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Chrysophiles versus Chrysophobes The White Asbestos Controversy, 1950s-2004 By Geoffrey Tweedale* and Jock McCulloch** ABSTRACT In the first half of the twentieth century, asbestos was a controversial mineral because of its association with asbestosis and asbestos-related lung cancer. It has proved no less so since the 1960s, when another asbestos cancer, mesothelioma, was identified. Mesotheli oma appeared to be more strongly linked with blue asbestos (crocidolite) than with the other asbestos varieties, brown (amosite) and white (chrysotile). This finding triggered a fierce debate between "chrysophiles" (those who declared chrysotile innocuous) and "chrysophobes" (those who believed it was a mortal hazard). This essay attempts the first history of the chrysotile controversy, which shows that a scientific consensus on the safety of white asbestos was very slow to emerge. This was only partly due to the complexities of scientific research. Political, economic, and social factors have militated against a speedy resolution of the debate, facilitating the continued production and use of asbestos in the developing world. N 1991 THE POPULAR MAGAZINE Science welcomed its readers to the world of Iasbestos research--"a world riven by deep fissures and bitter disputes... where science and the law interact in a slew of multimillion-dollar lawsuits . . . [and] where scientists with opposing views no longer seem able to talk to each other at a scientific level." The journal was alluding to two recent conferences on asbestos: the first, held at Harvard in * Centre for Business History, Manchester Metropolitan University Business School, Aytoun Street, Man chester M1 3GH, United Kingdom. ** School of Social Science and Planning, RMIT University, City Campus, GPO Box 2476V, Melbourne, 3001, Victoria, Australia. In researching this article, we drew extensively on documents produced in legal discovery in America. Of particular relevance is the Turner & Newall collection, produced in Chase Manhattan Bank v. T&N (87 Civ. 4436, Judge J. G. Koeltl), U.S. District Court, Southern District ofNew York, 27 Oct.--6 Dec. 1995. A microfilm copy of the T&N collection (as copied by Chase) is held at Manchester Metropolitan University Business School, United Kingdom. Documents from this collection are referenced in this essay as T&N microfilm archive, with reel/frame numbers. In addition, we had access to a treasure trove of unpublished documents on the Canadian asbestos industry, which was generously copied to us on DVD by David Egilman, Brown University, Providence, Rhode Island. We hold copies of all the documents cited in the article. Finally, we must thank Morris Greenberg, who kindly cast an expert medical eye over an early draft. Any errors that remain are our own; so are the views expressed. Geoffrey Tweedale has no competing interests; Jock McCulloch was a consultant for plaintiffs' attorneys in Lubbe v. Cape plc (2000). Isis, 2004, 95:239-259 2004 by The History of Science Society. All rights reserved. 0021-1753/2004/9502-0003$10.00 239 240 CHRYSOPHILES VERSUS CHRYSOPHOBES December 1988, addressed "Health Aspects of Exposure to Asbestos in Buildings"; the second, which took place in New York in June 1990, considered the "Third Wave of Asbestos Disease."1 Superficially, the conferences had much in common. Both were attended by leading scientists in the field and were concerned with evaluating the hazard posed by asbestos in the environment, especially in offices and schools. None of the participants questioned whether asbestos was potentially a serious health risk: it was acknowledged that inhaling asbestos fibers could cause asbestosis (lung scarring), lung cancer (originating in the lining of the airways of the lungs), mesothelioma (a virulent cancer of the lining of the chest or abdomen), and possibly other cancers. Nor did they doubt that asbestos-related disease (ARD) was incurable and often fatal. At that point, however, agreement ended. In fact, the conferences sent the public and the scientific community widely differing messages: according to the Harvard symposium, the danger posed by asbestos in buildings was negligible; the New York meeting, on the other hand, flagged asbestos in the environment as a serious hazard and warned that ARD could harm thousands of construction workers, office staff, and schoolteachers. The discussion was polarized in another way, reflecting these opposing conclusions: the participants at the two conferences were so hostile that they did not attend each other's meetings. The divisions and bitterness were symptomatic of the fraught social and political atmosphere generated by widely publicized disputes in America over the costs and benefits of cleaning up environmental contamination from asbestos. Fundamental to this hostility was a disagreement about which type of fiber caused ARD--a reflection of the fact that asbestos is not a single entity.2 "Asbestos" is a generic name given to a