Another Innocent Asbestos Victim Dies

The Green Quenington, Cirencester, UKIn yet another heartbreaking example of peripheral damage from asbestos, the wife of a UK man who claims four years' worth of exposure to asbestos—but whose wife was never exposed through her own employment—has lost her battle with asbestos mesothelioma after ingesting asbestos fibers from her husband's work clothes.

Yvonne Moaby died of the asbestos cancer known as mesothelioma. The October 4th issue of the Gloucestershire Echo reported that a post mortem carried out by pathologist Dr. Priti Joshi found a malignant mesothelioma. Dr. Joshi said that even though the count of asbestos fibers in her lungs was low, there was an indirect link.

Gloucestershire coroner Alan Crickmore recorded a verdict of accidental death following a coroner's inquest based on evidence that Moaby had shaken out her husband's work clothes every other day to get rid of the asbestos dust. The timescale to her death was entirely consistent with the way "this dreadful disease" advanced.

"There is no evidence that she came into contact with asbestos through her own employment but I am satisfied that she was exposed unwittingly," Crickmore said.

Mesothelioma and asbestosis, in tandem with other asbestos-related maladies, most often affect workers who have unknowingly come into contact with asbestos long before its dangers were widely known. Workers exposed to asbestos fibers decades prior, will generally appear in good health until thirty years hence, when mesothelioma suddenly emerges.

As has been witnessed in previous cases, family members can also come into contact with the asbestos fibers that cause asbestos injury.

Moaby's husband John told the inquest that while his late wife had never worked either directly or indirectly with asbestos during her own work career, he had been responsible for the removal of storage heaters containing asbestos "and pipe work that had been lagged with it," he said.

He testified he had no idea as to the dangers of asbestos. "Of course we would have refused to do the work had we known there was anything to worry about," he said of this particular aspect of his working career in the 1970s.

A year younger than her husband, Yvonne Moaby was in fine health until suddenly developing a cough in 2009. An X ray revealed a spot on her lung. Further tests revealed mesothelioma. There is no cure.

They were married 47 years.

There was no word if John Moaby intended on launching an asbestos lawsuit with the aid of an asbestosis attorney.