Burns criticizes Baucus provision to pay sickened Libby residents

WASHINGTON -- Montana Sen. Conrad Burns said Wednesday that he opposes a pending senate bill designed to compensate residents of Libby, Mont., who have been sickened by asbestos.
Burns, a Republican, is opposing a provision authored by the state's other senator, Democrat Max Baucus. The language, which would pay sickened Libby residents up to $1.1 million each for asbestos-related diseases, is included in larger asbestos legislation passed by the Senate Judiciary Committee last year. The Senate is expected to take up the bill in coming weeks.
About 200 deaths and many more cases of asbestos-related disease have been blamed on asbestos contamination associated with Libby's vermiculite mine, which was operated by W.R. Grace & Co. and closed in 1990.
Burns said he opposes the legislation because it does not use a certain test to determine who would be eligible for the compensation. The test, called the diffusion capacity test, measures the lungs' efficiency to pass oxygen into the bloodstream and helps diagnose victims of tremolite asbestos disease, which is commonly found in Libby.
Language requiring the test was removed by the committee when it approved the bill last May.
"Many Libby residents have been under the impression that legislation specific to Libby meets their needs, but that simply isn't true," Burns said in a statement.
A spokesman for Baucus refuted Burns' claim Wednesday, saying Baucus has been working with members of the Judiciary Committee to add the test back into the bill. The spokesman, Barrett Kaiser, said Baucus will try to add the language when the legislation is considered on the Senate floor.
"Max, as the champion for Libby, is going to fight tooth and nail to get this provision added," Kaiser said. "But if he were to oppose the bill right now, that would be walking away from the people of Libby."
Kaiser said that several of Baucus' aides traveled to Libby last week to work on the language.
In his statement, Burns referred to a letter he received from McGarvey, Heberling, Sullivan and McGarvey, a Kalispell law firm that represents many sickened Libby residents. In the letter, the firm's partners argue that without the test, 40 percent of those otherwise eligible for compensation would not receive payment.
The vermiculite mine near Libby contained naturally occurring tremolite asbestos, a particularly dangerous form of the mineral. The long, needlelike asbestos fibers easily can become embedded in human lungs and cause such illnesses as asbestosis, often fatal, and mesothelioma, a rare, fast-moving cancer that attacks the lining of the lungs.
The size of individual payments included in the Baucus provision would depend on the level of sickness. The highest payments would be for people suffering mesothelioma, but all those sickened would get at least $400,000.
The larger legislation would end asbestos liability lawsuits in exchange for a multibillion-dollar compensation fund. Baucus, the top Democrat on the Senate Finance Committee, has said he will withhold support for the entire bill unless Libby residents are compensated.
The EPA has declared Libby a Superfund site and since 1999 has been cleaning contaminated property, including homes and businesses, in the town. Last year, a federal grand jury indicted Grace and seven executives, accusing them of conspiring for decades to hide the danger. Grace has denied any criminal wrongdoing.

Alfacell Provides Update on ONCONASE Clinical Program

BLOOMFIELD, N.J., Jan. 19 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Alfacell Corporation(Nasdaq: ACEL) today announced that over 300 patients are now enrolled in theCompany's international, confirmatory Phase IIIb trial evaluating ONCONASE(R)(ranpirnase), the Company's lead investigational drug candidate, as atreatment for unresectable malignant mesothelioma (UMM). The required numberof patients for full enrollment is 316. The Company will continue to provideupdates as key developments occur. "We have been unwavering in our commitment to complete the ONCONASE UMMclinical program," stated Kuslima Shogen, Chief Executive Officer of Alfacell."In enrolling more than 300 patients, Alfacell is conducting one of thelargest global UMM studies ever undertaken. We now look forward to achievingmore milestones on our regulatory path towards bringing ONCONASE to market." About Alfacell Corporation Alfacell Corporation is a biopharmaceutical company focused on thediscovery, development and commercialization of novel therapeutics for cancer,using its proprietary RNase technology platform. ONCONASE(R) (ranpirnase),Alfacell's lead investigational drug candidate, is currently being evaluatedin several studies, including a Phase IIIb registration study for malignantmesothelioma (MM) and a Phase I / II trial in Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer(NSCLC). For more information, please visit http://www.alfacell.com. This press release includes statements that may constitute"forward- looking" statements, usually containing the words "believe,""estimate," "project," "expect" or similar expressions. Forward-lookingstatements involve risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results todiffer materially from the forward-looking statements. Factors that wouldcause or contribute to such differences include, but are not limited to,uncertainties involved in transitioning from concept to product, uncertaintiesinvolving the ability of the Company to finance research and developmentactivities, potential challenges to or violations of patents, uncertaintiesregarding the outcome of clinical trials, the Company's ability to securenecessary approvals from regulatory agencies, dependence upon third-partyvendors, and other risks discussed in the Company's periodic filings with theSecurities and Exchange Commission. By making these forward-lookingstatements, the Company undertakes no obligation to update these statementsfor revisions or changes after the date of this release.