group of fibrous minerals. Two main types exist: serpentine and amphibole. Chrysotile (or white asbestos) is the only member of the serpentine group and is mined mainly in Russia, Canada, China, Brazil, and Zimbabwe. The amphibole group includes, inter alia, two important commercial grades of asbestos--amosite (brown) and crocidolite (blue). Chrysotile has been the most widely used commercial grade, accounting for over 90 percent of asbestos usage in the twentieth century. The Harvard conference participants emphasized the ubiquity of chrysotile and claimed that, unlike amphiboles, it neither in duced mesothelioma nor, with proper safeguards, caused asbestosis or lung cancer. Con versely, "Third Wave" scientists argued that chrysotile, besides causing asbestosis, was an undoubted carcinogen, quite capable of causing mesothelioma as well as lung cancer. Fourteen years later, much of the heat generated by the asbestos-in-buildings controversy has dissipated, at least in the United States. But asbestos remains the most controversial and feared of the industrial minerals. Most countries in the developed world have virtually banned its manufacture, though they still have to come to terms with its legacy of litigation, bankrupted companies, and rising morbidity and mortality from ARD. In the United States, such has been the explosion in litigation that there have been demands for congressional 1 Richard Stone, "No Meeting of Minds on Asbestos," Science, 15 Nov. 1991, 254:928-931, on p. 928. The "first wave" of ARD was caused by occupational exposure to asbestos; the "second wave" was caused by indirect occupational exposure (such as in the construction trades); and the "third wave" is due to exposure in the environment (among, e.g., office staff and housewives exposed to dusty overalls). 2 Asbestos fibers, after processing from the host ore, can be used in a variety of products (textiles, cement, brake linings, insulation products) that take advantage of the valuable properties of asbestos: high tensile strength, flexibility, resistance to chemicals and high temperatures, and high electrical resistance. See Catherine W. Skinner, Malcolm Ross, and Clifford Frondel, Asbestos and Other Fibrous Minerals (New York: Oxford Univ. Press, 1988). GEOFFREY TWEEDALE AND JOCK MCCULLOCH 241 action. Meanwhile, European countries are projected to suffer an epidemic of ARD that could eventually kill half a million people. Asbestos remains an environmental concern, given its pervasiveness in buildings and engineering products. The controversy with regard to fiber type is also very much alive; the contention that chrysotile--unlike amphiboles--presents no danger if the proper precautions are taken is now used to justify the continued production and use of asbestos in the developing world. With the end of world amphibole production in South Africa in 1996, chrysotile is now the only type of asbestos available. In 2002, world production was 1.9 million tonnes, with Russia, China, Canada, and Kazakhstan the leading suppliers. Most output is targeted at countries in Latin America, Asia, and the Far East, which use products that are no longer tolerated in nations that belong to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and De velopment. The rationale for the continued use of asbestos rests heavily on the argument that was advanced so vigorously by some scientists in the 1980s: that white asbestos can be used safely and should therefore be a prized mineral--especially in the developing world, where any health risks are outweighed by the benefits offered by products such as asbestos-cement water pipes. But critics still counter that chrysotile is a menace, that there is no safe threshold of exposure, and that production in the developing world, where safety measures are typically lax, is irresponsible. The debate has been characterized, by a par ticipant, as one between "chrysophiles" and "chrysophobes."3 The argument, which has lasted for more than thirty years, remains bitter; as the asbestos industry struggles for survival, it is the contested area in asbestos epidemiology. The resultant literature is enormous and its appraisal difficult--especially for laypeople. Inevitably, the debate has spilled into the medico-legal and political arenas, generating yet more documentation and increasing the problems of evaluation. One physician has written: "Various exposes have been published, but a historian's account remains to be written of the conduct of these [chrysotile] battles, as does the extent to which the scientists' differ ences were exploited." This essay attempts such a history--the first that has been written, as far as we are aware. We explain how the debate over the safety of chrysotile arose and describe the opposing viewpoints and the main events in the controversy. As historians, we have not attempted to provide a scientific "answer" as to whether chrysotile is a "safe" fiber, though we do show the slow emergence of a scientific consensus (which we regard as