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WEDNESDAY, July 26, 2023 (HealthDay Information) — Employees making the preferred kind of countertop offered in the USA are in danger for probably lethal lung illness, a brand new examine finds.
The danger owes to the tiny particles of mud produced whereas slicing, shaping and sharpening the artificial quartz.
Inhaling the mud causes the identical lung injury, referred to as silicosis, seen for hundreds of years in miners and cutters of pure stone. Engineered stone, nonetheless, is extra harmful due to its excessive focus of silica, present in sandstone, and the polymer resins and dyes added to the artificial quartz, in response to researchers.
“Growing case counts of silicosis amongst stone fabricators during the last 10 years and accelerated development of illness transforms the paradigm of an all-but-previously-forgotten illness within the U.S.,” mentioned lead researcher Dr. Jane Fazio, a pulmonary specialist with UCLA Well being in Los Angeles.
The examine exhibits extreme sickness and untimely loss of life amongst a “notably susceptible group of younger underinsured and sure undocumented Latino immigrant employees,” she mentioned.
The danger was first recognized in Israel in 2012. The primary U.S. case was recognized in Texas, and California is now epicenter of the illness.
For the examine, Fazio’s staff recognized 52 engineered-stone employees with silicosis in California, 51 of whom had been Hispanic immigrants.
Leobardo Segura-Meza, now 27, has been a stone employee for 10 years. Regardless of taking well being precautions by sporting a masks and utilizing dust-reducing instruments, he went to the emergency room with shortness of breath in February 2022 and was identified with silicosis. He has been on an oxygen tank since and may now not assist his spouse and three younger kids, researchers mentioned.
Segura-Meza has been accredited for a lung transplant, however fears he’ll die earlier than that occurs. Two different stone employees died whereas on the ready listing.
“On daily basis I hope that the telephone rings telling me to return to the hospital to get my new lungs,” Segura-Meza mentioned in a College of California, San Francisco information launch.
“Our paper raises the alarm,” researcher Dr. Sheiphali Gandhi, a UCSF pulmonologist, mentioned within the launch. “If we don’t cease it now, we’re going to have a whole lot if not hundreds of extra instances. Even when we stopped it now, we’re going to be seeing these instances for the following decade as a result of it takes years to develop.”
The findings had been printed July 24 in JAMA Inside Medication.
Extra data
The American Lung Affiliation has extra on silicosis.
SOURCE: College of California, San Francisco, information launch, July 24, 2023
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