RONAR s.r.o. - azbest a likvidácia azbestu

What is asbestos?

Asbestos - "a magical mineral" was often used as a fire-proof insulating material. For many decades this fibre, silicate natural material was used in many industrial areas, especially in the building industry, thanks to its extraordinary properties (resistance to high temperatures, abrasion, oxidation, tensile force and elasticity). The most commonly used asbestos is chrysotile, 150 million tons of which were mined in our country from 1870 to 1992.

Harmfulness of Asbestos

For humans asbestos is dangerous because of its free in-the-air-suspended microscopic fibres. When breathed in these to-the-naked-eye-invisible fibres of the length of 5µ and of the gauge of 3µ get in one’s lungs. Thanks to its solidity and sharpness the fibres are even able to get in the cell walls of lungs lining. Self-cleaning effect of lungs that enables lungs of the human body to get rid of dust, does not work in such case. Asbestos long-term effect on the organism leads to a disease occurrence.

Diseases causes by the exposure to asbestos:

Lung asbestosis (gradual replacement of lung tissue with ligament) – It is accompanied with cough caused by irritation, with coughing out, indefinite pressure inside the chest, gradually worsening dyspnoea and final cardiac and pulmonary insufficiency, lung cancer, mesothelium – a disease of the abdominal cavity lining or gastrointestinal system cancer.

Important:

• A latent period between the beginning of the exposure to asbestos and occurrence of diseases is from 20 to 40 years.
• There is nothing such as a safety level of the exposure to asbestos effects. There is no limit value of the exposure to asbestos set. (It means that there is nothing such as harmless amount of asbestos fibres breathed in.)
• The longer the exposure the higher the risk that the person will be affected by an asbestos-related disease.
• If a heavy smoker works in the environment with the risk of exposure to asbestos, the probability of a bronchus malignant disease is 50 – 90 times higher than for a non-smoker who does not come in contact with asbestos.

FACTS:

• EWG’s (Environmental Research Group headquartered in Washington) analysis predicts that on the basis of the current development within 10 years more than 100,000 people in the U.S.A. will have died of diseases related to asbestos.
• According to British HSE (Health and Safety Executive) the number of deaths related to diseases occurring as the result of the past exposure to asbestos will have increased to 10,000 by the year 2010.
• In Sweden the number of recorded deaths caused by later effects of exposure to asbestos is higher than the overall number of fatal work injuries (statistical data of the European Agency).
• According to WHO – IARC asbestos is classified as No. 1, i.e. a provable carcinogen for humans.
• If a heavy smoker works in the environment with the risk of exposure to asbestos, the probability of a bronchus malignant disease occurrence is 50 – 90 times higher than for a non-smoker who does not come in contact with asbestos.
• In the U.S.A. demolitions of buildings cause high long-term concentrations of asbestos in the environment that remain high several months even.
• In the past asbestos-caused diseases were affecting workers employed in the asbestos industry only. Later on this disease also started to strike people who were not exposed to asbestos based on their occupation.
• Unlike several decades ago when the majority of deaths was occurring amongst workers exposed to asbestos, there currently have been more than a million of people at their workplace and other million of people in their working environment or environment as such exposed to this fire-proof mineral.

What to do when we get in contact with asbestos?

In case that you are in contact with asbestos in you workplace, report this fact to BOZP or to the building administrator. If the asbestos and materials containing asbestos are not handled and there is no threat of asbestos fibre release, there is also no threat of one’s health being damaged.

If you work in building industry or maintenance or if you carry out cleaning services, you can be endangered because of being exposed to the effect of asbestos.

Prior to work initiation, get informed whether there has been any asbestos-presence checking inspection performed. If you have no proof of asbestos not being present, take it as yes. Interrupt works and ask for consultancy, once there is a suspicion of asbestos presence.

On no account the materials containing asbestos are to be handled, do not try to remove them, cut them, drill in them, break or handle them in any other way.

Where can be asbestos found, where do we come in contact with it?

• Walls, partitions (insulating panels in partition walls);
• Building facades, suspended ceilings, building outer sheathing panels;
• Fire-proof spray application on steel structures;
• Insulation on building steel structures;
• Suspended ceiling structures (as a protection against fire in the overhead partings);
• Roofs (mainly as asbestos and cement products otherwise known as eternit);
• Office ceiling beams;
• Decorative tiling and paints;
• Floor tiling, linoleum flooring;
• Boilers with thermal insulation;
• Thermal insulation of heating units and boilers;
• Wiring, doors;
• Water piping and waste water piping systems.

Asbestos was mainly used in thermo-insulating materials, such as:

• Thermo-insulating boards used for building sheathing;
• Fire-proof spray application and painting;
• Electro-insulating materials,
• Fire-proof textile materials.

Asbestos is always here with us," warns Richard Lemen, a doctor and a health consultant for environmental issues and former chief doctor of Health Services of the U.S.A. "We have reduced the rate of exposure to this material, and that is the step in the right direction. However, we have not initiated any educational campaign or a public education campaign regarding public health, in which we would inform people that asbestos still exists and that it is vital to take preventive actions, otherwise they will keep on getting diseases and dying."

In the workplace asbestos is the cancer-causing factor No. 1.