UK Mesothelioma Day 2023: Asbestos Still Kills

On the occasion of Mesothlioma day in the UK, Mick Holder, who's the renowned health and safety campaigner, warned that country's toxic legacy in the form of asbestos can't be over until the government takes strict action to dump such hazardous material.

Those who are still unaware about the dangers of asbestos and its hazardous effects must know that it has to be removed safely from the environment, otherwise it will continue to kill people not only in the UK but the entire world.

The biggest threat to asbestos is its exposure into the atmosphere where it mixes with the air and gets accumulated into the air sacs of lungs. After this is done, the asbestos spindles start causing problems like scratching and irritation around the lung surface.

In most cases, the exposure to asbestos is further developed into chronic conditions like mesothelioma and asbestosis. However, it takes years to develop such conditions.

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There are cases where it took over 40 years when symptoms first started appearing. The development of all such lethal conditions mostly have a long latency period.

Now, if you look at the number of deaths in the UK, up to 2,500 people annually die due to mesothelioma alone.

Please note that mesothelioma is a type of lung cancer which is caused mainly due to the long exposure of asbestos.

It's a rare form of cancer that can be prevented by the proper education, guidance and removal of asbestos from the surroundings. In all other medical ailments caused due to the asbestos, mesothelioma is easily recognizable as it mainly affects the inner lining of the lungs, gut or heart cavity.

Other than that, there is enough evidence to prove that asbestos exposure can also lead to the ovarian cancer as well.

As we just mentioned above, the latency period of such type of ailments caused due to the asbestos is quite high. In most cases, the first symptoms tend to appear somewhere after a gap of 40 years or more.

The above problem was all there in the past but nobody took time to handle the severity of this naturally occurring mineral. But now, the time has come to get united and dump it safely into the ground to safeguard or prevent our future generations.

The problem which is still lying in front of us is that millions of tons of asbestos is still lying in front of us in the form of public buildings, workplaces, homes and environment. This is the high time that this naturally occurring mineral needs to be eradicated completely.

If we don't remove this mineral in the time to come, it will continue to affect the lives of hundreds of citizens across the world

It was in 1999 when the UK banned all kinds of asbestos imports or related products by associating with other EU members. In spite of taking such a large scale measure, the country is still paddling with the toxic and killer dust across the world.

Although, many such forums and panels have been created in these long years to remove this killer dust from the environment, it looks like this is not enough and more steps need to be taken to curb the menace of asbestos.

In the past, the governments have stuck with the line that asbestos removal should be safely done as soon as possible. But if you look at the reality, it's still not happening.

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One way to manage this is to check all the employers if they have taken safety precautions against the dumping of asbestos in any way. This is a great initiative. But in the majority of cases, it is not being done.

This has actually caused Britain to suffer as the country has witnessed much causality in the past and will continue to do so if strong actions to eradicate this are not taken on time.

The Mesothelioma Day in the UK is celebrated every year on the first Friday of July. On this day, the concerned authorities discuss all the future actions to safeguard the lives of people by taking appropriate measures to curb the menace of asbestos.

This year there was a special event held via Zoom where the renowned BBC journalist, mesothelioma patient, academic and broadcaster Kate Williams participated to discuss the issues related to eradicate it completely.

Well, you can always want to join the forum to Support Asbestos victims in UK and get all the relevant information to keep yourself updated.

Also Read: Can You Get Mesothelioma Without Asbestos Exposure?