Timeline of Mesothelioma Claims
Malignant Mesothelioma has been linked to workplace asbestos exposure.
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If you or a family member has been diagnosed with Mesothelioma or an Asbestos-related disease, we are here to help you file a Mesothelioma claim.
Call our Mesothelioma Toll Free Helpline at 888.640.0914 and get help today!
24 Hour Live Chat Available >>> See Chat button on right side of page.
We can usually tell within a few minutes whether we can help you, and if we can’t, maybe direct you to someone who can. We are always accessible by phone, email, and online chat.
We are always available to answer your questions with a phone call and will always keep you informed. We will do everything we can to ensure that you receive the highest compensation for your injuries.
If you have a legal question about a Mesothelioma lawsuit, you don’t have to come into our office. Call us, and you’ll speak directly to a lawyer, and if a lawyer is not available, They will return your call as quickly as possible.
Asbestos History
Pre 1860:
In ancient Rome, asbestos fibers were uses to make clothing flame retardant.
In Greece, the fibers were used to make other textiles.
In Persia, garments were prized for their ability to be cleaned over a fire, instead of with water.
In China, Marco Polo describes similar items that were “washed” by being dropped into flames.
1860: Asbestos had appeared again across the United States and Canada, mostly used as insulation within buildings.
1879: The first commercial asbestos mine appeared in Canada, just outside of Quebec.
1890s Asbestos, which previously had few industrial uses, becomes a raw material for large manufacturing industries, exposing large numbers of workers to asbestos dust for the first time. Asbestos-caused disease often develops decades after a person was first exposed. As a result, it was not until the early 1900s that large numbers of workers developed symptoms.
1899: First published case of asbestos lung scarring caused by asbestos exposure.
1890 – 1909: By the turn of the century, asbestos use was much more common: flame-resistant coatings, concrete, flooring, roofing, acid resistant materials, and lawn furniture all had asbestos components. The appearance of asbestos in late 19th and early 20th century newspapers was relatively limited. In many cases, reporting on asbestos was limited to its discovery or its uses in antiquity.
1917: Dr. Henry Pancoast of (University of Pennsylvania Medical School) finds lung scarring in X-rays of asbestos-factory workers.
1918: A Prudential Insurance Company official notes that life insurance companies will not cover asbestos workers, because of the “health-injurious conditions of the industry.”
1922: Louis Dublin, a statistician for the Metropolitan Life Insurance Company, writes that asbestos workers are at risk of injury to the lungs.
1924: a doctor in England recognized the pattern of illness and made the first diagnosis of asbestos cancer. Dr. W.E. Cooke publishes an article in British Medical Journal describing the death of a person who had been exposed to asbestos.
1927: First workmen’s compensation disability claim for asbestosis upheld by Massachusetts Industrial Accident Board.
1930: Dr. Edward Merewether publishes first clinical examination of workers in England’s asbestos industry. He found that 1 out of 4 was suffering from asbestosis. He found that workers who suffered asbestos exposure would not show signs of injury for many years and workers exposed to asbestos should be informed and warned in order to give them a “sane appreciation of the risk”.
1930: A British medical journal offers the first comprehensive look at the clinical effects of asbestosis and recommends safety measures.
1930: Major asbestos company Johns-Manville produces report, for internal company use only, about medical reports of asbestos worker fatalities.
1932: Letter from U.S. Bureau of Mines to asbestos manufacturer Eagle-Picher states: “It is now known that asbestos dust is one of the most dangerous dusts to which man is exposed.”
1933: First American case report of asbestosis in an insulation worker.
1933: Metropolitan Life Insurance Company doctors find that 29% of the workers at one Johns-Manville plant are suffering from asbestosis. Johns-Manville settles lawsuits by 11 employees on the condition that the lawyer for the employees agrees that he will not bring any new actions against Johns-Manville.
1934: Researchers report cases of asbestosis and lung cancer among asbestos factory workers, construction workers, shipyard workers, boiler workers, custodians and insulators. Many of them had less than s6 months of exposure to asbestos.
1934: Officials of two large asbestos companies, Johns-Manville and Raybestos-Manhattan, edit an article about the diseases of asbestos workers written by a Metropolitan Life Insurance Company doctor. The changes minimize the danger of asbestos dust.
1935: Johns-Manville and Raybestos Manhattan instruct the editor of Asbestos Magazine to publish nothing about asbestosis.
1936: A group of asbestos companies agree to sponsor research on the health effects of asbestos dust, but require that the companies have complete control over the disclosure of the results.
1937: Roy Bonsib, Chief Safety Inspector for the Standard Oil Company of New Jersey, documents illnesses such as asbestosis and analyzes the dust-creating potential of installing and removing asbestos insulation.
1937-38: The Industrial Hygiene Digest at the Industrial Hygiene Foundation includes 2 articles about industrial types of cancer by workers working with asbestos.