Calif. High Court Tackles Question of Landowner Liability in Asbestos Case

If a landowner hires an independent contractor to do some work on his property, and an employee of the contractor is injured while doing that work, is the landowner liable?
The California Supreme Court recently tackled that question in its review of a lawsuit filed by Ray Kinsman, a carpenter who contends he developed mesothelioma from exposure to airborne asbestos while doing contract work during the 1950s at a Unocal refinery in Wilmington, Calif.
A jury attributed 15 percent of the responsibility for Kinsman's illness to Unocal – it assigned 85 percent of the blame to "all others," the definition of which is unclear to the high court – and ordered Unocal to pay Kinsman more than $3 million in compensatory damages. The First District Court of Appeal in San Francisco reversed the jury verdict and ordered a new trial, pointing out that the jury likely would have ruled in favor of Unocal if it had known of the appeals court's interpretation of a landowner's legal liability.
In its Dec. 19 opinion, the California Supreme Court in San Francisco upheld the appeals court's reversal of the jury verdict but also reversed parts of the appeals court's opinion.
The high court concluded that a landowner may be liable to a contractor's injured employee if several conditions are met:
The landowner knew, or should have known, of a latent or concealed pre-existing hazardous condition on its property;
The contractor did not know and could not have reasonably discovered this hazardous condition; and
The landowner failed to warn the contractor about this condition.
The state Supreme Court reversed the jury's decision on the basis that the jury did not receive proper instruction on the key legal issue in the case.
Prior to the jury's verdict, the trial court instructed the jury on a premises liability theory and a negligent retention of control theory. The jury ruled in favor of Kinsman based on the premises liability theory, which was misapplied to this case, according to the high court.
"Because the general premises liability instruction given does not make clear that the hazard must have been unknown and not reasonably ascertainable to the independent contractor that employed Kinsman and to other contractors working contemporaneously on the premises – the jury was instructed in error," Associate Justice Carlos Moreno wrote for the high court.
The Supreme Court remanded the case to the appeals court and ordered a new trial.
To view the California Supreme Court's opinion, visit http://www.courtinfo.ca.gov/opinions/documents/S118561.PDF.
- Josh Cable

LAWRENCE MAN PLEADS GUILTY TO VIOLATING MASSACHUSETTS CLEAN AIR ACT

BOSTON – A Lawrence man has pleaded guilty to violating the Massachusetts Clean Air Act, Attorney General Tom Reilly and Department of Environmental Protection (MassDEP) Commissioner Robert W. Golledge Jr. announced today.
Michael Theriault, 47, pleaded guilty to three counts of violating the Massachusetts Clean Air Act. Salem Superior Court Judge Thomas Billings sentenced him to two years in the House of Correction, suspended for two years to be followed by two years of supervised probation. As a condition of his probation, Theriault was also ordered to perform 200 hours of community service and is prohibited from working in the asbestos abatement business.
This case came to light when during the early morning hours of February 3, 2004, an employee of Contract Assembly Inc. discovered approximately 40-50 black garbage bags dumped behind the company's building at 90 Glenn Street in Lawrence. Inspection of the bags revealed that they contained dry asbestos pipe insulation.
Members of the Environmental Crimes Strike Force conducted an investigation into the origin of the bags. Trash found with the asbestos led them to a company located in a converted mill at 468 Canal Street Lawrence. An employee of that company informed the investigators that he knew the name of the individual who had been removing asbestos from the basement of 468 Canal Street. He provided the name of Michael Theriault, a former employee of the company.
Tenants of the Canal Street building indicated that they had observed Theriault removing asbestos dry, without containment, respirators or protective equipment. They expressed concern over the fact that their work areas had been covered in dust and debris during and after the removal. Tenants had observed Theriault totally covered in white dust while he was removing the asbestos. Samples collected by the DEP from the mill and the dumpsite indicated that the insulation was over 40% asbestos.
According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, a large number of occupational studies have reported that exposure to asbestos via inhalation can cause lung cancer and mesothelioma. The removal of asbestos is governed by a set of strict regulations promulgated by the DEP to prevent the release of asbestos fibers into the air.
Assistant Attorney General Douglas Rice of AG Reilly's Criminal Bureau prosecuted this case. Karen Golden-Smith and John MacAuley of the MassDEP and Environmental Police Officers assigned to the Attorney General's Office investigated this case for the Environmental Crimes Strike Force. The Massachusetts Environmental Crimes Strike Force is an interagency enforcement team overseen by AG Reilly and Environmental Affairs Secretary Stephen Pritchard. It was formed to identify, investigate and prosecute environmental crimes.

