Life and death in Kuruman's asbestos hell

Death lives in a string of villages outside Kuruman in the Northern Cape.

Ten years after asbestos mining was halted in South Africa, people living in the contaminated mining belt continue to be killed by the mineral. Many are falling prey to an aggressive, incurable cancer that eventually squashes the lungs and makes breathing difficult.

Children walk to school along contaminated roads, they run in contaminated playing fields and many still live in contaminated homes.

In 2009, a municipal report on asbestos exposure said that more than 30 schools were "highly contaminated" either by the soil on the school premises, or by the building material used. It recommended that these schools be moved or rehabilitated. To date, only two have been relocated.

The mesothelioma cancer continues to claim lives - and is increasingly affecting younger people who have never set foot in the mines.

Dipitso Sechudi, 19, attends one of the "high-risk" schools, Khiba Junior Secondary.

At first, Sechudi would cough and then his nose would bleed. In 2011, his lungs were scanned - and doctors found asbestos fibres in both of them.

"My chest becomes painful when I cough and the last nosebleed I had was three days ago," he said. Now he risks developing mesothelioma.

Judas Mopalami, 41, from Batlharos in Kuruman, was diagnosed with the cancer on Tuesday, just 10 days after he had buried his older brother, Johannes, who had been killed by mesothelioma.

Mopalami is now being screened by the trusts responsible for helping victims.

Mopalami grew up close to two asbestos mines and said he started having lung problems around April 2011.

As a youngster, he and his friends had played in asbestos waste dumps. "I only found out about its dangers when I was in Grade 10 when the mines started closing," he said. "I'm not bitter. I can't be bitter as this disease is with me now, but I do realise that it's going to get rid of us all."

Two funds, the Asbestos Relief Trust and the Kgalagadi Relief Trust, were set up in 2003 and 2006 after lawyer Richard Spoor spearheaded an unprecedented legal battle that compelled mining companies to pay millions in compensation to victims of asbestos-related diseases.

The parties reached an out-of-court settlement and former mineworkers and communities living in the vicinity of the Gencor, Griqualand Exploration and Finance Company and African Chrysotile Asbestos Limited mines between 1965 and 1988 are compensated by the Asbestos trust if they are diagnosed with asbestos-related illnesses. The Kgalagadi trust compensates individuals who contracted asbestos-related diseases while employed between 1952 and 1981 at the Kuruman Cape Blue and Daniëlskuil Cape Blue asbestos mines.

The trusts were started with funds totalling R700-million and have received about 14500 claims from former mineworkers and community members.

Since 2003, more than R250-million has been paid to 3640 claimants and the trusts have compensated about 245 people diagnosed with mesothelioma.

Environmental Affairs Department spokesman Albi Modise said the Department of Mineral Resources was responsible for the rehabilitation of the mining areas and had been "proactive in determining what needs to be done for the remediation of secondary asbestos contamination".

Despite numerous requests, the Department of Mineral Resources declined to answer Sunday Times questions - which included requests for details of rehabilitation in the area and concerns about the standards of the rehabilitation work already completed.

Asbestos Relief Trust chairman Piet van Zyl said various criteria were used when considering claims, including a claimant's work history in the region and medical condition.

"There was so much contamination before the 1950s because there were so many mines operating ... We had to take into account the general contamination, and for that reason we can accept liability or responsibility for environmental exposure for people who lived within 10km of that vicinity."

Van Zyl said the trust "continuously" reviewed its criteria using new research and information and would adjust the rules if necessary to enable it to help more victims.

When asked why only about a third of claims were successful, Phiroshaw Camay of the Kgalagadi Relief Trust said some claimants had not worked for the mines covered by the trust.

But, Van Zyl said, the asbestos trust took "full responsibility" for those suffering from mesothelioma and other asbestos-related lung cancer.

Dr Danuta Kielkowski, deputy director of the National Cancer Registry, said mesothelioma in people from the affected areas in the Northern Cape was not diagnosed early enough.

"Or they come so late that before diagnosis is made they die in hospital," she said.

Mesothelioma "kills people within 12 months of clear symptoms", Kielkowski said, and there is no cure.

She warned that the number of mesothelioma cases was increasing and that the cancer could occur up to 40 years after exposure. "I would expect rising cases for the next 20 years."

What is mesothelioma?

It is an aggressive and incurable cancer that occurs on the outer surface of the lungs or the abdomen. It is caused by exposure to asbestos, usually from breathing in fibres.

The cancer starts as a weeping of the lung surface, causing pleural effusion (excess fluid), and progresses to small nodules that coalesce into a large, thick sheet of growth that envelops and squeezes the lungs. It causes pain, breathlessness and weakness..

The time latency between breathing in the asbestos and the development of the disease is typically more than 20 years. The number of fibres required to initiate mesothelioma can be relatively low, so people who are environmentally or occasionally exposed to asbestos are also at risk.

Early recognition of the cause of the pleural effusion is key to good medical and palliative management. - SOURCE: University of Cape Town public health specialist Dr Jim te Water Naude, medical manager of the Asbestos Relief Trust, and Professor Anthony Linegar, a specialist thoracic surgeon affiliated to the University of the Free State

Measuring the hazard overhead

THE standard township four-room houses built by the South African government in the 1950s have roofs made of corrugated sheets - a mixture of cement and asbestos. Professor James Phillips from the National Institute of Occupational Health conducted a study to determine the measure of environmental exposure in some of these homes in Soweto.

Phillips, who collected air samples from 61 houses in Diepkloof, Em deni and Mapetla , found that there was no significant exposure to asbestos for those living there.

He said, though, that caution had to be taken when the asbestos sheets were handled when people carried out repairs or renovations. "The use of power tools, in particular, may liberate asbestos fibres from the asbestos cement," he said. - Isaac Mahlangu