Asbestos Products

Sheetrock

Sheetrock may be one of the most widely used materials in the building industry. Prior to the 1980s, much of the sheetrock used in building homes and business buildings contained asbestos for its protective and fire retardant properties. It's been estimated that there are millions of homes across the U.S. whose walls are sheathed with sheetrock that contains asbestos. While that sheetrock does not present a health hazard as long as the walls are intact, any damage to those walls can shed asbestos dust into the air where it can be inhaled and may cause health problems that include a relatively rare but deadly cancer known as mesothelioma.

While mesothelioma is most often diagnosed in those who worked with asbestos laden products daily for many years, there are also many cases where mesothelioma resulted from much lesser exposures to asbestos dust. There are even cases where exposure to asbestos has been traced back to a single, intense short-term exposure, such as one might have in remodeling a room in their own home. If you were exposed to high concentrations of asbestos fibers in the air over as short a period of time as a few hours or days, you may have inhaled asbestos fibers that lodged in your lungs or the lining around your heart or abdomen, and are simply biding their time.

As melodramatic as that may sound, there have been cases where mesothelioma resulted from very short term exposure to asbestos - the kind of exposure you might get if you tore down walls in your home to open up the floor plan, or replaced existing sheetrock with new wall facing. If you worked in the demolition, renovation or remodeling industry as little as twenty to twenty five years ago, even as a summer job, you were very likely exposed to excessively high levels of airborne asbestos. Your risk of developing mesothelioma is dramatically increased.

What sort of activities might have exposed you to asbestos dust? Nearly any remodeling, renovation or demolition in a home that was built between about 1900 and 1980 that created dust probably exposed you to asbestos dust. In addition to sheetrock on the walls, asbestos was used in joint compound, floor adhesives, paneling adhesives, pipe compounds, floor tiles and acoustic plaster. Remember those textured and patterned ceilings and walls that were so popular in the 1960s and 1970s? The plaster used for that texturing and decorative work often contained asbestos. If you sanded those walls or ceilings, the resulting dust was loaded with asbestos.

Today, renovators and remodelers are expected to comply with specific guidelines for safe handling of asbestos containing materials. While the dangers were widely known among asbestos industry management since at least the 1920s, the warnings about safe handling of asbestos containing materials didn't filter down to the general public and workers who worked with those products until the late 1970s. If you worked in demolition, remodeling or renovation before 1980, or if you have remodeled or worked on homes built prior to 1980 without following EPA guidelines for minimizing the chance of inhaling or ingesting asbestos dust, you have an increased chance or developing mesothelioma. Many of the newest cases of mesothelioma are being diagnosed among people who worked in remodeling and demolition trades prior to 1980.

If you have been diagnosed with mesothelioma, or suspect that you may have been exposed to asbestos dust from sheetrock or other construction materials, you may have a legal right to compensation. There are many lawyers who specialize in evaluating, negotiating and litigating complaints arising from exposure to asbestos. If you believe that you were exposed and have since become ill with mesothelioma, contact a mesothelioma lawyer to find out more about compensation for your asbestos related illness.

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