THE GOVERNMENT will on Monday begin testing asbestos miners and their families for a form of cancer caused by exposure to asbestos fibres suspended in the air, according to Parliamentary testimony yesterday and a Health Ministry physician.
Akel Deputy Yiannakis Thoma tabled the issue yesterday in the House Labour Committee, noting that in 1980, 1,400 asbestos workers had been examined and nothing suspicious found.
"From 1980, of the 1,400 miners who were examined then and nothing found, dozens have died from asbestos-related disease," Thoma said, including his uncle Stelios Thoma.
Thoma said tests on his uncle showed he had pure asbestos fibres in his lungs. He said his uncle never worked anywhere else except the Amiantos asbestos mine, so his fatal asbestosis could not have come from anywhere else.
Also dead of asbestosis was PEO trade union official Stelios Kyprianou, of Pelendri, who only visited miners and inspected mine conditions, Thoma said, adding: "I personally know five individuals (from the mine) whose disease is at an advanced stage."
Dr Andreas Georgiou, of the Health Ministry’s public health service, confirmed that "starting on Monday we… will start testing for cancer of the lungs" among asbestos mine workers and their families.
"We are going to look at those who were exposed to asbestos in previous years to see if the mine’s suspended (asbestos) particles in the air have had any harmful effect" on them, he said.
"The trade unions demanded this," he said, adding he had testified concerning the testing yesterday before the House Labour and Social Insurance Committee.
Georgiou said there were 30 villages near the now-defunct Amiantos Mine, the island’s sole asbestos mine; miners would be tested, as would members of their families, since the miners could have brought asbestos fibres home in their clothing.
He said he had "written to the heads of the (30) villages, and 470 people responded," agreeing to be tested at Kyperounda Hospital for the deadly pneumoconiosis asbestosis. Sadly, he said, "I did a study in 1980… and 1,460 persons responded." Many of them have since died.
Georgiou noted a three-and-a-half-year-old change in Cyprus law – removing occupational health jurisdiction from the Health to the Labour Ministry – opened Cyprus to the prospect of huge lawsuits for asbestosis and other work-related illnesses, especially the closer Cyprus gets to EU membership.
"The most appropriate thing," he said, is to transfer occupational health authority back to the Health Ministry from the Labour Ministry. "When we enter the European Union, by law we have to have this," he said.
"The only thing the European Union is concerned about is occupational medicine. Nothing else," he said. "They don’t say you have to have surgeons, or internal medicine or ENT specialists, or cardiologists. They say you must have occupational physicians," he said.
Georgiou said the Labour Ministry had had power over occupational medicine for three-and-a-half years and "they have never used it to appoint doctors, because it’s impossible to have doctors in the Labour Ministry."
"No doctor will accept (a post there), because the law says – Article 40, paragraph three – that doctors there will work under the jurisdiction and guidance of the chief inspector of factories, who is an engineer… No doctor will ever accept that," he said.
"It’s a very serious thing," he said, "because anybody who is going to sue the government for not having had access to occupational medicine is going to win money," Georgiou said.
"Because for three-and-a-half years, we have people who have been exposed to asbestos (without any medical help). We have industrial deafness to persons who are exposed to heavy noise. We have occupational asthma. We have radiation – so many things," Georgiou said.
"Who is going to pay these people, who for three-and-a-half years have been heavily exposed (to industrial hazards) without any medical examination? Who is going to pay the money when they sue?" he asked.
"I think at the end, this Republic will be heavily exposed to legal action and lawsuits by persons," Georgiou warned.
