Asbestos Mine Mocked on TV Show by Highlighting Mesothelioma and Other Known Health Hazards Caused by the Toxic Mineral
Once again Jon Stewart’s Daily Show brings the hazards of asbestos into the spotlight. Using satire, the show made fun of the small town of Asbestos, Canada where the Jeffrey Asbestos Mine has been re-activated after receiving a $58 million loan from the Canadian government. On a previous show in December Jon Stewart took a serious tone when he focused on the 911 first-responders and their health issues, including mesothelioma and respiratory diseases, caused by inhaling asbestos and other toxic dust.
The leaders of Canada have been an international focus since agreeing to provide the money to the mine. Advocates from the science and medical fields have criticized the government for ignoring the hazards of asbestos and continuing on this path for economic purposes. The expansion of Jeffrey Mine would create 425 full-time jobs in the town of Asbestos and keep Canada in the asbestos market for 25 years. Mesothelioma, lung cancer, asbestosis and other respiratory diseases have all been linked to the inhalation of airborne asbestos fibers.
In this week’s show, the interviewer says to the president of Jeffrey Mine, Bernard Coulombe, “Does ‘asbestos’ mean something different in French than it does in English? Because in English, it means slow, hacking death.”
Although the show mocked the town, it took a serious tone in the segment focusing on the dangers that could be inflicted on residents in Canada as well as India, where much of the mined asbestos will be shipped. India is known to have weaker worker safety laws and continues to contribute to the growing global mesothelioma burden by failing to admit to the mesothelioma-causing properties of the mineral, according to a study published this year in Environmental Health Perspectives.
The reporter is from India and went on to mock Canada for exporting the deadly asbestos to the country saying it’s messed up “selling them things that are going to kill them. I mean, that’s my family over there.”
Joseph W. Belluck, a partner at Belluck & Fox, LLP, a prominent New York law firm that represents asbestos and mesothelioma victims, commented earlier this year on the Jeffrey Mine operation saying, “It’s outrageous that a government would permit this toxic mineral to be shipped elsewhere, where it can expose another generation to illness.”
The Daily Show has a viewership of over one million TV viewers per episode.
The Daily Show Mocks Asbestos Mine