Warming up to this old house

On closing day, my parents and siblings gather at the new house to eat pizza and drink beer. In my family, this is how you follow through on an offer to help with the move. Sure, my brother rolls a few pans of paint over the pink walls in the kids’ bedroom, and my sisters cram some dishes into the kitchen cabinets, but mostly they’re here to christen the new digs and wish us well. Again.
This is the third home my husband Mike and I have owned in eight years, the third time we’ve packed up the clan and moved on. No, we had not been relocated by work and no, we were not getting more bedroom space, a bigger yard, newer construction or a better neighborhood. We were getting something a little different.
And a lot older.
Last summer, when we ambled through this 1917 brick bungalow—a home comparable in square footage to the one we already owned and located just three blocks away, but 40 years its senior—we were so charmed by its sunny disposition and quirky personality, and so inspired by the renovation possibilities, that we decided to try it on for size. And on this, our first evening as its caretakers, we’re feeling pretty good about the fit.
Yelling to be heard above the din that 20 people in an unfurnished living room create, I tell my husband to open a few windows and air the place out. It’s a request that has more to do with rejuvenation than with ventilation—an "out with the old, in with the new" gesture. A fresh start.
Unfortunately, my orders cannot be executed.
"They’re all painted shut," Mike returns. "Isn’t that weird?"
And immediately I’m thinking, "How come we didn’t notice that before?"
Ugly heads, reared
I have been inside many old houses, professionally as a feature writer and socially as a resident of a historic suburban area. It is my personal opinion that each one has its own unique spirit and obviously, its own baggage.
Our previous home was a ‘60s ranch that met all our needs efficiently and had no structural issues to speak of, but interesting it was not. My immediate visceral reaction to this well-worn bungalow—a handsome but humble home with room-spanning radiators, wavy glass windows and rustic wood details—was strong and positive. The attraction was due in part to my nostalgia for an era of greater architectural integrity, when a working-class guy likely built this home for his family using quality materials and high construction standards. But looking back, I can see it was also the result of some truly delusional, "It’s a Wonderful Life" romanticism.
"This crazy old house," I’d envisioned myself saying to Mike as he waltzed me through the drafty dining room humming Buffalo Gals. "Isn’t it a character?"
And in the first few days after moving in, we do take little idiosyncrasies—like doors that don’t catch closed, doors that won’t stay open, down-sloping floors, chipping paint and mysterious odors—with the same lighthearted bemusement that George and Mary do on their first leaky evening at 223 Sycamore.
We chuckle after the front door handle comes off in a guest’s hand. A constant breeze blowing in under the back door (an oversized monster of a door that made one potential contractor walk away laughing) prompts us to introduce the kitchen as a three-season room to friends who’ve come for a tour. We consider letting the kids sled down the front steps when a sagging gutter turns the porch into a mountain of ice. And when the pull of a closet light chain separates the fixture from the ceiling, sending a shower of plaster down onto our sweaters, we take it with good humor.
But soon, an insidious paranoia—fueled initially by neurotic genes inherited from my mother but accelerated to the point of hysteria by frequent visits to home restoration websites—would rise up to dominate the period where these quarters and I would get better acquainted.
Within a few days, conversations between Mike and I that once began with wondrous discoveries like, "Hey look, a broom closet!" are quickly replaced with questions like, "Where did that puddle on the kitchen floor come from?" and "What is that smell?"
Could the oil tank that was once under the back porch have leaked into the soil? Is that 300-year-old tree going to fall on our house and crush the children in their beds? Could the glass shingles on the back porch be giving us all Mesothelioma?
For a while, I wonder what could have possibly made us think we had the guts and the optimism required to take on an old beast like this. I am consumed with fear that there is something dreadfully, horribly wrong with the house and everyone else in town knows about it but us.
"Those poor people," I imagine our new neighbors saying to one another over the privet. "Wait until they find out about the (insert major, $100,000-costing structural issue here). Hope those kids don’t think they’re going to college."
All of this is completely ridiculous, of course. We know the home’s previous owners through doings in the village, and they are good people. They would not have palmed off a lemon on us intentionally. Still, maybe there’s something they hadn’t known ...
I think back to our first night in the house, when my brother-in-law addressed our non-functioning window dilemma with a hammer and a flathead screwdriver; when bits of paint flew hither and yon as he cranked them all open. A link on Bobvila.com takes me to a passage about lead hazards in houses built before 1970 and the likelihood (around 90 percent) that an old home contains at least some. And I completely lose it.
At night, I dream of my children eating peanut butter and paint chip sandwiches. When I wake in a cold sweat, Mike urges me to get a grip.
Inner peace, restored
"I think you’re overreacting, but if you’re worried about the windows, let’s deal with it," Mike says with complete calmness. "Make a few calls. Get some estimates."
Deal with it? Why hadn’t I though of that? I knew I married him for a reason. For the next three weeks, every single day, there is someone at my house giving me a professional opinion about the windows. And they’re all different.
"Obviously you want better insulation and easier maintenance," the replacement window salespeople say.
"What you want to do is take them apart and coat everything real good with an oil-base," insist the painters.
"It’d be a crime to get rid of those windows, they’re works of art," the refinishers say. "Strip the paint and stain ‘em. They’ll take your breath away."
And ultimately, because a liquid strip is considered the safest way to remove old paint (and because we really didn’t need a vacation this year, or clothes, or groceries ...) we determine that this is the right thing to do in the formal spaces. While we’re at it, we might as well restore all the doors, trim, molding and baseboards. What the heck.
In the weeks that precede the start date, energized by the forward motion and recommitted to the effort of making this home our own, I quickly get to work on the things I can do myself. On one afternoon, I take a bleach-soaked toothbrush to the mosaic tile in the entrance vestibule and the world around me disappears. On another, I spend three hours scraping Pokemon stickers off a radiator cabinet with a spatula, and I can’t remember the last time I felt so satisfied. Maybe there is something to this old house stuff.
Now that the ball is rolling, Mike and I begin to talk long-term about the place. We make plans to attack the exterior, work the garden, expand the attic – plans we never made at our other homes. And suddenly, the old barn isn’t quite so scary.
Staying put
"All I really need from a new house is a kitchen that looks out over the backyard," I used to tell Mike. "I just want to be able to stick my head out the back door and yell at the kids if I think somebody’s about to lose an eye."
Now that my modest demands have been met by a west-facing galley kitchen—which is small but cool thanks to an architecturally harmonious update made by previous owners—my husband wonders if I’m truly sated.
"In Lake County, we could have a brand new, five-bedroom modern colonial with a billiard room, a home office, a three-car garage and a 2,000-square-foot kitchen/great room for what we paid here," Mike offers from behind the New Homes section of our daily paper.
"Yeah, that sounds great in print," I say, after some consideration. "But there aren’t any trees in those subdivisions. We’ll all have melanoma. And why are all those joints built around retaining ponds? How many kids do you think drown in those each year? Plus, those new homes are hammered together in an afternoon, and who knows how long the water supplies will last out there ..."