compelling) that views chrysotile in a far from favorable light. We also illuminate a fact that is not always apparent from the medical literature or official pronouncements: that political and economic factors have shaped the scientific debate at critical points. This focus connects our work to a growing literature in the history of occupational medicine, which emphasizes how corporate control over scientific research has influenced both the scientific process and government efforts at environmental protection.4 3J. C. McDonald, "Unfinished Business: The Asbestos Textiles Mystery," Annals of Occupational Hygiene, 1998, 42:3-5, on p. 3. For the figures see Canadian Minerals Yearbook (2002), www.nrcan.gc.ca/mms/cmy/ content/2002/20.pdf. 4M. Greenberg, "Dust Exposure and Mortality in Chrysotile Mining, 1910-76" [letter], Journal of Occupa tional and Environmental Medicine, 1994, 51:431. For work in the history of occupational medicine see, e.g., Ronald Bayer, ed., The Health and Safety ofWorkers: Case Studies in the Politics ofProfessional Responsibility (Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press, 1988); Claudia Clark, Radium Girls: Women and Industrial Health Reform, 1910 1935 (Chapel Hill: Univ. North Carolina Press, 1997); David Rosner and Gerald Markowitz, Deadly Dust: Silicosis and the Politics of Occupational Disease in Twentieth-Century America (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton Univ. Press, 1991); Samuel S. Epstein, The Politics of Cancer Revisited (New York: East Ridge, 1998); Stanton A. Glantz, John Slade, Lisa A. Bero, Peter Hanauer, and Deborah E. Barnes, The Cigarette Papers (Berkeley: Univ. California Press, 1996); Markowitz and Rosner, Deceit and Denial: The Deadly Politics of Industrial GEOFFREY TWEEDALE AND JOCK MCCULLOCH 243 Crocidolite was seized by the industry as the culprit--and, ironically, the cure--for its problems. In 1968 leading producer Turner & Newall told one worried purchaser that its products were made from white asbestos, which "has not been similarly implicated [in mesothelioma]. Once again I do not think your customer runs any risk in this connection." By 1969 the U.K. asbestos industry had voluntarily ceased importing crocidolite, though this was partly because the government had introduced more stringent regulations on asbestos. It remained legal to produce all types of asbestos; however, the dust controls required for crocidolite were much tighter than those for chrysotile and amosite, thus making blue asbestos uneconomical to produce. Crocidolite was enshrined in British law as officially the most dangerous fiber.9 In practice, the distinction between chrysotile and crocidolite was misleading. In the same way that the terms "white," "blue," and "brown" are not accurate descriptions of fiber color, the geological distinction between the types was often blurred. For example, the mine at Penge in South Africa's northern province was the world's only source of amosite. Yet the amosite was invariably mixed with crocidolite, so that in fact both fiber types were processed together in the mills--and, of course, anyone using amosite down stream was inadvertently using crocidolite as well. Similarly, "pure" chrysotile often con tained small amounts of amphibole, such as tremolite. Asbestos could also be found as a constituent in other potentially hazardous minerals, particularly silicates, such as talc. This inevitably confounded medical studies on health effects. Production processes further blurred the distinction between fiber types. Asbestos-cement products, such as pressure pipes and long-span sheeting, traditionally used white asbestos, but these would warp if taken from the mold "green," or not set. The addition of crocidolite to chrysotile asbestos cement, however, made it possible to work "green-strength" materials. The Eastern bloc countries, especially, used large quantities of crocidolite as a kind of "broad-spectrum antibiotic" to enhance the quality of inferior Russian white asbestos.10 Determining the toxicity of asbestos by fiber type was complex for other reasons. Major problems were posed by the extended latency of ARD (with mesotheliomas usually oc curring only thirty or forty years, or even longer, after exposure), its relative rarity in the general population, the lack of information about dust exposure that had occurred many decades earlier, and the fact that exposure was usually to a mixture of fiber types. Another conundrum was that mesotheliomas were soon apparent among workers in Canadian chrysotile mines and among asbestos workers and end users in America, where white asbestos had been mostly used. According to Irving Selikoff, the doyen of U.S. asbestos experts, only trivial amounts of amphiboles were imported into the United States before the 1940s. Was it likely, some wondered, that all the mesotheliomas were due to these small quantities of crocidolite? In 1964 scientists attending an international meeting in New York refused to believe "that only this type of fibre [crocidolite] is concerned with these tumours." In 9 S. Holmes to Griffin & George, Ltd., 22 Apr. 1968, T&N microfilm archive, 15/1355; and Geoffrey Tweedale, Magic Mineral to Killer Dust: Turner & Newall and the Asbestos Hazard, 2nd ed. (Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press, 2001), p. 207. 