Today is Mesothelioma Awareness Day. I was made aware of Mesothelioma Awareness Day a couple weeks ago via an email asking me to help raise awareness about Mesothelioma. The email was from Cameron and Heather Von St. James.
Mesothelioma is rare form of cancer that develops from cells of the mesothelium. Mesothelium is a fancy word for the protective lining which covers the internal organs of the body.
The prognosis for those who are diagnosed with Mesothelioma is bleak. Heather Von St. James is a Mesothelioma survivor. You can listen to Heather tell you about her winning battle against Mesothelioma in the video below.
Exposure to asbestos is the primary causal agent for Mesothelioma. Heather was exposed to asbestos when she was a kid, before the danger of asbestos exposure was common knowledge.
Asbestos began being mined and used commercially in the late 19th century. Use of the mineral greatly increased during World War II, exposing, since the early 1940s, millions of Americans to asbestos danger.
It is now known that breathing in asbestos fibers is extremely hazardous to human health. And yet asbestos continues to be mined, with 2 million tons mined world wide in 2009. Russia produces about half the world's asbestos, followed by China, Brazil, Kazakhstan.
Canada closed its last two asbestos mines in 2011.
The dire severity of asbestos related diseases, including Mesothelioma, combined with the extremely widespread use of asbestos, along with it continued long term use, even after the dangers were known, has brought about asbestos litigation which has become the most expensive mass tort case ever in the U.S.
Approximately 100,000 Americans have died or are currently terminally ill from asbestos exposure related to ship building. Thousands of tons of asbestos were used in World War II ships. Some 4.3 million shipyard workers were exposed to asbestos during the war. For every thousand of those shipyard workers fourteen died from Mesothelioma.
In this century, when New York City's World Trade Center towers were knocked down, lower Manhattan was blanketed with the dust of debris, with asbestos among the combustible materials in the debris. Breathing in the 9/11 dust is thought to be the cause of the high cancer death rate among emergency workers since 9/11. Thousands of others who were exposed to that day's dust are thought to be at risk.
With today being Mesothelioma Awareness Day, beware of the continued danger caused by asbestos.
Go here to learn about Asbestos sites in Texas. Go here to learn about Asbestos sites in Fort Worth, including information about medical and legal help.
Watch the video below to hear Heather Von St. James testimony to the fact that one can be a Mesothelioma Cancer Survivor....
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