Survivor of Experimental Treatment for Rare Cancer Uses Apple’s iPod to Podcast Hope to Other

A young Massachusetts woman who at the age of 29 was diagnosed with a rare cancer was given just months live. She survived by receiving an experimental treatment. Now a survivor, she podcasts messages of hope and encouragement through Apple’s iPod.
A young Massachusetts woman who at the age of 29 was diagnosed with a rare cancer was given just months live. She survived by receiving an experimental treatment. Now a survivor, she podcasts messages of hope and encouragement through Apple’s iPod.
At age 29, Karen Grant was diagnosed with Mesothelioma, a rare form of cancer which was present in both lungs was given just months to live. Karen was always a healthy active woman never showed symptoms, which is typical of this diagnosis.Dr. David J. Sugarbaker, Chief of Thoracic Surgery at Boston's Brigham and Women's Hospital has pioneered an experimental treatment which has improved the chances of survival for many patients. Karen, who became the first person to be treated for Mesothelioma in both lungs is a pioneer in her own right.Karen’s treatment involved an unbelievable 5 major surgeries within 4 months, combined with extensive rehabilitation which kept her in and out of the hospital for one year. Her toughest fight lasted 114 days, 6 weeks in I.C.U. and then rehabilitation. Karen received the news of a lifetime from her oncologist, “You are cancer free”. Karen is now a volunteer patient advocate, giving hope and optimism, she also loans Apple iPods to patients in Dr. Sugarbaker’s clinic. For patient success stories and information regarding mesothelioma treatments http://www.impmeso.org/ Patient success stories are also available through Apple’s iTunes online service.

