An 80-year old UK woman has died as a result of mesothelioma cancer, according to the Swindon Advertister, a UK paper.

Evelyn Pierrepont of Bishopstone had never come into direct contact with any asbestos products while on the job. According to her family, Pierrepont’s jobs included working in a tobacco factory and assembling record players.

Her exposure to asbestos occurred as a child, when she most likely inhaled asbestos dust from her father’s work overalls.

“She told me that her dad would come in after work in his overalls,” said Pierrepont’s daughter, Christine Osman. Pierrepont’s father - Osman’s grandfather - had been a carpenter at Great Western Railway Works.

Pierrepont was diagnosed with mesothelioma in October of 2006, and lost her battle with the disease on January 3, 2007.

The coroner who conducted Pierrepont’s autopsy said that mesothelioma cancer as a result of secondhand exposure “is unusual” but “not unheard of.”

Closer to home, in the asbestos-plagued town of Libby, Montana, for example, many women have been diagnosed with asbestosis or mesothelioma as a result of secondhand exposure. A majority of these women washed work clothes belonging to their father or husband, who were employees at the now-closed W. R. Grace vermiculite mine, and subsequently inhaled asbestos fibers while handling those items.

Due to the long latency period associated with asbestos-related diseases (as many as twenty to fifty years) it is often very difficult for individuals who were indirectly exposed to asbestos to pinpoint when and where their exposure occurred.

In the UK, the rates of asbestos cancer - in certain areas - are far higher than here in the United States. In 2006, UK asbestos guidelines were revamped, and the “Control of Asbestos Regulations” was drafted.

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