10 Jock McCulloch was given information about the mixing of amosite and crocidolite by former miners during a visit to Penge in November 2002. On the amphibole in "pure" chrysotile see A. Churg and B. Wiggs, "Fiber Size and Number in Workers Exposed to Processed Chrysotile Asbestos, Chrysotile Miners, and the General Population," American Journal of Industrial Medicine, 1986, 9:143-152; and Churg, "Chrysotile, Tremolite, and Malignant Mesothelioma in Man," Chest, 1988, 93:621-628. The problem of warping was discussed in Jock McCulloch, interview with Pat Hart, CEO, Griqualand Exploration & Finance Company, Braamfontein, Johannesburg, 6 July 2001; the addition of crocidolite as a "broad-spectrum antibiotic" is noted in McCulloch, interview with Hart, 7 July 1999. GEOFFREY TWEEDALE AND JOCK MCCULLOCH 245 TELLING THE CHRYSOTILE "STORY" Obviously, chrysotile could prevail only if it was shown that it did not pose the same health hazard as crocidolite. During the 1960s and 1970s, concerned for its survival, the asbestos industry began a massive research and public relations exercise that was designed to achieve this aim. Funding was poured into industry-sponsored bodies, which sprouted as the knowledge that asbestos caused cancer spread. In December 1970 the Asbestos Infor mation Association/North America (AIA/NA) was formed at the New York headquarters of the leading U.S. company, Johns Manville. By the following year the AIA budget was almost $300,000, to be spent on monitoring medical conferences and papers and then initiating "lines of action." One such line was to smear industry critic Selikoff and then "start to tell the chrysotile story and discredit other fibers." Acting in concert with the Americans was the Quebec Asbestos Mining Association (QAMA), which in 1966 had launched an Institute of Occupational and Environmental Health (IOEH) in Montreal. Eighty percent of Canadian asbestos was mined in Quebec, with Thetford Mines as the focus. Canada had 40 percent of the world chrysotile market, making it the largest producer of that mineral, with yearly shipments by the mid 1960s of 1.5 million tons valued at over $160 million. With such profits under threat, there was no shortage of money to support work that would protect the industry, and by 1972 the QAMA had expended over $2 million on research projects.14 The association accepted--confidentially--that the "three types of asbestos are in the same boat . . . [and] . . . one cannot ignore that with proper circumstances the same fibrogenesis and malignancy apply to amosite and chrysotile." Indeed, the first cases of pleural mesothelioma and other lung cancers among Canadian chrysotile miners had been identified in the late 1940s, at which time the Canadian industry had shown little com punction about suppressing publication of the evidence. Once publicity became unavoid able, the QAMA erected two defenses. One was to emphasize the distinction between the (allegedly) favorable health experience of Canadian asbestos miners and millers--presumably protected by policies that emphasized responsible use--and the disastrous record of American insulators (as highlighted by Selikoff). The other was the argument that Cana dian asbestos exposure was to "pure chrysotile, whereas insulation workers had been ex posed to a mixture of various types of asbestos." The linchpin in these defenses was the epidemiological work at the IOEH. This centered on J. Corbett McDonald, a professor at McGill University in Montreal who in 1966 launched a major cohort study of the health effects of chrysotile mining in Canada.15 McDonald denied that the IOEH was an industry initiative, though this assertion is contradicted by QAMA documents. Certainly McDonald's team was the main recipient of 14 Minutes: Meeting to Discuss Formation of Asbestos Information Association/North America, Thursday, 5 Nov. 1970 (8306A), p. 4; Minutes: Meeting to the Board of Directors, Asbestos Information Association/North America, Thursday, 24 Aug. 1971 (8301), p. 5 ("lines of action"); AIA/NA, Items for Discussion, 23 Mar. 1973 (smearing Selikoff); and "IOEH: A Review of Background and Projects Sponsored," n.d., ca. 1974, T&N microfilm archive, 71/20-45. 