British Court Asbestos Ruling is an American (Company’s) Dream
By Michelle Logsdon - December 19, 2001In recent months, several victims of asbestos-related illnesses, such as mesothelioma, have received multi-million dollar jury awards in the United States; conversely, in Britain the Court of Appeal handed down a ruling that will make it harder for some asbestos disease victims to be compensated at all.
The British court made a comprehensive ruling Dec. 11 on six related cases involving workers who were exposed to asbestos by more than one employer. The justices decided that none of the employers were liable to compensate the worker because it was impossible to prove which exposure caused the illness.
While presenting the judgment for the six collective cases, Lord Justice Brooke said the mesothelioma occurred when one single cell in the lung lining was damaged and determining the origin of the fiber that caused the damage was impossible.
Anthony Coombs, the lawyer for mesothelioma-sufferer Edwin Matthews, refuted that argument. “There are many diseases where the precise mechanism is not understood, but the cause is established. Lung cancer caused by cigarette smoking is one example. It cannot be said that smoking causes an individual’s lung cancer, but it is known that smoking increases the risk and so causation is inferred by doctors.”
In the United States, that inference has led to many favorable judgments for asbestos victims. But in most cases the monetary compensation for victims who worked for multiple employers comes out of only one or two employers’ pockets.
Under California law, the employee must provide a medical report establishing the time period that he was exposed to asbestos on the job. All of that exposure is considered cumulatively in a court case but the only employers liable to compensate the worker are the ones who employed him during his final year of exposure. If recent case settlements are any indication, the liability price tag can be a hefty one.
In August, a Texas man who built homes in California during the 1970s was awarded $55.5 million for contracting mesothelioma. In September, another Texas jury awarded five men $130 million for their illnesses resulting from exposure to asbestos while working as laborers and millwrights in the 1960s and 1970s. Then in October, a Mississippi jury awarded $150 million to six workers who were exposed to asbestos but were not yet sick.
Asbestos is a mineral fiber that was widely used in the 1970s as an insulator and fire retardant. The element was incorporated into everything from building insulation to yarn. The types of employees most often exposed to asbestos included construction workers, welders, and auto mechanics.
Mesothelioma, a rare form of lung and abdominal cancer, is the disease most often associated with asbestos inhalation. But the fibers can cause a variety of other cancers and non-cancerous afflictions such as asbestosis—a scarring of the lung that can lead to shortness of breath or thickening of the pleura.
These illnesses usually occur 15-20 years after the first exposure to asbestos but they can take up to 50 years to appear. Many of the asbestos victims currently filing claims in the US worked around or with the toxic mineral decades ago.
Those victims are receiving huge settlements right now. In the past several years, asbestos injury claims have forced more than 42 companies including W.R. Grace and United States Mineral Products, into bankruptcy protection. And businesses as large as Ford Motor Co., Sears Roebuck & Co. and Viacom Inc. are facing injury suits as well.
Effects of asbestos-related claims are also being felt in the US insurance industry. Standard & Poor’s predicted that US insurers would have to pad their asbestos reserves a total of $5-10 billion this year. Some of those hardest hit include CNA Financial Corp., AIG, Hartford Financial Services Inc. and Travelers Property Casualty Corp.
More than 75,000 US workers filed asbestos-related claims this year. In Britain, approximately 3,000 mesothelioma cases are recorded each year. Nearly all of them are from asbestos exposure.
The British Court of Appeal ruling could affect hundreds of asbestos victims each year according to Coombs. “[This decision] will herald the end of civil damages for most mesothelioma victims in the UK if it is followed by other judges.”
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