Asbestos victims deserve our support. Getting sick from your work is terrible and unjust '. That is what our deputy prime minister Lodewijk Asscher says in the annual report of the Institute for Asbestos Victims (IAS) for 2014. And so it is, especially for the victims for which the IAS was founded in 1999. 15 years later, the power to attack has unfortunately not yet been reduced. There was even a small increase in 2014. More than 700 asbestos victims registered in 2014 for mediation at the IAS.
In addition to an interview with our deputy prime minister, the 2014 annual report includes much more, including asbestosis and the many asbestos incidents that were in the news. All this 'larded' with the latest data from the IAS Monitor.
Asbestosis
On 1 April 2014, the doors of the IAS opened to people with the disease asbestosis. People who want to be eligible must meet a number of conditions. For example, it must be established that the person involved has been subjected to asbestos for a long period and intensively. Furthermore, the diagnosis should be asbestosis and there should be a serious degree of lung function loss. In 2014, 157 victims registered asbestosis.
Asbestos constantly in the news
In 2014, asbestos was constantly in the news. Particularly the closure of a large part of the city center of Roermond after a large fire spread asbestos particles in the living environment made a big impression. Epidemiologist Prof. dr. Dick Heederik says in the annual report that the attention for these incidents is excessive. The assumed dangers for residents and local residents are, in his opinion, very small after such a one-off exposure. On the other hand, he regrets that nobody cares about construction workers who are still milling and drilling in asbestos at high speed and who have to deal with much higher doses of fibers. Asbestos inspector Victor Kin points to the ignorance of many about the dangers of asbestos. One of the employees who came into contact with asbestos in the past for years was Frans Neijndorff. Now he has mesothelioma.
IAS Monitor Mesothelioma
People with mesothelioma are mainly men who worked in the construction / installation sector, shipbuilding and metal and electrical engineering industries in the 1960s and 1970s, where they were exposed to asbestos. This often involved insulating, heat-resistant asbestos applications. This data comes from the IAS Monitor, which was updated again in 2014. The IAS Monitor shows on the IAS website (www.ias.nl) who the victims are with mesothelioma. This shows, among other things, that more than 500 people get mesothelioma every year and that this number has almost doubled since 1990 (1990: 270, 2012: 522).
Comments
Post a Comment