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48-Year-Old California Woman Blames Her Mesothelioma on Johnson & Johnson’s Baby Powder
As the nation considers news that a recently-purchased sample of Johnson & Johnson’s Baby Powder tested positive for chrysotile asbestos, a 48-year-old California woman is suing the company, saying that asbestos in their product caused her malignant mesothelioma. Opening statements in the lawsuit filed by Amy Fong and her husband Put Fong were heard one…
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Goodyear Must Face Jury In Face of Carpenter’s Mesothelioma Death
Before being diagnosed with malignant mesothelioma, Peter Komiak worked as a carpenter and a flooring installer, as well as a home renovation professional. The New York man’s career started in 1960, when he worked part-time for a carpeting retailer in Hempstead, Long Island while still in high school. Over the next thirty years he worked…
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Oncology Team Reports Promising Results From Combining Immuno-gene Therapy and Radiotherapy
Researchers working to find a cure for malignant mesothelioma are acutely aware of the need for speed: the disease is always considered fatal, and more people are diagnosed with and die of the condition every day. Still, there is a process that must be followed: theories need to be tested in the laboratory before people,…
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California Woman Born in Hong Kong is Latest Mesothelioma Victim to Blame Johnson & Johnson
Pui “Amy” Fong is just 48 years old, but the California mother of two faces a grim, foreshortened future after having been diagnosed with malignant mesothelioma. She blames asbestos contamination in Johnson & Johnson’s Baby Powder for her illness, and this week marked the beginning of her personal injury lawsuit against the company.
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Court Reverses Decision That Would Have Cheated Mesothelioma Victim of Compensation
In a notable victory for a mesothelioma victim, the Court of Appeal of Louisiana, Fourth Circuit has overturned a trial court decision that would have left the victim unable to collect the compensation they were owed. The decision not only allows justice for the individual victim, but also establishes an important precedent for victims going…
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Mesothelioma and Ovarian Cancer Victims See Baby Powder Recall As Proof
Consumer product companies have pushed back against lawsuits accusing their talc-based products of causing malignant mesothelioma and other cancers, but victims’ arguments were strengthened this week when the Food and Drug Administration revealed it had found chrysotile asbestos fibers in a recently-sold bottle of Johnson & Johnson’s Baby Powder.
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United Kingdom Mesothelioma Researchers Begin Targeted Strategy Trial
Patients diagnosed with malignant pleural mesothelioma have few treatment options available to them, and those that exist deliver results that are marginal at best. Most patients die within two years of being diagnosed. In an effort to extend survival time, researchers at three different United Kingdom medical centers have begun a trial that takes an…
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UK Hairdresser’s Mesothelioma Diagnosis Blamed On Hairdryers
When you think about professions that are at risk for malignant mesothelioma, the ones that come to mine include factory workers, firefighters, and construction workers. You imagine boiler rooms clouded with dust, or insulation being installed. The last occupation you would picture would be a hairdresser in a salon, cutting and curling hair and wielding…
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Stagehand’s Mesothelioma Claim Blames Power Cables for Asbestos Exposure
When Peter Tytell worked as a stagehand, hanging stage lighting in the 1960s, he never dreamed that doing so would end up leading to a diagnosis with malignant mesothelioma. But in February of 2017 he got confirmation that he was suffering from the rare and fatal asbestos-related disease, and by December of that year he…
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Occupational Medicine Expert Publishes Study Linking Talc Powder to Mesothelioma
One of the country’s top experts in occupational medicine, epidemiology and prevention has just published a study in the Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine supporting the idea that talcum powder contaminated with asbestos is directly linked to malignant mesothelioma. The question of whether exposure to cosmetic talc can cause the rare asbestos-related disease, as well as…
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Two Former EPA Administrators Pen Anti-Asbestos Op-Ed
In a move that will hearten victims of malignant mesothelioma and other asbestos-related diseases, former Environmental Protection Administration Administrators Gina McCarty and William K. Reilly have penned an op-ed in today’s New York Times urging Congress to ban asbestos in the United States.
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Australians Point to Chemoimmunotherapy As the Future of Mesothelioma Treatment
Mesothelioma is one of the rarest forms of cancer, and it is also one of the most frustrating. The disease has an extremely long latency period, only making itself known decades after patients were exposed to asbestos, and by the time its symptoms arise physicians have few options for effective treatment. The most common approach…
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Mesothelioma Victim’s Quest for Justice Defeated By Delay
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How Physicians’ Poor Communication Skills Can Fail Mesothelioma Patients
Receiving a mesothelioma diagnosis is devastating. The rare, asbestos-related form of cancer has no cure and is so aggressive that most patients die within just two years of the disease being identified. While physicians and researchers are working hard to find effective treatments and methods for improving both survival and quality of life, a recent…
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California Mesothelioma Victims Benefit From New Law
This week, California Governor Gavin Newsom signed Senate Bill 645 into law, and it marks a significant victory for victims of malignant mesothelioma. The new law will protect victims of the asbestos-related disease from physically and emotionally taxing deposition examinations by limiting the amount of time that defendant companies are permitted to take to question…
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Owkin Labs Uses Artificial Intelligence to Improve Understanding of Mesothelioma Survival
A New York company dedicated to using machine learning to harness our understanding of medical data has announced the development of a new program to help predict mesothelioma patients’ survival and response to treatment. According to an article published in the journal Nature Medicine, the company’s artificial intelligence program successfully identified patient characteristics found in biopsy…
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Electrician’s Case Against Asbestos Company Allowed to Proceed
When Philip A. Lattanzio chose to become an electrician, he never dreamed that his 42-year-long career would lead to being diagnosed with malignant mesothelioma, a rare and fatal form of cancer. But once he was diagnosed in September of 2017 and learned that the disease is caused by exposure to asbestos, he set out to…
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Asbestos Glove Manufacture’s Bid to Avoid Court in Mesothelioma Case Fails
Michael Rosen, M.D., Ph.D is a victim of malignant mesothelioma who blames his disease on exposure to asbestos that contaminated gloves and burner pads made by Fisher Scientific Company, which he used throughout his undergraduate and graduate school years, as well as when he worked as a medical technologist during summer breaks. Though Fisher attempted…
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ESMO Attendees Hear of Success for New Mesothelioma Chemotherapy
Mesothelioma researchers are all-too aware that the disease they’re investigating is extremely resistant to treatment. They have to measure victories in small increments, and being able to offer patients even a few more months of life has significant value. So it is no wonder that attendees at this year’s European Society of Medical Oncology (ESMO)…
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California Jury Decides Johnson & Johnson Must Pay Mesothelioma Victim $40.3 Million
The company behind Johnson & Johnson’s Baby Powder and Shower to Shower Body Powder has suffered another legal loss, as a has ordered them to pay $40.3 million to a woman diagnosed with malignant mesothelioma. This is only the latest in a series of claims filed against the company, accusing them of negligently allowing asbestos…
