Original scientific paper
The control of dust disease in the British ceramic industry
E. Posner
; Birmingham Regional Hospital Board, Mass Radiography and Routine Chest X-Ray Centre, Central Out-patients Deportment, Hartshill, Stoke-on-Trent, England
Abstract
The British ceramic industry has always been concentrated in a small area of Staffordshire. Because of the widespread use of flint (almost 100% free silicic acid) for kiln placing and as a component of most ceramic articles, silicosis has been a serious health problem for about 300 years. The paper deals with the trends of silicosis morbidity since the reconstruction of the industry which began at the end of the last war. In only a few processes hazardous materials have been substituted by harmless ones (for instance flint by alumina in the placing of bone china). Most efforts have been concentrated on the improvement of local dust control and general workshop hygiene. In recent years it was found that the traditional so-called protective clothing of ceramic workers constituted itself a definite hazard and has now been replaced by materials made of dust-repelling man-made fibres. Modified routine mass radiography has proved a valuable tool for assessing the incidence of dust disease in ceramic workers and the analysis of its records suggests that only a small proportion of workers acquired pneumoconiosis during the past 15 years. Although manufacture of flint-containing articles must be considered the most hazardous risk, it is shown that pneumoconiosis occurs to a significant extent in the manufacture of fine china which does not contain any flint. In recent years the most impressive facet of pneumoconiosis statistics has been the rapidly declining rate of progressive massive fibrosis. In Great Britain category I simple pneumoconiosis (according to the I. L. 0. classification) is generally and not considered to be a »disease process« but its importance as a biological index of undue dust exposure is stressed.
Keywords
Hrčak ID:
175538
URI
Publication date:
26.3.1969.
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