Exposure to Libby Amphibole: The clinical picture of autoimmune disease

Exposure to Libby Amphibole: The clinical picture of autoimmune disease Karen Lee Morrissette and Jean C. Pfau from the Center for Asbestos-Related Disease discuss the clinical presentation and complexity of the autoimmune disease progression among those exposed to Libby Amphibole. The Center for Asbestos Related Disease (CARD) opened in 2000 to provide asbestos health screening and ongoing care for those exposed to Libby Amphibole asbestos at the Superfund site in Libby, Montana. A vermiculite mine, open for a seventy-year period ending in 1990 and at one time producing up to 80% of the world’s vermiculite supply, was naturally contaminated by asbestiform fibers – tremolite, winchite, and richterite – a combination now known as Libby Amphibole. Not only were mine workers exposed, but also their families and most of the nearby town of Libby. In 2009, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) declared the area an environmental public health emergency, the first designation of its kind in the US.