The story of asbestos disease in Canada has been one of long denial. When annual exports were still only of the order of hundreds of tonnes, Canadian chrysotile was noted to be fatal to British (Deane,1898; Murray, 1906) and French (Auribault, 1906) textile workers. Inquiries about the health of Quebec miners and millers in 1912 were met with the assurance that it was robust (Labour Gazette, 1912). Denial of disease in Quebec continued until 1955 when the serpent entered the Eden of Thetford with a vengeance, and 128 cases of asbestosis including 33 deaths suddenly materialised (Cartier, 1955). Even then Cartier could plead in mitigation, without his professional colleagues entering a demur:"... in practice, this disease [asbestosis] may look more serious and cause important medicolegal problems if a too scientific medical concept or a too liberal social interpretation is accepted by medicolegal professions, labor and compensation bodies."

In 2001, the reluctant cat is now well out of the bag. The call for a ban on chrysotile cannot be dismissed as the machination of a small group of irresponsible, misguided or worse, mavericks and extremists, any more than past concern about death and cancer in Quebec miners was a figment of the overzealously scientific or the bleeding hearted. Consensus has been reached under the aegis of the World Health Organisation, the International Labour Organisation, and their agencies, that include the International Programme of Chemical Safety and the International Agency for Research on Cancer, and now by Europe, that chrysotile is to be eschewed.

After countenancing the international march of asbestos deaths for a hundred years, can the Canadian Medical Association in all conscience oppose the call for a worldwide ban on asbestos?

Morris Greenberg

Auribault, M. (1906) Sur l’hygiene et la securite des ouvriers dans la filature et tissage d’amiante. In: Annual report of the French Labour Inspectorate for 1906.

Cartier, P.(1955) Some clinical observations of asbestosis in mine and mill workers. Arch Ind Hlth,11: 204-207.

Deane, Lucy (1898) ‘Report on the health of workers in asbestos and other dusty trades,’ in: HM Chief Inspector of Factories & Workshops, Annual Report for 1898. London, HMSO. 1899.171-172.

Labour Gazette. 12^th February 1912.