Would you use ‘safe’ asbestos?

ONE OF the unfortunate things about some new discoveries is when their serious sideeffects only emerge once they’ve been widely used.

Take asbestos.

Once upon a time this was seen as a brilliant new building material — cheap, strong, fireresistant, great for insulating buildings and wonderfully sound absorbent. It even was used in mattresses and children’s toys, such as modelling clay.

We now know that if you inhale asbestos fibres it can lead to mesothelioma, an incurable cancer, which may not appear until years later.

But one good thing you can say about science is that while it can cause serious problems, it also offers solutions.

Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania in the U.S. have identified a species of bacteria, found living in the deep ocean, which are good at stripping the iron out of asbestos, making it less toxic.

This could make disposing of asbestos easier — and might even mean asbestos being reused but in a ‘safer’ form. Though whether anyone would trust asbestos again is another matter.