29/09/2008
Record and rising asbestos imports to India will translate to thousands of asbestos-related cancer deaths each year and are already responsible for "a hidden epidemic", according to an expert report published this week. The authors say the report exposes the Indian government's collusion with asbestos stakeholders at home and abroad, and call for an immediate national ban on all asbestos use.

"India's asbestos time bomb," published by a coalition of Asian campaign and research organisations, global union federations and the International Ban Asbestos Secretariat (IBAS), calculates that total asbestos usage in India since 1980 exceeds 6 million tonnes, matching the amount used in the UK in its entire industrial history. India is far and away the world's largest importer of asbestos. "The UK is now in the grip of its largest ever industrial disease epidemic, with between 5,000 and 10,000 estimated to be dying of asbestos cancers every year," commented report editor Laurie Kazan-Allen.

"India, with ineffective regulation on asbestos use, is on the verge of a much larger and more devastating epidemic". Annual imports of asbestos to India now exceed a quarter of a million tonnes, and have climbed rapidly over the last decade. Usage accelerated after the Indian government in 2004 slashed import duty on asbestos. Laurie Kazan-Allen said "politicians and asbestos peddlers should take heed - we aim to see the industry wither and die and its apologists face the courts for knowingly and in the name of profit pushing the world's worst ever industrial killer."

Source: Risk