Following the Environmental Protection Agency’s concerns relating to asbestos exposure and disease in Michigan, the Karmanos Cancer Institute and the Center for Occupational and Environmental Medicine have joined together to introduce the National Center for Vermiculite and Asbestos Related Cancers.

The center will be at the forefront of investigations in to effective and timely diagnosis and treatment of asbestos related diseases, such as mesothelioma, in the area of Michigan. Investigations are already underway into the use of asbestos contaminated vermiculite, which was mass produced in Dearborn until the beginning of the 1990s and was used in tens of thousands of homes across the area.

It is hoped that this center will serve as a valuable resource where information and expertise can be pooled together and used to research and study this problem and how to effectively deal with it. The teams that are put together to carry out research will be looking into both statistics and risk assessment, as well as diagnosis and treatment of asbestos related disease such as mesothelioma.

The center will have a team of specialists who are experts in different areas of treating this disease, such as radiologists, cardiologists and oncologists. They will work together to try and put together a programme which will help to detect and treat mesothelioma and asbestos related diseases early on.

The center will also assess and monitor risk levels within the area.