h e r bui ld ing in New York, The du st contains a s b e s An a p a r t m e n t c o m p l e x in New Jersey. C e i l i n g s t h r o u g h o u t 12 were sprayed with asbestos. Some tenants are suing the builder because they consider the asbestos a health hazard* Even after 1973, you called it d e c o r a t i v e . that use. a s b e s t o s could still be sprayed if It took EPA five m o r e years to stop School buildings, too. Thousands of them had been built with s p r a y e d - a s b e s t o s ceilings. A g o v e r n m e n t inspection in New Jersey of 48 schools showed two-thirds of the ceilings were d a m aged, with considerable risk of asbestos contamination. The government now recommends they be removed. And in t h i s country, what goes u p ' e v e n t u a l i y comes down.. Most buildings, except the very oldest, contain some asbestos; and demolition spreads the dust into the area, an unintentional d a n g e r for a p r odu ct t h a t serves m a n in m a n y useful ways. A l m o s t e v e r y o n e who lives in an urban area has some a s b e s t o s dust in t h e i r lungs. Despite all that was known about asbestos, the EPA only recently tightened up regulations for house wreckers to keep the dust from spreading. But there are still many people who work "with asbe s t o s and do n ' t know that if can be dangerous. All drum-brake linings contain asbestos, some as high as 732* As they wear down, or when they are replaced, asbestos dust is r e l e as ed . Three years ago, government scientists recommended that the asbestos dust be vacuumed out instead of blown. But the Occu- , pational Safety and Health Administration ignored the recommen d a t i o n . A 1976 study found that 25 % of the mechanics sampled had lung abnormalities. Nine hundred thousand workers are exposed to brake-lining dust. Nor is t h e r e any r e g u l a t i o n on labeling b r a k e - l i n i n g boxes. Of the five we examined, one had rather detailed precau tions printed on it. Two had caution labels, one on the bottom of t h e box, w h e r e It was not likely to be seen. And two o t he rs had no warnings at all. And the a r g u m e n t of how m u c h a s b e s t o s Is too tos still goes on. T h e c u r r e n t s t a ndard is t w o fibers centimeter of air. The government wants that lowered. res ists. much asbes per cubic Industry Dr. Paul Kotin, Medical Director and Senior vice Presi dent of Joh ns -Ma nv II Ie , the largest a s b e s t o s c o m p a n y In the world. DR. PAUL KOTIN: In the case of a s b e s t o s , I think that 13 we are creating no asbestos disease; or GI cancer, as you -- at two fibers career. lung cancer, mesothelioma, per cc or less for a working BERGMAN: Then why do the g o v e r n m e n t 's top experts want to see the t w o fibers per cc lowered to .5 or even less? DR. KOTIN: Because the government experts have been wrong before and they're wrong now. B E R GM AN: D i d n 't you once say t h a t t h e r e is no such thing as a safe level of exposure for any carcinogen? DR. KOTIN: I sure did, and I said it as part of the S u r g e o n G e n e r a l 's c o m m i t t e e in 1970. And I guess I 'm g o i n g to tell you I 'm s m a r t e r now. BERGMAN: A lot smarter now, but smart enough to prevent a recurrence of the past? Dr. Kotin thinks yes. Most other doc tors disagree. Over the years, industry and government too often be lieved that t h e limits then in e f f e c t we re good enough. And time and agai n, t h e y w e r e wrong. known W h a t is m o s t for decades, and * disturbing no one did * is t h a t t h e d a n g e r s a n y thing a b o u t it. * have been BE RGM AN: i t 's not as if the d a n g e r s of a s b e s t o s have ju st been d i s c o v e r e d . W e 've known about t h e m for 70 years. 1907 :. A s b e s t o s d i s e a s e Is repor t e d , for the firs t time/, Fn G r ea t \Bc:Ffa i;n/. 1918: T h e fi rst r e p o r t in the Unit ed States. The g o v e r n m e n t sa ys th er e Is an u rgent need for m o r e investigation of the health aspects of asbestos manufacture. But no one was listening. The war to end all wars was ending. America was about to enter the Roaring Twenties. Even if the w o rkers knew anyth i n g a b o u t a s b e s t o s -- and they didn't -- there wasn't much they could do. They had few rights. They could be fired at will. Unions were either weak or nonexistent. 1 reports on asbestos?. No on e seemed to care. A m e r i c a n s we re m o r e intrigued by Babe R u t h 's 60th home run; and an adventurous young pilot, Charles Lindberg, flew the Atlantic all alone. President Calvin Coolidge said the business of America was business. He didn't say anything 14 about the worker. 1928: The Journal of the American Medical Association r e p o r t e d on a y o u n g woman who died of a s b e s t o s l s . It wondered why a s b e s t o s d i s e a s e w a s n 't g e t t i n g m o r e atten t i o n . One reason, A m e r i cans w e r e living it up. P r o h i b i t i o n had been in effect.fo r almo st 10 years, but t h e r e was still plenty of booze to be had. P e o p l e were having a good time. No one cared. Jf930 -."The. B r i t i s h are.'now s u r e . Dr. E.R.-'Merr iweather? exani-necF-36D -texti.le w o r k e r s and-tfound a s b e s t o s l s in 25% of -them. Shor-bi y.. T h e r e a f t e r the B r i11 sh '.-.took t he f irst: steps'-torred uc e ;asbastos~..dust"::cI n*J:he.-,,wor k p,la c e ..