Asbestos exposure, should i be worried

[Loz]

Hi,

 

Having renovation done and when builders cut through plastic soft fit yesterday in two places for block work to go up on second storey with jig saw turns out there was a thin cement board on the underside, I was in garden watching as discussing project with builder, the builder then dropped the soft fit into the dumper about a couple of metres away from me and load of dust came up - mainly from dust/debris that was already in dumper.  It was only afterwards main builder looked at soft fit in dumper and said mmm that could be an asbestos cement board that the soft fit was siliconed to.  Is about 7mm thick and 50cm across.

 

No one was masked at that point as was not expected.  Took a double bagged sample of the board to local testing place and came back as Chrysotile asbestos, now really worried about possible exposure not when soft fit was cut as well away (would worry for the carpenter) but when was dropped down into dumper as may have broken some more at that point.

 

Am I worrying about nothing given the brief potential exposure at that distance and outside, I am guessing lots of people mistakenly do stuff every now and then or should I be concerned ?  The rest will be dealt with properly, double bagged and taken away.

 

Any thoughts greatly appreciated,

 

Lawrence

 

 

[Jilly]

I think lots of us have had occasional accidental short exposure. There's nothing you can do now except put it out of your mind and stay calm and mitigate any future exposure risk. I think the whole building thing heightens your general anxiety levels. Paul McKenna has some good exercises where you visualise the thing you are worried about and shrinking down to a very small thing far away, which can be helpful to get things in proportion. 

 

Wash all of your clothes and shower too, which I'm sure you have done. Watering helps damp the dust down, get appropriate PPE. Make sure whoever is responsible does the risk assessments and don't let them be gung ho.

 

 

[Loz]

Thanks for such quick reply, good advice on the worrying although the clothes thing does worry me as stupidly stayed in the same clothes right through the kids bedtime, I had been outside a lot during the day (not near the building) so hoping stuff would have blown away, been googling a lot and does seem a lot of people make mistakes and guess if lethal from a short exposure any more people would be going down with asbestos related illness.

 

Many thanks,

 

Lawrence

[Ralph]

High levels over time is what causes problems like asbestosis.

 

I would not worry about what you've described at all and it sounds like you are generally being careful anyway. 

[MikeGrahamT21]

cement based asbestos is low risk anyway, its very likely that the dust you saw was just dust and not actually from the sheet. They are incredibly hard to break and when they do they don't make much dust, you would have to take to it with an angle grinder to get any proper dust.

[Loz]

Many thanks for reassurance, sounding like exposure was minimal if at all, been really worried so thanks for taking time to respond, guess had lucky escape as now know what dealing with and can get rest dealt with properly,

 

Many thanks,

 

Lawrence

[Carrerahill]

1 hour ago, Loz said:

Hi,

 

Having renovation done and when builders cut through plastic soft fit yesterday in two places for block work to go up on second storey with jig saw turns out there was a thin cement board on the underside, I was in garden watching as discussing project with builder, the builder then dropped the soft fit into the dumper about a couple of metres away from me and load of dust came up - mainly from dust/debris that was already in dumper.  It was only afterwards main builder looked at soft fit in dumper and said mmm that could be an asbestos cement board that the soft fit was siliconed to.  Is about 7mm thick and 50cm across.

 

No one was masked at that point as was not expected.  Took a double bagged sample of the board to local testing place and came back as Chrysotile asbestos, now really worried about possible exposure not when soft fit was cut as well away (would worry for the carpenter) but when was dropped down into dumper as may have broken some more at that point.

 

Am I worrying about nothing given the brief potential exposure at that distance and outside, I am guessing lots of people mistakenly do stuff every now and then or should I be concerned ?  The rest will be dealt with properly, double bagged and taken away.

 

Any thoughts greatly appreciated,

 

Lawrence

 

 

In a word No.

 

To victims and families of victims of asbestos related illness/fatalities I am sure they would say, hold on a minute, but having essentially been through accidental and chosen, risk managed exposure (with PPE) I have done a lot of research into this and founded my own ideas.

 

There are various types of asbestos, blue, brown and white in order of danger, blue being the most deadly due to the smallest fibre size. 