15QAMA, Minutes of the Special Meeting . . . held on 28, 29 March 1968, at Grand Bahama Hotel and Country Club, Grand Bahamas; and QAMA, Paul-A. Filteau, Notes on Dr. Irving Selikoff, guest speaker, Univ. Toronto, 2, 3 May 1973. On the IOEH work see Paul Brodeur, Expendable Americans (New York: Viking, 1974), pp. 131-134. For the early instances of mesothelioma and lung cancer among Canadian chrysotile workers see W. E. Smith, "Surveys of Some Current British and European Studies of Occupational Tumor Problems," Ar chives of Industrial Hygiene and Occupational Medicine, 1952, 5:242-262; on their suppression see Barry I. Castleman, Asbestos: Medical and Legal Aspects, 4th ed. (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Aspen Law & Business, 1996), pp. 86-87, 113-117. GEOFFREY TWEEDALE AND JOCK MCCULLOCH 247 than chrysotile, but nowhere in its report was there a suggestion that the latter did not cause mesothelioma. These reports concluded that the industry was more interested in exploiting the medical uncertainty created by the compensation system and by epidemi ological studies than in spending money to protect workers from the dust. In Britain, the asbestos industry's science and public relations function was performed by the Asbestosis Research Council and its associated lobbying organizations, which prop agated the view that chrysotile could be used safely. At a major U.K. government inquiry in 1976, the Simpson Committee, the asbestos industry presented a united front, claiming that within certain thresholds chrysotile (and amosite) production could be continued. The government accepted that chrysotile "rarely caused mesothelioma" and that this "favour able" point should be used to frame policy.*19 The idea that some types of asbestos could be produced safely if the proper precautions were followed would be enshrined as the doctrine of "controlled use." By the mid 1970s, however, the devastating impact of asbestos on the U.K. workforce had led to the creation of a disparate group of asbestos industry critics composed of scientists, journalists, lawyers, trade unions, and victims. Lacking the resources of the industry and the government, these people reviewed the published evidence (and in some cases drew on their personal experience) to reach a different judgment on chrysotile. Nancy Tait, whose husband had died from mesothelioma caused by indirect asbestos exposure in his work as a telephone engineer, was the first to publish an attack on the amphibole hypothesis by emphasizing that "chrysotile [is] a carcinogen." Tait formed the Society for the Prevention of Asbestosis and Industrial Diseases, which lobbied on behalf of victims and campaigned against the use of all forms of asbestos. A more vigorous attack on the asbestos industry was launched in 1979 by Alan Dalton (1946-2003), a socialist scientist who ridiculed the white asbestos myth "peddled by the industry over the last fifteen years."20 Clydeside Action on Asbestos was another influential interest group formed at around this time. The fight against all types of asbestos was carried forward in America by the White Lung Association and in Japan by the Ban Asbestos Network. Scientific evidence supported these critics. In the early 1970s, under World Health Or ganisation (WHO) auspices, the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) had begun evaluating the cancer risk to humans posed by chemicals. The first IARC asbestos working groups, which included industry representatives, presented a cautious evaluation of the cancer risk in 1973. However, a more independent IARC group concluded in 1976 that all forms of asbestos caused lung cancer and mesothelioma and that it was impossible to designate a safe threshold. The IARC gave much more weight to the evidence of car cinogenicity in animals than Wagner did, though the latter had himself concluded that Storey and W. Lewchuck, "From Dust to DUST to Dust: Asbestos and the Struggle for Worker Health and Safety at Bendix Automotive," Labour/Le Travail [Journal of Canadian Labour Studies], 2000, 45:103-140. For Baudry's comment see R. Beaudry, G. Lagace, and L. Jukau, Rapport final: Comite d'Etude sur la Salubrite dans l'Industrie de l'Amiante (Quebec: Le Comite, 1976), p. 381. See also Lloyd Tataryn, Dying for a Living: The Politics ofIndustrial Death (Ottawa: Deneau & Greenberg, 1979), pp. 15-60. For the criticisms of McDon ald's mesothelioma figures see Subcommittee on Environmental Health, Department of National Health and Welfare, Report of the Asbestosis Working Group, Ottawa, 15 Feb. 1976, copy in T&N microfilm archive, 417/ 1220-1250. 19 Health and Safety Commission, Asbestos, Vol. 1: Final Report ofthe Advisory Committee (London: HMSO, 1979), p. 62. On the Asbestosis Research Council see Geoffrey Tweedale, "Science or Public Relations? The Inside Story of the Asbestosis Research Council," Amer. J. Indus. Med., 2000, 38:723-734. 20 Nancy Tait, Asbestos Kills, 2nd ed. (1976; London: Privately published, 1977), pp. i-ii; and Alan Dalton, AsbestosKiller Dust (London: BSSRS Publications, 1979), p. 48. See also London Hazards Centre, TheAsbestos Hazards Handbook (London: London Hazards Centre, 1995), pp. 103-104. 