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crystalline silica and lung cancer

updated fri 25 aug 00

 

Edouard Bastarache on thu 24 aug 00


Hello all,

here is an excellent article on this issue,
that may have worried many ceramicists.

Later,



Edouard Bastarache
Dans / In "La Belle Province"
edouardb@sorel-tracy.qc.ca
http://www.sorel-tracy.qc.ca/~edouardb/


TITLE: Silica, silicosis, and lung cancer: a response to a recent working
group report [In Process Citation]
AUTHORS: Hessel PA; Gamble JF; Gee JB; Gibbs G; Green FH; Morgan WK;
Mossman BT
AUTHOR AFFILIATION: University of Alberta, Edmonton, Canada.
pat.hessel@ualberta.ca
SOURCE: J Occup Environ Med 2000 Jul;42(7):704-20
[MEDLINE record in process]
CITATION IDS: PMID: 10914339 UI: 20371548

ABSTRACT: The relationship between crystalline silica and lung cancer has
been the subject of many recent publications, conferences, and regulatory
considerations. An influential, international body has determined that there
was sufficient evidence to conclude that quartz and cristobalite are
carcinogenic in humans. The present authors believe that the results of
these studies are inconsistent and, when positive, only weakly positive.
Other, methodologically strong, negative studies have not been considered,
and several studies viewed as providing evidence supporting the
carcinogenicity of silica have significant methodological weaknesses. Silica
is not directly genotoxic and is a pulmonary carcinogen only in the rat, a
species that seems to be inappropriate for assessing particulate
carcinogenesis in humans. Data on humans demonstrate a lack of association
between lung cancer and exposure to crystalline silica. Exposure-response
relationships have generally not been found. Studies in which silicotic
patients were not identified from compensation registries and in which
enumeration was complete did not support a causal association between
silicosis and lung cancer, which further argues against the carcinogenicity
of crystalline silica.