One of my previous blog posts was a review of the book “Scared to Death” by Christopher Booker and Richard North. I did not mention that there is a good chapter in there on the subject of the paranoia that developed over asbestos.
Asbestos is now perceived as so dangerous that it is avoided in future building projects and is vigorously removed from houses, schools, hospitals and other buildings. Even products such as Artex which contained asbestos fibres in the 1960s and was used extensively in decorative ceiling plaster is treated as dangerous. For example our house, built in 1963, is full of Artex ceilings.
Now I do have a personal interest in this matter as my father died in 1977 from Mesothelioma, a type of lung cancer, known to be caused by breathing asbestos dust. He probably contracted it from involvement with pipe and boiler lagging during the second world war.
But the book mentioned makes it clear that not all asbestos is dangerous. The danger from Artex is quite minimal so all of you who live in houses of a certain age do not need to panic. But a big industry has developed of charging people large sums to remove asbestos. Most such removal is unnecessary but it’s a typical scare story where popular media inflate the dangers and contractors welcome the income they can enjoy from removing asbestos.
One of the biggest losers from the asbestos scare was the Lloyds of London insurance market and the “Names” who supported it. They had unlimited liability at the time when claims over asbestos arose which effectively destroyed the market and impoverished many of the Names – people who often had no awareness of the risks they were taking. Altogether a disgraceful financial episode.
Read the book mentioned before you waste money on needless building work.
Roger Lawson (Twitter: https://twitter.com/RogerWLawson )
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