CBC -- The Canadian government rejected advice from Health Canada that asbestos be added to a global list of hazardous materials in 2006, CBC News has learned.
According to documents obtained under Access to Information, a senior Health Canada bureaucrat wrote that the agency believed that chrysotile -- a form of asbestos that has been linked to cancer -- should be added to a UN treaty known as the Rotterdam Convention.
"[Health Canada's] preferred position would be to list -- as this is consistent with controlled use -- i.e. let people know about the substance so they have the information they need, through prior informed consent, to ensure they handle and use the substance correctly," wrote Paul Glover then director general of Health Canada's safe environments program, in 2006.
The 2006 Rotterdam Convention comprises a list of hazardous substances that require countries to disclose any restrictions imposed for health or environmental reasons by exporting countries. Importing countries would then decide whether to import the substance, ban it, or restrict it, something known as prior informed consent.
More than 50 countries ban the use of asbestos. But Canada, one of the leading exporters of the material, lobbied to keep asbestos off the Rotterdam list with the support of purchasing countries such as Iran and Zimbabwe. Ultimately, chrysotile asbestos did not make the list and remains off it.
Canada exports $90 million of asbestos, all of it from Quebec, every year.
While Glover noted in his email that Health Canada cannot say that chrysotile is safe, he said the agency does feel "there is science and evidence to support that chrysotile is less dangerous than other forms of asbestos."
Full Article
Source: Huffington
According to documents obtained under Access to Information, a senior Health Canada bureaucrat wrote that the agency believed that chrysotile -- a form of asbestos that has been linked to cancer -- should be added to a UN treaty known as the Rotterdam Convention.
"[Health Canada's] preferred position would be to list -- as this is consistent with controlled use -- i.e. let people know about the substance so they have the information they need, through prior informed consent, to ensure they handle and use the substance correctly," wrote Paul Glover then director general of Health Canada's safe environments program, in 2006.
The 2006 Rotterdam Convention comprises a list of hazardous substances that require countries to disclose any restrictions imposed for health or environmental reasons by exporting countries. Importing countries would then decide whether to import the substance, ban it, or restrict it, something known as prior informed consent.
More than 50 countries ban the use of asbestos. But Canada, one of the leading exporters of the material, lobbied to keep asbestos off the Rotterdam list with the support of purchasing countries such as Iran and Zimbabwe. Ultimately, chrysotile asbestos did not make the list and remains off it.
Canada exports $90 million of asbestos, all of it from Quebec, every year.
While Glover noted in his email that Health Canada cannot say that chrysotile is safe, he said the agency does feel "there is science and evidence to support that chrysotile is less dangerous than other forms of asbestos."
Full Article
Source: Huffington
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