Asbestos Victim's Family in Landmark Legal Victory

A tribunal in a landmark opinion Tuesday ordered a company to pay compensation to the household of a worker who died from the aftereffects of exposure to asbestos. The ruling, Korea's first to acknowledge the danger of asbestos and throw an employer liable, paving the manner for similar suits. The Daegu territory tribunal ordered an asbestos manufacturer to pay W133 million (US$1=W923) in amends to the household of the woman, who died last twelvemonth of malignant mesothelioma, a word form of malignant neoplastic disease caused by asbestos dust.

The justice establish the company negligent of its duty of attention for the employee. Although it was aware of the danger of the substance, it did not supply protective gear wheel to staff, put in a airing system or seek to raise consciousness of the dangers. However, the justice admitted the victim's partial liability for failing to protect herself. The woman, named as Won, worked at the company in Busan for two old age from 1976. Although she was not diagnosed with malignant mesothelioma until 2004, 26 old age after she had left the company, she sued for W210 million in compensation.

The lawyer for the victim said it had been hard to turn out that Won's disease was related to asbestos exposure, since asbestos-related diseases like malignant mesothelioma can develop after a rotational latency time period of 10-40 years. He said the opinion sets an of import case in point for asbestos victims to have compensation. "But asbestos impacts not only the workers involved but also end-users and people who dwell near an asbestos plant," he said. "The authorities should carry on an enquiry into the dangers of asbestos." Few asbestos victims have got so far received damages, and South Korean Won was the first whose unwellness was recognized as a work-related disease by the Korean Peninsula Labor Social Welfare Corporation, adding malignant mesothelioma to a relatively short list.

According to an environmental militant grouping in Daegu, 46 people have got died of asbestos-related diseases in the last seven years. Among occupants near an asbestos mill in Busan, one was recently diagnosed with malignant mesothelioma. But the figure of patients is expected to turn given the fleet development of the asbestos industry since the 1960s and the long rotational latency time period of related to diseases. Korean Peninsula only implemented measurements over asbestos in July this year. A basic study of the harm is expected next twelvemonth and a systematic enquiry in 2009.

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