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Doctoring asbestos study to promote its use
Gopal Krishna
Documents unearthed under the Right to Information Act reveal how industry added Rs. 16 lakh to the government’s Rs. 44 lakh to commission a study by the National Institute of Occupational Health (NIOH) to “specifically indicate how technology has made working conditions [in asbestos factories] better.”
The study is titled “Implementation of Rotterdam Convention on Prior Informed Consent Procedures — Study of Health Hazards/Environment Hazards Resulting from the Use of Chrysotile Variety of Asbestos in the Country.” Chrysotile is popularly known as white asbestos.
Acknowledging the hazards from asbestos, Anbumani Ramadoss, Union Health Minister, informed Parliament: “…regarding asbestos, a lot of poor people use it. As regards the issue pertaining to banning of asbestos, as a health issue, the government certainly has not taken it up. It is an occupational hazard and people working in the asbestos factories are prone to lung cancer, but we are taking the enormity of the usage of asbestos. Mostly, poor people in the villages use it. Hence, I cannot take a decision on this issue.”
Deadly fibre
The enormity of usage is no excuse to expose Indian workers and citizens to this deadly fibre. Without amendment to the existing import policy by the Union Ministry of Commerce and Industry for white asbestos, its consumption pattern is unlikely to change.
The study that has now been exposed through the Right to Information is supposed to be presented at the next meeting of the Chemical Review Committee of the Rotterdam Convention to rationalise its third veto against the U.N. action on white asbestos. It will also form the basis for India’s domestic policy on the continued use of asbestos.
The next conference of the Parties to the Rotterdam Convention will be held from October 27 to 31, 2008 in Rome. Chrysotile asbestos will be on the agenda of Fourth Conference of Parties (COP-4) as was agreed at COP-3. This treaty, a result the efforts of the United Nations, came into force in February 2004. The text of the Convention was adopted in Rotterdam, the Netherlands. The Indian government, irrespective of the ruling party, has consistently colluded with asbestos interests.
The COP-3 of Rotterdam Convention held in Geneva, Switzerland, in October 2006 failed to bring the Prior Informed Consent (PIC) Treaty to apply to chrysotile (white asbestos), a known human carcinogen that represents 94 per cent of world’s asbestos.
Although 95 per cent of the countries sought its inclusion, the COP-3 failed to list this and the decision to include it has been proposed in COP-4 in 2008. The Indian delegation has consistently argued that the science behind the recommendation to list chrysotile asbestos was not categorical.
The minutes of the Review Committee obtained recently through the Right to Information Act, dated December 19, 2006, read: “The report will be finalised after due discussions with the asbestos industry.” Another meeting minutes, dated April 18, 2007, report that “...the results of the study which was under way could not be shared [with public] till the same was finalised.” Clearly, a scientific study that is finalised after discussions with the corporate interests is grossly conflict of interest ridden and deserves to be scrapped.
As per data released by the U.N. Statistics Division, India imported about 306,000 tonnes of asbestos in 2006. Of which, 152,820 tonnes was imported from Russia and 63,980 tonnes from Canada.
Made-to-order science
The rising consumption is a result of a made-to-order science that gets exposed by the documents that show how the Union Ministry of Chemicals, acting in collusion with the asbestos industry, is manufacturing science to back its pre-determined position to fight global regulation on the killer fibre by reiterating that ‘controlled and safe use’ of white asbestos is acceptable both to the white asbestos industry and the Indian government.
Dr. Barry Castleman, an expert on asbestos who was in India in December 2007, commented: “Anyone who says there’s a controlled use of asbestos in the Third World is either a liar or a fool.”
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