^ N o , son e h e r e dj.d .anything*. By this time, America was deep into the Depression. were hard to come by. Jobs CCIip of song, "Brother Can You Spare a Dime?"^ BERGMAN: Workers competed for what jobs there were. Occupational health got low priority. Nothing was done. 1934: The British medical magazine Lancet reports on 100 ca ses of a s b e s t o s i s - a n d the first cases of lung cancer in "asbestos workers. 1935: In this country, Dr. A n t h o n y Lanza, in a study do ne for t h e industry, r e c o m m e n d s dust -control m e a s u r e s in a s b e s tos factories. The industry, he says, seems quite uninformed of th e hazard. Little, if an ything, is done. There were other things to worry about: asters, drought creating dust storms. natural dis l C l ip of song, " I 'm a D u s t Bowl R e f u g e e " ^ B E R GM AN: By this time, asbes t o s p r o d u c t i o n is growing, from und er 100,000 tons in 1910 to 700,000 tons at the end of Wor ld War 11. M i l l i o n s of p eople have been exposed. And stilt, little is done. 1949: Dr. Ken Smith, Medical Director of the JohnsManville Company, studies 708 asbestos workers and finds 534 with lung c h a n g e s . John McKinney, the President of Johns-ManviI Ie, Did you know Dr. Ken Smith when he was your corporate medl eal d irector? JOHN MCKINNEY: Yes, I did. 15 B E R G M A N : You know he did a study of 708 Johns-ManviI Ie e m p l o y e e s and found an a s b e s t o s d anger way back in 1949? MCKINNEY: Yes. BERGMAN: ' Smith called for a warning label on asbestos pack ages, and has since -- and it was o v e r r u l e d , h e 's t e s t i f i e d , for b u s in ess p u r p o s e s . He was told it would hurt business. MCKINNEY: I know nothing about that, that that was the reason for it. 1 know that Dr. Smith has testified to that, but I d o n 't know t h a t t h a t ' s a c c u r a t e at all. BER GM AN: Well, lt|s sworn t e s t i m o n y in a federal court. MCKINNEY: Undoubtedly. We think Dr. Smith was mistaken about a lot of things, including his own policies. ports eyes, BERGMAN: on asbestos. and did very By the '50s and '60s, t h e r e are scores of r e But the government turned its back, closed its little. sician. Dr. William Johnson, a former PubJic Health Service phy DR. WILLIAM JOHNSON: The U.S. Public Health Service conducted surveys of these plants under assurances of c o n f i d e n tiality. They essentially shared the data between themselves and the c o m p a n i e s , and in a few instances with s t a t e agencies, which t r a d i t i o n a l l y ha ve not been very a g g r e s s i v e as far as occu pa tio na l health protection. B E R GM AN: V/hat y o u're s aying Is t h a t the governme nt, state governments, and companies worked together. DR. JOHNSON: Yes, very much so. BERGMAN: Doesn't that amount to collusion? OR. JOHNSON: fair to s a y . If you want to cail it that, I thin k i t 's Unfortunately, I think there was an attitude of, "Well, l e t 's -- l e t 's t r e a t t h e w orker as a g u i n e a pig out t h e r e In that - plant, and let's expose him over a lifetime. L e t 's see how many of t h e m develop problems with asbestos-related diseases. Then m ay be in th at way, over a long time, we can d e t e r m i n e what a safe level of e x p o s u r e to a s b estos is. DR. SE LI KOF F: What w e 're seeing now is the result of our i n a d e q u a c i e s of the past, of r e s e a r c h that w a s n 't done, of in sp ectio ns t h a t w e r e n ' t made, of r e g u l a t i o n s th at w e r e n 't pro- e 16 duc ed , of laws t h a t w e r e n 't passed, of s t u d i e s that we re never started. And now, unfortunately, we're paying that price. Unfor tunately, too, it's the people who worked under those circumstances that are paying the price; we're not. It's unhappy to think that these people, like Mr. Cullen, went to work thinking that somebody must be looking at the situa tion to see that it was safe; or they knew about government d e p a r t ments, Industrial hygienists and scientists, and so forth. And there was no somebody. MAN Ls in gi n g U : I did my pa rt in W o r l d War II, got wounded for the nation. Now my iungs are all shot down, there ain't no compensation. i'm going to go to work on Monday one more time. I'm going to work on Monday one more time, one more time. I'm going to work on Monday one more time. The doctor says I smoke too much, he says that I'm not tryin'. He says he d o n 't know w h a t I got, but we both know, he's aiyin*. i'm going to go to work on Monday one more time. I'm going to go to work on Monday one more time, one more time. I'm going to go to work on Monday one more time. The last time i went near my job i thought my lungs were broken. Chest bound down like iron bands, i couldn't breathe for choking. I'm going to go to work on Monday one more time. I 'm g o i n g to go To w o r k on M o n d a y onem o r e time,one mor e Time. I'm going to go to work on Monday moremore time. The d o ct or says both lungs are gone, t h e r e a i n ' t no way shake it. But 1 c a n ' t live w i t h o u t a job, s o m e h o w I've g o t to take it. I'm r\ going to go to w o r k on M onday one m o r e tine. ! 'm going to go to w o r k on M o n d a y on e m o r e time, o n e m o r e tircie. I'm going to go to work on Monday one more time. They tell me ! can't work at all, there ain't no need of tryin*. But livin' like some use-up thing is j u s t s h o r t of d yin '. i'm going to go to w o r k on M o n d a y one , more time. i'm going to go to work on Monday one more time...