250 CHRYSOPHILES VERSUS CHRYSOPHOBES of asbestosis, lung cancer, and mesothelioma, though lack of data made it impossible to quantify the rates. In the developed countries, mesothelioma was found in individuals exposed only to white asbestos: brake mechanics, makers of friction products, and railroad workers.26 Evidence was also found that white asbestos caused mesothelioma in wine-filter workers and metal workers and even after environmental exposure. A marked excess of lung cancers was shown to be associated with asbestos textile spinning in Charleston, South Carolina. In 1987 an IARC working group concluded that chrysotile induced lung cancer and pulmonary mesothelioma and that there was no safe level of exposure.27 Counterarguments by the Canadians still emphasized the role of "contaminants" and co carcinogens in asbestos disease. They explained the high cancer rate in asbestos textile manufacture in Charleston as possibly due to oil. Another intriguing suggestion was that many of the observed mesotheliomas in chrysotile workers (especially miners and millers in Canada) were due to amphiboles. Since the 1960s, it had been known that Canadian ore contained blue fibrous reibeckite (i.e., crocidolite), yet researchers and asbestos com panies initially ignored this--possibly because crocidolite could not be removed from the ore or the final product, thus compromising the claim that Canadian asbestos was benign. By the late 1980s and 1990s, however, it was suggested by McDonald and others that tremolite (which typically constituted about 1 percent in commercial-grade chrysotile) was the sole cause of mesothelioma in Canadian workers and, further, that if an effort was made to identify tremolite-free ore chrysotile mining could continue. Others believed that the presence of the tremolite merely underlined the truism that asbestos was never a pure entity and that to single out one variety as safe was reckless. As one critic remarked: "attributing mesothelioma production to this amphibole contaminant... is clearly suspect. If tremolite cannot be removed from chrysotile via industrial processing, the whole issue of tremolite contamination appears academic at best."28 However, McGill scientists coun- 26 Regarding fiber length see Selikoff and Lee, Asbestos and Disease (cit. n. 8), pp. 427-428. For the research at Zimbabwe chrysotile mines see Rabelan Baloyi, "Exposure to Asbestos among Chrysotile Miners, Millers, and Mine Residents and Asbestosis in Zimbabwe" (Ph.D. diss., Inst. Occupational Health, Univ. Kuopio, Hel sinki, 1989), p. 65; and M. Cullen and Baloyi, "Chrysotile Asbestos and Health in Zimbabwe, I: Analysis of Miners and Millers Compensated for Asbestos-Related Diseases since Independence (1980)," Amer. J. Indus. Med., 1991, 19:161-169. On mesothelioma in brake mechanics see A. M. Langer and W. T. E. McCaughey, "MesotheliomainaBrake RepairWorker," Lancet, 13 Nov. 1982, 8307:1101-1102; M. J. Teta, H. C. Lewinsohn, J. W. Meigs, R. A. Vidone, L. Z. Mowad, and J. T. Flannery, "Mesothelioma in Connecticut, 1955-1977: Oc cupational and Geographical Associations," Journal of Occupational Medicine, 1983, 25:749-756; and M. Huncharek, J. Muscat, and J. V. Capotorto, "Pleural Mesothelioma in a Brake Mechanic," Brit. J. Indus. Med., 1989, 46:69-71. On mesothelioma in railroad workers see T. F. Mancuso, "Relative Risk of Mesothelioma among Railroad Machinists Exposed to Chrysotile," Amer. J. Indus. Med., 1988, 13:639-657. 27 On mesothelioma in wine-filter workers see G. Scansetti, F. Mollo, G. Tiberi, A. Andrion, and G. Piolatto, "Pleural Mesothelioma after a Short Interval from First Exposure in the Wine Filter Industry," Amer. J. Indus. Med., 1984, 5:335-339; in metal workers see K. Moringa, N. Kohyama, K. Yokohama, Y. Yasui, I. Hara, M. Sasaki, Y. Suzuki, and Y. Sera, "Asbestos Fibre Content of Lungs with Mesotheliomas in Osaka, Japan: A Preliminary Report," in WHO/IARC, Non-Occupational Exposure to Mineral Fibres, IARC Scientific Publica tions No. 90 (Lyon: IARC, 1989), pp. 438-443; and after environmental exposure to white asbestos see K. M. Wolf, Z. H. Piotrowski, J. D. Engel, L. G. Bekeris, E. Palacios, and K. A. Fisher, "MalignantMesotheliomawith Occupational and Environmental Asbestos Exposure in an Illinois Community Hospital," Archives of Internal Medicine, 1987, 147:2145-2149. On the Charleston results see J. M. Dement, R. L. Harris, M. J. Symons, and C. M. Shy, "Exposures and Mortality among Chrysotile Asbestos Workers, Pt. II: Mortality," Amer. J. Indus. Med., 1983, 4:421 -433. For the conclusion that there was no safe level of exposure to chrysotile see WHO/ IARC, IARC Monographs on the Evaluation of Carcinogenic Risks to Humans: Overall Evaluations ofCarcin ogenicity: An Updating of IARC Monographs Vols. 1-42, Supplement 7 (Lyon: IARC, 1987). 