Pneumologie 2015; 69(11): 654-661
DOI: 10.1055/s-0034-1393038
Standpunkt
© Georg Thieme Verlag KG Stuttgart · New York

Sozialjuristische und wissenschaftliche Kontroversen sowie Fehlinterpretationen im Kontext mit der weltweiten Asbest-Tragödie – Was ist daraus zu lernen?[*]

Asbestos: Social Legal and Scientific Controversies and Unsound Science in the Context with the Worldwide Asbestos Tragedy – Lessions to be Learned
X. Baur
Institut für Arbeitsmedizin, Charité Universitätsmedizin Berlin, European Society for Occupational and Environmental Medicine, Berlin
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Publikationsverlauf

eingereicht 30. Juli 2015

akzeptiert nach Revision 10. August 2015

Publikationsdatum:
23. September 2015 (online)

Zusammenfassung

8 – 15 % aller Lungenkrebsfälle und nahezu alle Mesotheliome sind asbestbedingt.

Probleme der Berufskrankheiten-Entschädigung ergeben sich aufgrund der teils vom Verordnungsgeber, teils von der Arbeitgeber-Haftversicherung, d. h. den Berufsgenossenschaften, vorgegebenen hohen Hürden der Beweisanforderung. Von letzteren ist besonders die wissenschaftlich widerlegte Forderung des Nachweises einer bestimmten Zahl von Asbestkörpern bzw. -fasern im Lungengewebe relevant. Sie hat sich auch bei einem einflussreichen Pathologieinstitut in den USA etabliert. Dabei wird den sich aus epidemiologischen Studien ergebenden Wahrscheinlichkeiten für den Ursachenzusammenhang jegliche Bedeutung abgesprochen.

Entsprechend negierende Argumentationen finden sich aktuell in Schwellenländern. Dort wird Weißasbest, der wie andere Asbestarten kanzerogen und fibrogen ist, derart effizient propagiert, dass die Verbrauchsmengen z. T. wieder ansteigen.

Über die weltweite Asbest-Tragödie hinaus ist von Bedeutung, dass zumeist geschickt verdeckt, letztendlich in vergleichbarer Weise, bestimmte transnational oder global agierende industrielle Interessengruppen ihre wirtschaftlichen Interessen ähnlich rigoros auf Kosten des Gesundheitsrisikos der Allgemeinheit verfolgen.

Abstract

8 to 15 % of lung cancer cases and nearly all mesothelioma cases are caused by asbestos. Problems in compensation issues refer to high legal as well as insurance barriers in attesting the occupational diseases. Claiming of certain numbers of asbestos bodies or fibers in lung tissue is of special relevance in substantiating legal medical cases. Such evidence, which is disproved by a sound science, is also used by an influential US pathology department. Frequently, also epidemiological evidence with its causal relationships and exposure histories are ignored.

Similar misleading arguments are currently found in industrializing countries where white asbestos which is carcinogenic and fibrogenic like other asbestos types, is efficiently promoted as less harm. As a result, the asbestos consumption is increasing in some of these countries. Beyond the worldwide asbestos tragedy a well-designed strategy of certain transnational or global acting industrial interest groups can be recognized. Their plan, hidden from the public eyes, follows rigorously sole economic interests, while leaving the resulting health harm to the public health systems.

* Univ.-Prof. em. Dr. med. Hans-Joachim Woitowitz zum 80. Geburtstag gewidmet.


 
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