Document wrL2r18Ka2p0L8GERw1vvJeKJ

FILE NAME: RT Vanderbilt (RTV) DATE: 1971 July 30 DOC#: RTV 148 DOCUMENT DESCRIPTION: Memo to Mr. William Grantham RE Hazardous Substances Act - Asbestos in Talc MEMORANDUM TOi FRO Mi ' SUBJECT;. ' DATE; M r, W illiam B, Grantham EJEllsw orth Hazardous Substances Act July 30, 1971 R eferrin g to our d iscu ssio n of y e ste rd a y re la tiv e to the above in d icated A ct, I want to co n firm the in fo rm atio n th at I have given you. and so m e of the problem s involved. The m atter of asbestos in talc is not only involved in this A ct but also in the P u re Foods and D rugs A ct. We a r e re c e iv in g re q u e s ts fo r c e rtific a tio n th a t our ta lc is not. h azard o u s but a cc o rd in g to the L aw ,as I have re a d it, .ta lc is c o n sid ered h a za rd o u s if the u s e r w o rk s in a d u sty en v iro n m en t. We are now investigating this thing m ore specifically. I am enclosing a few -"jpies of som e correspondence that w ill give you som e thing to think about, as it hen wi. Of greatest im portance is the request for a "threshold lim it value". The U .S. D epartm ent of L abor publishes a "M a te ria l Safety D ata Sheet (a copy of which I am enclosing). This was sent to us by our New O rleans agents, Mehaffey and D aigle, Inc. , at the request of th e ir custom er Standard Paint and V arnish of New O rlean s, a long-tim e u s e r of DESERTALC. We had a sim ilar request from Sinclair Paints of Los Angeles. Accordingly, I asked Tom R em m ers to check with the A m erican Conference of G overnm ental Industrial H ygem sts, which apparently is the laboratory tied in with the D epartm ent of L abor, The answ er that we received back from them is quite disturbing as I think you w ill realise after you look through this file. In. the m e a n tim e , we a r e having Dick L a m a r m ak e fu r th e r in v estig atio n s . because he has som e questions that he w ants to put forw ard, I have also sent another C ertificate for the Cosm etic C orporation of A m erica to Bill Fischbach fa r his verdict as to the extent of our involvem ent, I haven't heard from him yet. Finally, in today's m ail we received a com m unication from Strauch C h em ical, d is trib u to rs in C hicago, w hich tie s in w ith th e in fo rm atio n you. secured from Johnson & Johnson. I am also checking with the D epartm ent of L abor to get m ore inform ation. We w ill not sign any C e rtific a te s th a t would involve us in th e m a tte r w ithout your a; >-al o r su b je c t to B ill F is c h b a c h 's a p p ro v a l if you w ant ua to send it to him , This is a v ery serio u s m a tte r and I am try in g to build up a file on it. In the m eantim e, I have asked everybody in the office h ere to re fe r all requests for inform ation to m e so that we can be consistent in the answ ers we give our tra d e . I suspect we w ill be getting m any m ore inquiries and I w ill keep you inform ed, When it seem s ap p ro p riate to d iscu ss this m a tte r in person, I think we should arran g e to have E a rl, Torn, and Dick L am ar included in a