Silicosis in the twenty first century

ilicosis (Latin, silex, flint) is perhaps the oldest occupational disease, probably existing in the paleolithic period. Hippocrates and Pliny refer to the disorder. Some of the most tragic and wanton examples of occupational disease were due to silicosis, for example, how table blade grinding in Sheffield (1886) robbed workers of 25 years of life, or the Gauley Bridge disaster in West Virginia (1931). Perusing a recent standard pulmonary medicine textbook would suggest that simple silicosis is no longer a problem as it is "not associated with impairment or disability and even without effect on longevity in many although not all". 1 Case closed, the silicosis story is over, or is it?