28 M. Huncharek, "Asbestos and Cancer: Epidemiological and Public Health Controversies," Cancer Investi gation, 1994, 12:214-222, on p. 217. On possible oil contamination see P. Sebastien, J. C. McDonald, A. D. McDonald, B. Case, and R. Harley, "Respiratory Cancer in Chrysotile Textile and Mining Industries: Exposure Inferences from Lung Analysis," Brit. J. Indus. Med., 1989, 46:180-187; on tremolite contamination see Churg, "Chrysotile, Tremolite, and Malignant Mesothelioma" (cit. n. 10). GEOFFREY TWEEDALE AND JOCK MCCULLOCH 253 congenial to the big British and American companies, with which he reached a modus vivendi. From 1986 until 2001 a leading American asbestos company, Owens-Illinois, made regular payments to Wagner through its legal firm. The total sum--probably over $300,000--was significant, especially in light of the low salaries paid to research workers in the United Kingdom. Yet this employment as a "consulting expert on asbestos issues" was never disclosed either by Owens-Illinois or by Wagner himself. It is not clear why the company employed Wagner and what he did for his monthly retainer, which often exceeded $6,000. One suggestion was that he was hired to help revise the medical literature by emphasizing the dangers of crocidolite above those of amosite and chrysotile, thereby buttressing Owens-Illinois's defenses in litigation.35 Certainly Wagner testified at the re quest of asbestos manufacturers using a chrysotile/amosite defense, and the transcripts reveal that it was an uncomfortable experience that had little to do with pure science. Possibly Wagner regretted that he had allowed himself to be compromised. When inter viewed in 1998, he complained about how the asbestos industry set out to frustrate sci entific discovery and how science had been hijacked by lawyers and the press--so much so that he expressed regret that he had ever worked on ARD.36 The secret consultancy emerged in legal discovery shortly before Wagner's death in 2001, though it did not blight any of the eulogistic obituaries. Peter Elmes (1921-2003) also regarded the chrysotile risk as negligible. He believed that the evidence for chrysotile's link with mesothelioma was inconclusive and endorsed its continued use, especially if it was tremolite free. He thought that even white asbestos spinning could continue if it was "restricted to a few, very sophisticated, safe factories." Elmes did not say where such factories were located; and his comments are puzzling given that, as an asbestos industry consultant in the 1980s, he had seen for himself--and criti cized--the dusty and dangerous conditions at the mines and mills of Turner & Newall, the most advanced firm in the industry. One of the Turner & Newall processes that Elmes had criticized was the manufacture of "Fortex"--a wet dispersion chrysotile technology that killed at least one worker from mesothelioma. Elmes's vision of an amphibole-free chrysotile received short shrift from the firm's managers, who pointed out that the mines gave no guarantees as to dust content and that their main consideration was cost.37 The chrysophobes were just as vocal in their opposition to chrysotile. In the 1990s, as Barry Castleman has shown, industry participation in bodies such as the IPCS and the WHO met with increasing resistance from scientists who demanded more objectivity in assessing health risks. This was partly because a continuing stream of epidemiological studies from as far afield as Australia, Germany, and the United States described chrysotileinduced mesotheliomas. The same disease was also suffered by Italian mine and mill workers (who worked with chrysotile uncontaminated by tremolite), by railway and lo- 35 McDonald's obituary of Wagner, London Independent, 4 July 2000; affidavit of Paul J. Hanly, Jr., in OwensIllinois, Inc., v. T&N, Ltd., in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas, Marshall Division, CA No. 2-99CV01117-DF, 24 Jan. 2000, p. 10; and amended affidavit of R. Bruce Shaw in response to affidavit of Paul. J. Hanly, Jr., in Owens-Illinois v. T&N, 16 Feb. 2000. 36 J. C. Wagner deposition, Claude Cimino v. Raymark Industries, Stafford Hotel, London, 30 May 1990, in which he stated that "chrysotile does not cause mesothelioma" but that amosite can, "probably with very heavy dosage" (pp. 79-80); and McCulloch, interview with J. C. Wagner, Weymouth, Dorset, 22 Mar. 1998. 37 P. C. Elmes, "Mesotheliomas and Chrysotile," Ann. Occup. Hyg., 1994, 38:547-553; and Elmes, "Conflicts in the Evidence" (cit. n. 12), p. 334 (quotation). For Elmes's criticism of the manufacture of "Fortex" see Tweedale, Magic Mineral to Killer Dust (cit. n. 9), p. 259. For the Turner & Newall response to Elmes's views see N. Rhodes to S. Marks, 2 Apr. 1983, T&N microfilm archive, 310/1676-1677. 