Naturally Occurring Asbestos in the asbestos-free European Union approach. Is asbestos exposure prevention being understood correctly?

The recent European Green deal is bringing up issues on occupational health mostly related to the hazardous material exposure. Due to the implementation of the Renovation Wave Strategy, increased asbestos exposure is expected. Following this, the European Commission has come with acts proposed to better protect people from asbestos exposure, focusing on occupational exposure.

We have analyzed the European Parliament activity related to asbestos from 1995 to 2022 focusing on the questions, proposals and debates brought by the Members of the European Parliament and the European Commission. There were 425 questions raised by the MEPs to the European Commission. While most of the question subjects were related to built-in asbestos and asbestos containing material waste management, only 4 questions were brought up for the natural environmental exposure from asbestos. Naturally Occurring Asbestos (NOA) is currently a case out of any legislative scope in the European Union.

Even though NOA is now being recognized in the impact assessment accompanying the proposal to amend the Asbestos Work Directive (Directive 2009/148/EC), it is once more left in national level focus and responsibility to pay attention to. All kinds of asbestos, being already considered carcinogen agents of group 1, have the possibility to be a source of natural hazardous material exposure to the general population, not only to the workers (during construction, renovation, demolition, waste management activities). European Union is reflecting the ambition to be an international leader in fighting asbestos exposure while is under evaluating the natural source of asbestos minerals risk to general population health. Identifying and registering the presence of asbestos in buildings is simply not enough to protect human health or aiming to accomplish Europe’s Beating Cancer Plan. A database with NOA presence in Europe is needed, together with proper guidelines to manage the natural occurrence in order to support appropriate land use, urban planning, risk management (natural disasters such as erosion), and mining activities in the geologic setting where asbestos fibers are possible to be encountered.