The Industrial Revolution once again made asbestos a popular material, despite past warnings about its safety. Suddenly, as factories were springing up in every corner of the United States, companies were looking for ways to protect the facilities and their employees from the heat and high temperatures emitted by the new “machines” that helped make all the products that were suddenly being mass produced. Asbestos materials could be found wrapped around pipes and pumps, boilers, turbines, generators and wires, and was in a host of other items, including so-called protective clothing. While it was obviously intended to protect, it was causing harm instead.
Occupational safety and health wasn’t a huge priority in the decades that followed the Industrial Revolution. By the early 20th century, however, doctors and researchers began to recognize the dangers of the mineral and the connections it had to workers who were developing severe pulmonary problems. They began spreading the word but were promptly quieted. However, there is proof that asbestos products manufacturers were aware of the negative impact the mineral was having on the health of those who worked with it, but they refused to reveal the truth about the mineral. Their negligence caused many unnecessary deaths.
Soon, however, it became readily apparent that asbestos was a killer. High rates of pleural mesothelioma and other asbestos-related diseases were being diagnosed in those who worked with the mineral on a regular basis and it became apparent that the only cause of these diseases was exposure to asbestos.
Definitive studies were conducted during the 1920s and 1930s, and though asbestos was identified as a hazard, American companies kept using it until the late 1970s, when the government was finally forced to admit that the mineral was toxic and that discontinuing its use was a wise step.
Posted in: Asbestos
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