 

Most asbestos containing materials (ACM's) found in houses will be white, from floor coverings to corrugated cement boards and almost certainly the stuff you had in your house. 

 

Most ACM's like flooring, adhesive and roof sheeting have the 5-12% of asbestos bound into them - so even when cut the fibres are bound up by bitumen or cement etc. making them bigger and heavier therefore they sink, don't float in the air as much - especially outside, and due to their size don't find the same way into your lungs. 

 

The boards used on roofing and for soffits and what not was often cut by installers with a hand saw with not so much as a paper mask, generally done outside this work thus concentrations of the dust was low and quickly carried away. There is good evidence to suggest many of these guys are still about to tell the tale how they used to cut it. 

 

White ACM's are also the only ACM that non-trained personnel and DIYers may remove under the HSE guidelines. 

 

Until not that long ago it was acceptable to dump old cement asbestos sheet material onto farm lanes and tracks to fill in potholes and could be buried on farms - the place was awash with the stuff being ground up into smaller and smaller pieces over the years - there was not a documented increase in agricultural workers with asbestos related illness.

 

White asbestos is one of the only asbestos types that can actually be cleared from the lungs.

 

One of the highest rates of asbestos related disease from white asbestos is actually school teachers and hospital workers due to the fact these buildings were filled with the stuff - not those who worked with it strangely. 

 

I think I would worry if I had had long term exposure to the stuff, I have removed a garage roof with full PPE and sort of accidentally cut through floor boards with a circular saw which was covered in bitumen adhesive and bits of old vinyl flooring, I do suspect they were ACM's - I didn't really consider this when I started this job - it was a bit of a worry but I had to move on a hope that my hopefully one off maybe high exposure will be OK. The benefit here is the bitumen and vinyl sticks to the asbestos, much like cement in cement board and doesn't actually just instantly release clouds into the air. 

 

I didn't read a few websites for my research, I downloaded medical journals and HSE reports and guides and spoke to Asbestos removal experts and read risk assessments and managed to speak with loads of old timer tradesmen from yesteryear to form an educated summary of just how bad is this stuff. 

 

Something else to bear in mind is that ACM's are sitting in gardens and farms across the land, old 50-60 year old sheets deteriorating away, rain washes the dust into the ground, it dries up and blows about - there is asbestos in the air all the time

 

I do not intend ever to deal with ACM's again - I think my couple of instances of contact will be OK and I think yours is even better. What way was the wind blowing? Or even was it blowing at all? Any air movement and unless it was a prolonged release of fibre being gently blown towards you, then chances are you are fine. Even a breeze towards you would arguably have carried the fibres off so quickly due to their very low mass that you never even got a change to breath them in!

 

Don't worry. 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited June 25, 2021 by Carrerahill

[Loz]

26 minutes ago, Carrerahill said:

In a word No.....

 

Don't worry. 

 

 

Many thanks for taking time to write such a detailed response, really is appreciated as been really quite worried over it and more I read and responses on here then am being much re-assured that this accidental short exposure happens a lot and is was as lethal as touted in some resources then many diy'ers would be dropping down of asbestos related disease.

 

Thanks again, really is excellent forum,

 

Lawrence

 

[Carrerahill]

47 minutes ago, Loz said:

 

Accidental short exposure happens a lot and is was as lethal as touted in some resources then many diy'ers would be dropping down of asbestos related disease.

 

This is this case for sure.

 

You must look closely at who writes some of these articles. If I was an ACM removal specialist I know what would be in my website blog! 

 

Every story has 2 sides. Everything out there is rigged to lead people down one train of thought.

 

I called out 3 ACM business to quote me to remove my garage roof, I got a great quote, £300 - I had the cash in my wallet to go for it, but didn't trust them not to rip it up, spray broken sheets all over my garden, maybe grind the heads off bolts. At that money they were also surely going to dump it.

 

Next guys were £1200 - I told them that was steep, how much were they factoring for ACM disposal to which he said £800 - I told him he was being ripped off because I had 3 quotes for disposal, 1 from a place I had to take it myself wrapped up £160 - and £350 for a small ACM skip and the worst quote was about £700. He didn't like that I knew the costs.

 

3rd was a joke at nearly £3K.

