Mesothelioma & Asbestos

The number of people diagnosed with asbestos caused diseases in the U.S. continues to increase. Experts believe 60,000 mesothelioma deaths will occur between 2010 and 2030.

Industrial Accidents

Work related injuries harm up to 14 million people annually, with harms including traumatic brain injuries, spinal injuries, amputations, burns, and electrocutions. Around 20,000 to 60,000 workers die each year from accidents, toxins, and violence at their jobs.

Product Defects

Millions of consumers and workers are injured each year because of defective products. Defects can occur when a product is designed poorly, when a product is manufactured in a manner that differs from the intended design, or when the product does not contain proper warnings or instructions. Defects can occur in automobiles, pharmaceuticals, medical devices, construction equipment, toys, and other goods.

Nursing Home Abuse

Between 1.5 and 2 million elderly reside in nursing home facilities, with studies revealing that 44% have suffered some form of abuse. Many believe the actual number of residents suffering abuse is much higher. Neglect and abuse may result in serious emotional, physical, and financial harm

Our Experience

Paul & Hanley’s legal team has produced some of the most notable verdicts and highest settlements in the United States. Over 500 of our clients have each obtained in excess of 1 million dollars. Over 250 have recovered multi-million dollar recoveries.

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Is Asbestos Banned in the United States?

NO!

Despite its well documented dangers as a toxic and deadly substance, the use of asbestos in products is not and never has been banned in the United States. Although over 50 countries have successfully banned asbestos, another 200 – including the U.S., Canada, Mexico, India, and Japan – continue to either mine asbestos, buy raw asbestos for remanufacture, or import and sell asbestos-containing products.

The simple fact is that asbestos-containing products are regularly imported, sold, and used throughout the U.S. and continue to endanger the lives of people with whom they come in contact. Despite the emergence of a growing movement to ban asbestos in the U.S., government agencies have issued remarkably few prohibitions regarding the use of asbestos – and even those restrictions did not come without a fight.

In 1989, the Environmental Protection Agency issued the "Asbestos Ban and Phase Out Rule" which sought to gradually implement a ban on U.S. manufacture, importation, processing, and distribution of most all asbestos-containing products. The EPA’s stated rationale for the ban was clear: "Asbestos is a human carcinogen and is one of the most hazardous substances to which humans are exposed in both occupational and non-occupational settings." (54 Fed.Reg. 29,460 at 29,468 (1989).)

Just two years later, in a lawsuit filed by asbestos manufacturers and industry organizations, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals in Louisiana revoked most of the EPA ban. Despite its recognition that "asbestos is a potential carcinogen at all levels of exposure," the appellate court ruled that that the EPA had failed to sufficiently prove that asbestos-containing products posed "unreasonable health risks" such that an asbestos ban was "justified" under the law.

After the Court’s ruling, the ban was reduced to a mere six categories of asbestos-containing products. To date, they remain the only asbestos-containing products banned in the U.S. Those products include:

•Flooring felt
•Rollboard
•Corrugated paper
•Commercial paper
•Specialty paper
•Products that have not historically contained asbestos ("new uses")

The list of asbestos-containing products that are not banned in the U.S., however, is much longer. Those products, among others, include:

•Asbestos-cement corrugated sheet
•Asbestos-cement flat sheet
•Asbestos clothing
•Pipeline wrap
•Roofing felt
•Vinyl-asbestos floor tile
•Asbestos-cement shingle
•Millboard
•Asbestos-cement pipe
•Automatic transmission components
•Clutch facings
•Friction materials
•Disc brake pads
•Drum brake linings
•Brake blocks
•Gaskets
•Non-roofing coatings
•Roof coatings

Ongoing efforts to obtain a total ban on the use of all asbestos in this country continue to date. 

One of the greatest tenets of this country is our professed belief in human rights. It is time we put that belief to work here at home. In the United States, an estimated fifty thousand blue-collar workers die each year from illnesses caused by workplace exposure, according to OSHA. That is an astounding number; yet it is largely unreported and ignored. Blue-collar workers remain what Brodeur once scathingly referred to as "expendable Americans."

~Michael Bowker in "Fatal Deception: The Terrifying True Story of How Asbestos is Killing America 

 

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