1940 to 1979: Approximately 27.5 million Americans are exposed to asbestos.
1942: An Owens Corning corporate memorandum refers to “medical literature on asbestosis . . . [and] scores of publications in which the lung and skin hazards of asbestos are discussed.”
1943: First case of a Mesothelioma-like tumor reported.
1942 or 1943: The president of Johns-Manville says that the managers of another asbestos company were “a bunch of fools for notifying employees who had asbestosis.” When one of the managers asks, “do you mean to tell me you would let them work until they dropped dead?” The response is reported to have been, “Yes. We save a lot of money that way.” Testimony of Charles H. Roemer, Deposition taken April 25, 1984, Johns-Manville Corp., et al v. the United States of America,
1944: Metropolitan Life Insurance Company finds 42 cases of asbestosis among 195 asbestos miners.
1944: The Journal of the Medical Association reports that asbestos is one of the “agents known or suspected to cause occupational cancer.”
1948: The American Petroleum Institute’s Medical Advisory Committee, whose members include oil giants, received a summary of a paper in which the chief pathologist for E.I. DuPont De Nemours & Co. suggested that the industry “aim at the complete elimination of the exposure” to asbestos.
1949: Encyclopedia Britannica lists asbestos as a cause of occupational and environmental cancer. The Journal of the American Medical Association concurs.
1951: Asbestos companies remove all references to cancer before allowing publication of research they sponsor concerning exposure to asbestos.
1952: Dr. Kenneth Smith, Johns-Manville medical director, recommends (unsuccessfully) that warning labels be attached to products containing asbestos. Later Smith testifies: “It was a business decision as far as I could understand . . . the corporation is in business to provide jobs for people and make money for stockholders and they had to take into consideration the effects of everything they did and if the application of a caution label identifying a product as hazardous would cut into sales, there would be serious financial implications.”
1953: National Gypsums safety director wrote to the Indiana Division of Industrial Hygiene, recommending that acoustic plaster mixers wear respirators “because of the asbestos used on the product.” Another company official notes that the letter was “full of dynamite,” and urges that the letter be retrieved before reaching its destination. A memo from those files notes that the company “succeeded in stopping” the letter which “will be modified.”
1955: A major study demonstrates that asbestos workers are 10 times as likely as the general population to contract and an asbestos-related disease.
1960: Study confirms reports that asbestos exposure causes Mesothelioma; Study included children and wives of asbestos workers who contracted Mesothelioma.
1964: Dr. Irving Selikoff publishes a study of asbestos workers in the Journal of the American Medical Association, proving that people who work with asbestos-containing materials have an abnormal incidence of asbestosis, lung cancer, and mesothelioma.
1966: The first lawsuit involving an asbestos injury is filed in Beaumont. The jury finds for the defendants. A second suit is filed in 1969, and this time the plaintiff, Clarence Borel, wins his case and is awarded $79,000.
1966: Raybestos-Manhattan official writes: “We feel that the recent unfavorable publicity over the use of asbestos fibers in many different kinds of industries has been a gross exaggeration of the problems. There is no data available to either prove or disprove the dangers of working closely with asbestos.”
1969: An asbestos lawsuit is filed and is decided in favor of the plaintiff and upheld in subsequent appeals courts. It was a landmark case, the first in the nation that recognized a manufacturer’s duty to warn about the dangers of asbestos. Within 10 years, more than 16,000 asbestos and Mesothelioma cases would be filed in American courts.
1971: First OSHA asbestos-exposure standard issued. The U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration set the first standards for workplace asbestos exposure.
1973: The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) bans spray-on asbestos insulation as an air pollution hazard.
1977: Lawyers for injured workers obtain the Sumner Simpson papers, which show that the companies had suppressed information about the danger of asbestos for at least 40 years.
1977: The first bill to limit the product liability of asbestos companies is introduced in Congress.
1978 Judge rules there had been “a conscious effort by the [asbestos] industry in the 1930s to downplay or arguably suppress, the dissemination of information to employees and the public for fear of the promotion of lawsuits.”
1979: U.S. EPA announces intention to issue rule that bans all uses of asbestos.
1982: Johns-Manville files for bankruptcy protection. Johns-Manville, the leading U.S. asbestos producer, files for Chapter 11 bankruptcy. Over the next two decades, more than 70 other companies follow suit.
1986: OSHA tightens asbestos-exposure standard.
1989 and 1991: In 1989, the United States Environmental Protection Agency bans asbestos and most of its uses.
1991: asbestos companies win a federal lawsuit which overturns the EPAs asbestos ban.
1991: Symposium entitled “The Third Wave of Asbestos Disease” is held. It shows conclusively that asbestos already in place in buildings across the U.S. poses a major public health hazard.
1994: OSHA tightens asbestos-exposure standard.
