British Hospitals Unsafe

Reprint from the Leeds Today Evening Post:

A MAJOR safety alert has been sparked at Leeds General Infirmary following the discovery of deadly asbestos.
Around 30 plant rooms – which house boilers, air conditioning systems and other maintenance services – have now been classified a "red risk" following a re-inspection of the sprawling site.
And a risk assessment will be carried out on staff who have worked in the areas and may have been exposed to the fibres.
In previous tests one of the plant rooms at the LGI was given the all clear as completely free from the material and people had returned to work there.
However, a further "routine" inspection carried out this weekend unearthed significant amounts of asbestos.
Now another 30 rooms have been switched from amber to red risk, as a precautionary measure.
Today hospital bosses were at pains to stress that the rooms are not in public areas and neither patients nor visitors should be affected.
However, staff have raised concerns about working in the areas and about the long-term health implications.
Last year, the YEP revealed how maintenance crews were being paid just 17p an hour extra to work in the affected areas. Staff now having to use the areas will also have to follow further strict guidelines.
An in-depth study – expected to take up to three weeks – is now being carried out by the hospital's asbestos team in conjunction with specialist contractors.
A spokesman for the Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust, which runs the LGI, said: "Our main concern is to assess the potential risk to staff who may have worked in this plant room and provide them with the appropriate advice and support. As all of the areas concerned are restricted, we are confident that patients and the public are unaffected."
Asbestos is an extremely hazardous material, the dust of which has been linked with the lung disease mesothelioma.
Both LGI and St James's Hospital – dating back to the Victorian era – are thought to contain large quantities of the material which was used routinely in buildings of that age.
18 February 2005
Deaths from mesothelioma, an asbestos-related lung cancer, will peak within ten years in the UK and then fall to a much lower level, according to new figures published in this week's British Journal of Cancer.

Mesothelioma is a type of cancer in the lining of the lungs or the lining of the abdomen. It is thought that the majority of cases are the result of exposure to asbestos, but the disease can take up to sixty years to develop.

Mortality in Britain rose from 153 deaths in 1968 to 1,848 in 2001 and is still increasing, but the new study suggests the rate will begin to decline by 2015.