 

Mention ACM's and people get greedy. I can think of more dangerous and hazardous jobs that cost less.

Edited June 25, 2021 by Carrerahill

[newhome]

6 hours ago, Loz said:

Many thanks for taking time to write such a detailed response, really is appreciated as been really quite worried over it and more I read and responses on here then am being much re-assured that this accidental short exposure happens a lot and is was as lethal as touted in some resources then many diy'ers would be dropping down of asbestos related disease.

There is thought to be a genetic link to those who contract mesothelioma, aka asbestos cancer. It can run in families with 2 or 3 generations suffering from it. It’s pretty rare however which is why ‘many diy’ers’ don’t drop dead from it. It can take decades to show but casual contact is indeed all it takes for those who are susceptible to it. So bottom line is that you’d be extremely unlucky to get mesothelioma from casual contact but sadly it does happen as I know from personal experience when my husband got it. 

[ProDave]

You were outside when this happened.  If you are like me and you see dust / smoke etc, you hold your breath and walk away.  I even do this when walking down the street and a smoker is walking the other way. 

[keith65]

My Dad worked as a apprentice in the dockyard and he said they used to have big bales of the different types and used to have snowball fights with it he is 84 now. 

[Loz]

11 hours ago, newhome said:

There is thought to be a genetic link to those who contract mesothelioma, aka asbestos cancer. It can run in families with 2 or 3 generations suffering from it. It’s pretty rare however which is why ‘many diy’ers’ don’t drop dead from it. It can take decades to show but casual contact is indeed all it takes for those who are susceptible to it. So bottom line is that you’d be extremely unlucky to get mesothelioma from casual contact but sadly it does happen as I know from personal experience when my husband got it. 

Sorry to hear that, guess nobody knows for sure and maybe you are right that some people are predisposed to it, do you mind me asking what the casual contact was as is worrying can develop the worst outcome from a casual contact ?  
 

Lawrence

[patp]

An acquaintance of mine contracted mesothelioma from washing her dock worker husband's overalls. He is absolutely fine! 

 

My husband has plaque on his lungs which can, eventually, lead to meso. It may be that, genetically, he is not predisposed to it. The plaque, however, does come with its own problems and he gets out of breathe easily. There will be many, many people walking around with plaque on their lungs. His was only discovered when he contracted pneumonia and had his chest x rayed. He was a heating engineer on building sites where they would renovate old properties and cut out asbestos all the time to later sweep it up and dump it in skips. He is in line for compensation but, as my friend put it, there are no pockets in shrouds.

[Loz]

27 minutes ago, patp said:

An acquaintance of mine contracted mesothelioma from washing her dock worker husband's overalls. He is absolutely fine! 

 

My husband has plaque on his lungs which can, eventually, lead to meso. It may be that, genetically, he is not predisposed to it. The plaque, however, does come with its own problems and he gets out of breathe easily. There will be many, many people walking around with plaque on their lungs. His was only discovered when he contracted pneumonia and had his chest x rayed. He was a heating engineer on building sites where they would renovate old properties and cut out asbestos all the time to later sweep it up and dump it in skips. He is in line for compensation but, as my friend put it, there are no pockets in shrouds.

Sorry to hear,  some real sad stories out there, is horrible stuff and guess many people had big exposures for a long time with no knowledge of what damage was being done,

 

Lawrence

[newhome]

4 hours ago, Loz said:

Sorry to hear that, guess nobody knows for sure and maybe you are right that some people are predisposed to it, do you mind me asking what the casual contact was as is worrying can develop the worst outcome from a casual contact ?  

There was a study of inhabitants of a small cluster of villages in Turkey that had natural exposure to erionite that can also cause mesothelioma. Nearly 50% of deaths were caused by mesothelioma which is shockingly high. Some families had a very high number of deaths and their immediate neighbours had none at all leading to the suspicion that genetics were involved. They are still researching this and trying to tailor treatments based on a person’s genetic make up. Genetics likely play a part in the development of most cancers. 
 