Asbestos, a demon of the past

With the Supreme Court laying down that the ship cannot enter Indian waters until the court considers a report by a team of environment experts, it’s time to consider just what is at stake in the Clemenceau controversy. Take the case of Mangalbhai Patel, a worker in a power plant, who was diagnosed with lung cancer. Doctors in the public employees’ state insurance corporation (ESIC) mis-diagnosed his ailment as tuberculosis, while he had asbestosis, an incurable cancer caused by exposure to asbestos. Such cases rarely come to the fore in India.
According to the ILO, over 100,000 people worldwide have died from exposure to asbestos while mesothelioma, an asbestos induced cancer, alone kills about 3,000 people annually in the US and 5,000 in Europe. Most unreported exposures and fatalities are in developing countries like India and Brazil.
Yet, ‘it’s safe’, cries out the powerful industry, which in India alone turns out almost 2000 crore, blaming workers for improper handling. Sadly, the Indian government has played ball, not only helping the import driven industry to expand (duty dropped from 78 per cent in 1992 to 15 per cent in 2004), but also by refusing to follow international norms, like ratifying the ILO asbestos convention 162.
Since the time when the first case linking asbestos with cancer was reported in 1924, over 40 countries have banned the material. Though demand has shrunk in developed countries, it is rising in the developing world. While per capita consumption in the West is less than 100g/year, in Brazil it has risen to 1400 g/y. Over two million mt of asbestos is mined worldwide annually, mostly in Canada, China, Russia and Brazil. It was used in over 3000 consumer items like coffee percolators, brake linings, water pipes, roofings, but in India it is, as cheap roofing, the ‘poor’ man’s material.
With a consumption of 125,000 mt, its use is rising at over 12 per cent annually. Most of it is imported without restriction (OGL) from Canada, which has a no home-use policy, while the rest is illegally mined.
A naturally occurring fibre, asbestos exists in six varieties. Today, mainly white asbestos or crysotile, is the most widely used one. The fibre’s virtual indestructibility and insulation properties made it the ‘wonder’ material of the 20th century but also made it deadly when inhaled. In India business interests seem to have overridden the overwhelming evidence of health effects of the material. Recently in April 2005, the Union minister of state for coal and mines informed Lok Sabha about the possibility of lifting the ban on asbestos mining in light of a study by the Indian Bureau of Mines which claimed that this is a safe activity. Later, India stalled asbestos’s inclusion in UNEP’s Rotterdam Convention, which merely mandates prior informational consent, before hazardous materials are traded.
Health data against asbestos, though, is damning, making the Indian stance more puzzling. The International Agency for Research on Cancer (WHO body) states that all forms of asbestos cause cancer, which can manifest 15 to 40 years after exposure. While workers are at highest risk, even a single fibre inhaled could result in a cancerous condition.
In India, though health data is scarce, it is improving. A recent study carried out at Hindustan Composites in Mumbai reveals that “6,000 workers are directly exposed and nearly 100,000 workers indirectly exposed to asbestos (in India),” and that “...most of the affected workers in past years have either died or have been removed from employment due to lockouts.” The study found that “less than 30 cases of Asbestosis compensated in India among the 100,000 exposed workers.”
Earlier asbestos firms based in the US and Europe were prime players in the asbestos industry in India, but today the industry is run by Indian companies. The shift is mainly owing to international product related liability. Now over 13 large companies and over 650 small operations, employing over 100,000 workers, dominate the scene, the main products being cement asbestos sheets and pipes. They claim that ‘white asbestos’ is ‘safe’ and that the problem can be ‘managed’ through the use of the ‘wet process’ to limit airborne fibres in manufacturing facilites, and the training of construction workers. They recommend that carpenters who saw cement sheets, or building workers who handle sheets should be trained, despite the futility of the task. There have been attempts to stifle public debate. Full page advertisements claiming that asbestos is safe are regularly put out in the main national newspapers and magazines.
Unfortunately, alternatives have not been promoted, though they exist. Existing alternatives include glass fibre, carbon fibre, cotton, organic fibre, man-made mineral fibres and particulate mineral fillers, poly vinyl alcohol, cellulose, and paramid fibres.
Asbestos is a material of the past. Like DDT and PCBs, it held an early promise which soon revealed its bad face. India needs to vie for a sustainable future and not repeat the mistakes of a bygone era.
The writer is director, Toxics Link