Claris Law Legal Blogging Community

Editor: M. Brandon Smith
Profession: Attorney at Law

Category: Asbestos News

For many patients like Ralph Blevins, being diagnosed with asbestosis, a deadly form of lung disease, comes as a complete shock due to the lack of knowledge and discussions of the ill fated effects of working around and with asbestos. His story of developing the condition, nearly 45 years later, is one that is all to common for those who have been exposed to asbestos for any significant period of time. For more information on Mr. Blevins' story, read this well written article recently published in The Salt Lake Tribune: "Asbestos dangers remained hidden for decades"

Many nights, Ralph Blevins' chest hurts too much to sleep. He can only take so many pain pills, so much sleep medicine. So, he props himself upright on a living room easy chair to make breathing easier.

For a long time, Blevins could not figure out what made him ill. Then, 45 years after leaving a $1.95-an-hour job he'd worked for just six months, Blevins found out that the dusty ore he handled in a downtown Salt Lake City processing plant was heavily polluted with an especially toxic form of asbestos. He believes the thick dust at Intermountain Vermiculite gave him asbestosis, a deadly lung disease.

"There's no way of making it better," says Blevins. "There's no cure."

No one told Blevins he was in danger then. No one contacted him years later to explain. And there is every reason to believe other Utahns are in the dark, too. Dangerous vermiculite from a Libby, Mont., mine was a popular attic insulation, cement additive and soil conditioner used by gardeners in Utah and worldwide.