The workers in the shipping and wreckage industry receive potential negative health impacts from traditional working procedures adopted in the scrapping yards such as:
- torch cutting without protection (eye and skin injuries)
- heavy lifting (wear and tear, back injuries)
- noise (hearing defects)
and from the exposure to hazardous substances such as:
- asbestos
- chemicals (PCS, PCV, PAH, Tin-organic compounds oils)
- heavy metals
- fumes (dust, fume/gas components; dioxines, isocyanates, sulphur, etc.)
Asbestos-containing materials (ACM) are found in the thermal system insulation and on surfacing materials. When ACM deteriorates or is disturbed, asbestos breaks up into very fine fibers that can be suspended in the air for long periods and possibly inhaled by workers and operators at the facility or by people living near by the scrapping yards. The most dangerous asbestos fibers are too small to be visible. Once they are inhaled, the fibers can remain and accumulate in the lung. These can only be removed or sealed by asbestos contractors Monmouth .Breathing high levels of asbestos fibers can lead to an increased risk of lung cancer, mesothelioma (a cancer of the chest and abdominal linings), and asbestosis (irreversible lung scarring that can be fatal). The risk of lung cancer and mesothelioma increases with the level of exposure. Symptoms of these diseases do not show up until many years after exposure. Most people with asbestos-related diseases have been exposed to elevated concentrations in connection with their work.
Asbestos removed from a ship is still not necessarily regulated as hazardous waste in many countries. In some other countries asbestos is recovered by manual crushing and then re-custed, or-re-formed, for re-use. Decontamination services South Wales can deal with asbestos decontamination.
The potential health impacts associated with the use of asbestos are of such a severe nature that compulsory minimum precautions are necessary. This includes worker education/capacity-building training and awareness in the ship-breaking yards on the negative effects of asbestos, protection of workers when extracting asbestos from vessels, a ban on the re-use of asbestos, the securing of the disposal of asbestos and measures preventing asbestos from re-entering the market from scrapyards.