WINNIPEG, Manitoba - Raven Thundersky has lost five family members to asbestos. Five more are ill with asbestos related diseases, and she herself is suffering from asbestosis. But the Canadian government tells her she cannot bring a mesothelioma lawsuit against the company responsible.

Thundersky, an aboriginal woman, is calling for a public inquiry after dropping a lawsuit against the U.S.-based W.R. Grace Company who manufactured the insulation used in her childhood home.

Thundersky spoke at a press conference Friday to announce that if the Canadian government does not call a public inquiry into the human rights abuses that led to her family’s exposure, she will bring her case to The Hague. There, she says, a human rights case could embarrass Canada in front of the whole world.

She said that she had received a call from Indian Affairs Minister Chuck Strahl last month, but that was the extent of the response.

“By the end of March,” Thundersky announced, “if they don’t call a public inquiry, I will go to The Hague.”

Thundersky has been fighting for years to get justice. At issue is Zonolite, asbestos-tainted insulation that was used decades ago. Manufactured of vermiculite from an asbestos-tainted mine in Montana, Zonolite was one of the most popular brands of vermiculite insulation. According to Grace’s records, Zonolite was used in hundreds of thousands of homes in the U.S. and Canada. The material was used in at least 600 First Nation homes beginning in the 1950s. Zonolite is still in over 300,000 Canadian homes.

In the United States, Grace is in the process of working out a bankruptcy settlement that will be acceptable to the courts and to those who are pursuing asbestos lawsuits against the company. Because the company is in bankruptcy, it is protected from further lawsuits in the U.S. The Canadian courts told Thundersky that she can’t sue the company in Canadian courts in 2005.

Thundersky’s sister died of mesothelioma 12 years ago this month. Mesothelioma is a cancer that is linked exclusively to asbestos. Since then, three more close family members have died of mesothelioma and a fourth of asbestosis. Five more of her family members are ill with asbestos-related diseases, and she has been diagnosed with mesothelioma.

Thundersky says that forty-six bags of Zonolite were used in the attic of her family home back in 1964 when she was a little girl. The choice of insulation used in the family home, she says, was made by the Indian agent for the government. She believes that the environmental and health issues are complicated by human rights abuses related to federal policies of the Canadian diet from that era.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, February 27th, 2008 at 5:44 pm and is filed under Asbestos Exposure, Asbestos Litigation. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS feed. Responses are currently closed, but you trackback from your own site.