May 31st, 2006

A study carried out by the Queensland Cancer Fund and University of Sydney has shown that the number of Australians affected by cancer through their occupation is higher than originally thought. It is now thought that up to 5,000 Australians each year contract occupational cancer, which is around twice as many as originally estimated.

Over 1,500 cases of lung cancer were attributed to exposure on an occupational level according to data from the study, and a further 300 cases of bladder cancer were attributed to exposure to a variety if toxins which also included asbestos.

Lawyers state that companies could find themselves with serious financial liabilities in terms of compensation due to these levels of exposure and the number of cases involved. One official stated: "If people are getting cancer or becoming very sick because of something that happens at work that is preventable, then clearly they or their family would be entitled to compensation. Some employers are slack and others are very careful with their workers."

One doctor stated that these figures had been seriously underestimated in previous studies. "A large study in the 1980’s suggested 4% of cancers in the world were caused by occupation, and that's the figure that is still used in Australia. But that is a really big underestimate, because the data they used was from the 1950’s and 60’s. We now know a lot more about chemicals and cancer risk than we did 20 years ago."