1994: Congress amends the U.S. Bankruptcy Code to allow companies in asbestos-related bankruptcies to create special trust funds to pay future victims. The change helps companies rid themselves of asbestos liability but also makes it easier for plaintiff Mesothelioma lawyers to win settlements for many cases.
1999: The Florida Supreme Court rules that Owens Corning willfully withheld information about the dangers of working with the company’s asbestos products. The Florida Supreme Court describes it as a “blatant disregard for human safety involving large numbers of people put at life-threatening risks.” As stated, the above actions by these companies are just a small sample of the many actions by companies using asbestos which did so in disregard of the safety of their employees and other innocent victims. Companies, who so frivolously ignored the health of the public and their own employees, are the targets of our litigation.
2002: The RAND Institute for Civil Justice estimates the number of asbestos lawsuits at 600,000. Estimates of total liability range from $200–250 billion.
2005: Ohio has lead in halting asbestos lawsuits.
2005: Company charged in nearly 200 deaths.
2006: The U.S. Senate defeats an asbestos bill that would have created a $140 billion trust fund to compensate victims of asbestos diseases like Mesothelioma. Opponents of the bill say it didn’t fairly compensate victims, instead favoring the interests of large corporations.
2008: Congress introduces the bill H.R. 6903, the “Bruce Vento Ban Asbestos and Prevent Mesothelioma Act of 2008,” designed to amend the Toxic Substances Control Act to reduce health risks from asbestos-containing projects and to support public asbestos education initiatives. The bill is named after Bruce Vento, a former politician who died of Mesothelioma in 2001.
2010: Final decree issued in the Owens Corning bankruptcy case.
Malignant Mesothelioma
Malignant Mesothelioma is a rare form of cancer that affects the lining of the lungs, abdomen, heart, and major organs in the body. Mesothelioma cancer cells are in the sac lining the chest (pleura) or the abdomen (peritoneum). There are about 3,000 new fatal Mesothelioma cases diagnosed each year in the U. S. If you are experiencing any Mesothelioma symptoms, you should contact a doctor immediately.
Diagnosed With Mesothelioma?
If you or a family member has a malignant Mesothelioma diagnosis, you are going to have a lot of questions about living with Mesothelioma and what legal options you have against asbestos manufacturers and asbestos companies for your asbestos exposure. Mesothelioma is a seriously deadly disease. According to the American Cancer Society, with the average survival time for people with Mesothelioma is 4-18 months.
Call TOLL-FREE 888.640.0914 now to talk with a live Mesothelioma Counselor that can answer your questions and give you the peace of mind that you need.
Family Member Died From Mesothelioma?
If you have a family member that has died from Mesothelioma cancer, immediately consult with an experienced Mesothelioma lawyer about your available compensation from asbestos trust funds.
It is VERY IMPORTANT that you file your Mesothelioma claim within your states Statute of Limitations.
We have seen many families lose their right to file a lawsuit because their Statute of Limitations had expired while they were grieving. Although there is a tremendous mourning period with the loss of a loved one, it is crucial not to let your Statute of Limitations expire before filing a Mesothelioma lawsuit. In most states, the Statute of Limitations is 2-3 years. Some states have a 6-year Statute of Limitations.
Mesothelioma Latency Period
Mesothelioma has a long latency period of 10-50 years. Many Veterans, Shipyard Workers, Construction Workers, Power Plant Workers, Mill Workers, Steel Workers, Railroad Workers, Pipefitters, Insulators, Electricians, Carpenters, Welders, Auto Mechanics, Veterans, Factory Workers, and laborers are living in the early stages of a variety of asbestos-related diseases. Many Mesothelioma lawyers will not accept asbestosis, asbestos lung cancer, pleural plaques, pleural thickening, colon cancer, and esophageal cancer cases.
There are More Than 30 Billion Dollars Set Aside for Mesothelioma and Asbestos Victims in Asbestos Bankruptcy Trusts
Need a Mesothelioma Lawyer?
If you or a family member has a Mesothelioma diagnosis or an asbestos-related disease, we can help you start a Mesothelioma lawsuit against asbestos companies responsible for your injuries. Our experienced nationwide Mesothelioma lawyers will come to you.
Call our Mesothelioma Toll Free Helpline at 888.640.0914 and get help today!
24 Hour Live Chat Available >>> See Chat button on right side of the page.
We can usually tell within a few minutes whether we can help you, and if we can’t, maybe direct you to someone who can. We are always accessible by phone, email, and online chat.
We are always available to answer your questions with a phone call and will always keep you informed. We will do everything we can to ensure that you receive the highest compensation for your injuries.
If you have a legal question about a Mesothelioma lawsuit, you don’t have to come into our office. Call us, and you’ll speak directly to a lawyer, and if a lawyer is not available, They will return your call as quickly as possible.
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