subject: Asbestos Survey & Asbestos Removal For Uk Property [print this page] Asbestos Survey & Asbestos Removal For UK Property
It is entirely unbelievable that we spent years installing asbestos in our homes before we realized the dangers we were courting. This article takes a look at the history of asbestos, usage in British homes and what we should be doing about it.
Everybody Is Exposed To The Dangers of Asbestos
The reality is that at one point or another we have all been exposed to asbestos but thankfully not to quantities that will do us any harm. Asbestos was widely used as a construction material in UK homes for over 100 years before we became aware of the dangers.
Asbestos has been mined in Southern Africa for more than a century. Chrysotile from the mines of Swaziland and Zimbabwe was marketed around the globe, while South African mines produced almost all of the worlds amphibole fiber.
The major mines were owned and operated by British firms that in the United Kingdom from 1931 were subject to occupational health and safety legislation. The failure of those companies to apply knowledge of the dangers of asbestos to their Southern African operations saw men, women, and children labor in conditions that would have been unthinkable in Britain. The result has been a legacy of disease and environmental pollution. Personally I saw photo evidence back in the 80s of some of the conditions that the African miners and their families were exposed to. Try to imagine working in an asbestos factory in shorts and no footwear with asbestos dust up as high as your ankles.
Try to visualize the local children playing in the dust like they were building sandcastles on the beach and you will start to get a picture of how things were. Everything in those mining communities was absolutely covered with asbestos dust and it was incredibly shocking to later learn of the consequences of such high levels of exposure.
That was about 30 years ago, now here in the UK in 2010 we have over 20 tradesmen dying each week from asbestos related disease.
Asbestos entered the UK market primarily as a building board with goof flame retardant qualities and some soundproofing attributes. It was also used in old fashioned electric consumer units and even worse it was used widely in electric ovens and hot plates. The first documented death related to asbestos was in 1906. In the early 1900s researchers began to notice a large number of early deaths and lung problems in asbestos mining towns. The first diagnosis of asbestosis was made in the UK in 1924. So the reality is that we still have asbestos in homes and building throughout the UK and we are now well aware of the problems.
Conclusion
If you have any asbestos queries whatsoever you should direct them to the experts. You can book an Asbestos Survey or get costs for Asbestos Removal at Asbestos Supermarket, the UKs fastest growing Price Comparison site for Asbestos Removal.
by: Tom Norris
welcome to Insurances.net (https://www.insurances.net)
