On 24 Aug 2004 17:17:59 GMT, (Greg) wrote:

Did they control for smoking?

Since these "studies" are usually driven by the plantiff's lawyer, they usually
try to ignore anything that puts the liability anywhere but in the deep pockets
of the defendant.

(page 86):

"By 1960, 63 scientific papers on the subject of asbestosis had
been done, 11 of which were sponsored by the asbestos industry, the
other 52 coming from hospitals and medical schools. The 11 industry
studies were unanimous in denying that asbestos caused lung cancer and
minimizing the seriousness of asbestosis -a position diametrically
opposite to the conclusions reached in the nonindustry studies.
....The history of industry denials was neatly summarized by David
Ozonoff from Boston University, who served as a witness in asbestos
litigation and describedthe series of defenses used by the asbestos
industry:

'Asbestos doesn't hurt your health. OK, it does hurt your health
but it doesn't cause cancer. OK, asbestos can cause cancer but not out
kind of asbestos. OK, our kind of asbestos can cause cancer, but not
the kind this person got. OK, our kind of asbestos can cause cancer,
but not at the doses to which this person was exposed. OK, asbestos
does cause cancer, and at this dosage, but this person got his disease
from something else, like smoking. OK, he was exposed to our asbestos
and it did cause his cancer, but we did not know about the danger when
we exposed him. OK, we knew about the danger when we exposed him, but
the statute of limitations has run out. OK, the statute of limitations
hasn't run out, but if we're guilty we'll go out of business and
everyone will be worse off. OK, we'll agree to go out of business, but
only if you let us keep part of our company intact, and only if you
limit our liability for the harms we have caused.'


'Trust us, we're experts' (2001)
Sheldon Rampton and John Stauber

Geo