‘I have lost a lot of friends to this disease’
9:18am Monday 27th February 2006 in News By Anthony Osborne
Ex-railway worker David Haines urges people to sign the mesothelioma charter Ref: 200579-89
FORMER railway worker David Haines worked with deadly asbestos for 21 years. He scraped the now outlawed substance from train boilers and would even go home covered in its toxic dust, unaware of its potential side effects.
But he admits he is one of the lucky ones, having seen old comrades die many years after even entering a railway workshop.
That's why today he is supporting the campaign for action on what has been dubbed the Swindon Disease mesothelioma.
The vicious and debilitating chest cancer has brought pain and suffering to hundreds of families in the town.
Today the Swindon Advertiser is backing the British Lung Foundation's first Action Mesothelioma Day, to raise awareness of the disease.
Asbestos was used extensively in Swindon's Great Western Railway works.
The substance's unique properties, its lack of conductivity and its inability to burn, made it a perfect insulator to preserve the precious heat produced by the boilers on railway locomotives.
As a result vast quantities of the naturally occurring material were used, but many workers simply were not aware of the dangers.
Mr Haines, of Purton, said: "I used to scrape the stuff off the boilers, and when I came down, I would be covered in white from head to toe.
"How I never breathed the dust in I'll never know.
"We never had any protective equipment and certainly no masks not until we started working on the diesels in the late 50s and early 60s."
"I am one of the lucky ones. I have lost a lot of good friends and comrades to this disease and I support any scheme that might help to prevent the suffering that those people went through happening to others."
He is now urging people to sign the British Lung Foundation's Action Mesothelioma Charter.
The charter urges the Government to make mesothelioma a national priority. It also urges the Government, alongside other national bodies, to fund good quality research on mesothelioma with a view to improving diagnosis, treatment and outcomes for patients and asks that the National Health and Safety Executives continue to vigorously enforce existing asbestos regulations.
The illness is being contracted by 2,000 people nationwide every year.
It usually occurs more than 40 years after a person has stopped working with the hazardous material and it is because of this delay that it is feared the number of cases in the UK will continue to rise until 2015.
Please click here to support the British Lung Foundation 'Action Mesothelioma Charter'