It is thought that a single breath may be all that it takes to cause mesothelioma later in life if you are genetically susceptible to it. There have been accounts of teachers who caught it though pinning children’s pictures on the wall and thus releasing a tiny number of fibres, medics who caught it just through working in a building with asbestos present, wives and children who got it via casual contact with a worker’s clothing on return from work. In one family that I know of the 3 children used to greet their father when he returned from work. He later died of mesothelioma and a few decades later all 3 children died of it too despite never having worked with asbestos. 

[Loz]

Well I was feeling pretty reassured but seems to be some horror stories coming forward, I am pretty happy my exposure was minimal but with dust in the air pretty stressed some might have got on my clothes, I cannot get over why I didn’t change my clothes before getting kids from school and putting them to bed, hoping that as i was outside a lot before that would have blown off although from above clothes do seem a method of transfer, I really wish I had a moment to stop them cutting the board, all happened so quickly where a moments pause wouldn’t have all this worry, so don’t need it,

 

Lawrence 

[Ferdinand]

There are several us on here who lost family members to asbestosis. I lost my dad, and his only known exposure was as supervising (ie not working directly on it) Council architect on a ventilation system with asbestos in it 40 years before he died.

So minimal exposure can do it but yours sounds small enough to be relatively safe.

But *never* relax about it.

So I find @Ralph's comment below to be rather too broadbrush:

High levels over time is what causes problems like asbestosis.

I would not worry about what you've described at all and it sounds like you are generally being careful anyway. 

[Loz]

Thanks for replies, really stressed now as wasn’t thinking straight and now worried got some on clothes which didn’t change and put both kids to bed, I so wish hadn’t started this project and builders had paused just a moment and not cut the board, really worried for the kids now rather than me as I’m getting on a bit, to think indirectly impacted kids is a nightmare, so wish I could wind back the clock as so avoidable,

 

Lawrence

[Ferdinand]

On 26/06/2021 at 17:38, Loz said:

Thanks for replies, really stressed now as wasn’t thinking straight and now worried got some on clothes which didn’t change and put both kids to bed, I so wish hadn’t started this project and builders had paused just a moment and not cut the board, really worried for the kids now rather than me as I’m getting on a bit, to think indirectly impacted kids is a nightmare, so wish I could wind back the clock as so avoidable,

 

Lawrence

 

So minimal exposure can do it but yours sounds small enough to be relatively safe.
 

It is also a sunk cost, so not a lot you can do apart be sire to take care in future.

 

[Loz]

28 minutes ago, Ferdinand said:

 

So minimal exposure can do it but yours sounds small enough to be relatively safe.
 

It is also a sunk cost, so not a lot you can do apart be sire to take care in future.

 

 

Well I could keep on worrying but realise that is not healthy !  In case anyone following or find thread by google I spoke to couple of firms today about dealing with the rest of it in a safe way and both times got a really experienced person who asked about my potential risk.

 

Both said given distance from the jig saw (ground level 10m away from cut on roof) and then subsequent throwing into dumper and breakage (5m away) that the chances of any particles landing on my clothing very unlikely given the distance and outdoors and that was cement bonded white asbestos.  If it were indoors or brown/blue then would be a bit more concerned, added to that I then was outside quite a bit after and walking around/getting kids from school so every opportunity to shed any fibres - do appreciate they tend to cling to clothing.  Also both said even if some landed on me then at that level of exposure the kids could easily be exposed to the same at school over their lifetime and also walking passed other building sites/weathered garage roofs.

 

I did quite a bit of reading on the cancer side.  There does seem to be conflicting info on the amount needed but one thing seemed fairly consistent in that genetics seem to play a part as does being a smoker on top of that.  The type of asbestos seemed also to consistently say the brown or blue are thinner sharper and tend to lend themselves to cancer more than the white.  This side seems very inclusive and guess the most tragic as there are stories of children/wives getting it from partners clothing who work in asbestos environments but also seems to be some outliers that get it after a very small exposure.

 

Thanks to everyone who has taken time to reply especially as mine seems a small/non existent exposure compared to what others have encountered and the outcomes some people have had.  I am going to try and move on from it based on the above info and as a few people said not a lot I can do about it and worrying isn't going to be any good, I do tend to worry about stuff that never happens.  Also during my reading now aware can exist in other places in house/products so going to be very careful checking well ahead of rest of renovation work where as before was  unaware.

 

Thanks all again,

 

Lawrence