June 28th, 2007

A recent coroner's ruling has confirmed that a man from Bushey in the UK did in fact die as a result of exposure to asbestos dust and fibers. The man, sixty-four year-old Roger Keegan, used to work as an air conditioning engineer, and was diagnosed with the asbestos related cancer, mesothelioma, in 2004.

A father of two, Keegan had previously been healthy and fit. He worked as an air conditioning engineer for thirty years, suffering long term exposure to asbestos dust and fibers. The coroner ruled that he had died from an industrial disease.

His wife stated: "He was a very fit and healthy man, that is why this is so hard to take. He didn't smoke and didn't really drink either but we knew he'd been exposed to asbestos. We first knew he was ill when he started getting short of breath."

She added: "In older days it asbestos was used all the time. He could remember laggers mixing up huge dust bins of asbestos - nobody knew it was dangerous then. But Roger kept going right to the end. I remember he gave up work for about two weeks before he told his oncologist he would go mad if he stayed at home any longer, so he went back."