256 CHRYSOPHILES VERSUS CHRYSOPHOBES questioning the ideas that amphiboles were uniquely dangerous and that white asbestos was harmless because it was removed more readily from the lungs. What if chrysotile triggered cancer before it was removed? After all, it had been known since the 1980s that chrysotile had a predilection for the pleura--exactly what one would expect if it caused mesothelioma. When pathologists examined mesothelioma fiber burdens under the micro scope, they certainly found amphiboles--but also chrysotile. They were therefore unable to exclude a role for it in causing the malignancy. Subsequent studies of mesothelial tissues by analytical electron microscope showed that in many tumors the major fiber type iden tified was chrysotile; moreover, many of the fibers were "short" (under 5 microns). By the mid 1990s, therefore, a marked reaction had set in against the chrysophiles, with some even suggesting that chrysotile was mainly responsible for mesothelioma.43 Even those who did not go that far refused to give chrysotile a clean bill of health. The emerging consensus that chrysotile causes mesothelioma was highlighted by several publications in the late 1990s. For example, in 1997 a multidisciplinary panel of scientists meeting in Helsinki found that, although chrysotile was less potent than amphiboles, it nevertheless caused mesothelioma. Moreover, in 1998 the IPCS, under the joint sponsor ship of the U.N. Environment Program, the International Labour Organisation, and the WHO, published a monograph devoted entirely to chrysotile. It concluded: "Exposure to chrysotile asbestos poses increased risks for asbestosis, lung cancer and mesothelioma in a dose-dependent manner. No threshold has been identified for carcinogenic risks. Where safer substitute materials for chrysotile are available, they should be considered."44 These developments coincided with a Canadian challenge, conducted through the World Trade Organisation (WTO), to the French decision to ban chrysotile. The Canadian industry was now a shadow of its former self. In 1999 Canada produced 345,000 tonnes of asbestos (over 18 percent of world output), making it the second largest producer after Russia; most of the fiber was destined for the developing world (Asia, Africa, and Latin America). The industry employed about fifteen hundred workers in various mining jobs (a decline from about six thousand in 1964). But the Canadian industry still thought it worthwhile to pursue the French case as a way of advertising chrysotile's beneficial properties to its diminishing customer base. This presented another opportunity for chrysotile defenders and their op ponents to lock horns: one charging unfair trade practices, the other scientific corruption and misinformation. The dispute was resolved in favor of the French in 2000, when the WTO confirmed to its satisfaction that there was a carcinogenic risk associated with the 43 On the predilection of chrysotile for the pleura see Y. Suzuki and N. Kohyama, "Translocation of Inhaled Asbestos Fibres from the Lung to Other Tissue," Amer. J. Indus. Med., 1991, 79:701-704; see also Suzuki and S. R. Yuen, "Asbestos Fibers Contributing to the Induction of Human Malignant Mesothelioma," Ann. N.Y. Acad. Sci., 2002, 982:160-176. On mesothelioma fiberburdens seeV. L. Roggli, P. C. Pratt, andA. R. Brody, "Asbestos Fiber Type in Malignant Mesothelioma: An Analytical Scanning Electron Microscope Study of Ninety-four Cases," Amer. J. Indus. Med., 1993, 23:605-614. For the electron microscope studies see Suzuki and Yuen, "Asbestos Tissue Burden Study on Human Malignant Mesothelioma," Industrial Health, 2001, 39:150-160; see also Suzuki and Yuen, "Asbestos Fibers." For the suggestion that chrysotile was the chief cause of mesothelioma see A. H. Smith and C. C. Wright, "Chrysotile Asbestos Is the Main Cause of Pleural Mesothelioma," Amer. J. Indus. Med., 1996, 30:252-266; and L. T. Stayner, D. Dankovic, and R. A. Lemen, "Occupational Exposure to Chrysotile Asbestos and Cancer Risk: A Review of the Amphibole Hypothesis," American Journal of Public Health, 1996, 86:179-186. 44 A. Tossavainen et al., "Asbestos, Asbestosis, and Cancer: The Helsinki Criteria for Diagnosis and Attri bution," Scandinavian Journal of Work, Environment, and Health, 1997, 23:311-316; and International Pro gramme on Chemical Safety, Environmental Criteria 203: Chrysotile Asbestos (Geneva: WHO, 1998), p. 94, posted at www.inchem.org/documents/ehc/ehc/ehc203.htm. GEOFFREY TWEEDALE AND JOCK MCCULLOCH 259 gistic effect with asbestos) in the developing world also has profound health implications.50 Thus "controlled use" is at best an unrealizable ideal in developing countries and at worst another industry myth. It is only because manufacture in the developing world is uncon trolled that chrysotile remains an economic alternative, thus ensuring that the debate be tween chrysophiles and chrysophobes continues. 50 On the situation in Canada see Institut National de Sante Publique du Quebec, Rapport epidemiologie des maladies reliees a l'exposition a l'amiante au Quebec (Quebec, Sept. 2003), posted at www.inspq.qc.ca/pdf/ publicationsZ222-EpidemiologieExpositionAmiante.pdf. On circumstances in developing countries seeL. V. Har ris and I. A. Kahwa, "Asbestos: Old Foe in Twenty-first-Century Developing Countries," Science of the Total Environment, 2003, 307:1-9; and A. L. Ramanthan and V. Subramanian, "Present Status of Asbestos Mining and Related Health Problems in India: A Survey," Indus. Health, 2001, 39:309-315. On the synergism with tobacco see A. L. Frank, R. F. Dodson, and M. G. Williams, "Carcinogenic Implications of the Lack of Tremolite in UICC Reference Chrysotile," Amer. J. Indus. Med., 1998, 34*314-317.