A Worn-Out Welcome

When Iceland became the first country to ban most forms of asbestos in 1983,1 global use hovered around 4.3–4.7 million metric tons per year.2 Twenty-five years later, with several dozen countries now implementing some form of ban,1 that number had dropped to 2.1 million metric tons.3 Today, while demand has plummeted in most developed countries, it continues to rise in those countries now rapidly industrializing. This is the backdrop for the Collegium Ramazzini’s renewal4 of its 1999 call5 for a global ban on the mining and use of asbestos, which joins a growing chorus from national and international science, health, and labor organizations seeking to ban the mineral worldwide once and for all. “We’re encouraged by how many countries now ban asbestos, but when you line up those that do not, including the United States, they encompass the majority of the population in the world,” says Joseph LaDou, director of the International Center for Occupational Medicine at the University of California, San Francisco, an emeritus fellow of the Collegium Ramazzini, and lead author of “The Case for a Global Ban on Asbestos” in this issue of EHP.6 “This problem of asbestos continues to persist where there is the most vulnerable population and the least governmental regulation and enforcement.”