More on Asbestos

The other day I wrote a piece lamenting the ongoing immoral Canadian export of asbestos and the fact that Canada was the sole country that recently prevented it from being listed as a toxic substance under the Rotterdam Convention. I also suggested that the government has made all Canadians who say or do nothing about this indefensible export complicit in it.

The Star's Tim Harper has a good column about the issue, and the fact that efforts are being made to keep this issue in the public arena. Kathleen Ruff, a senior human rights adviser to the Rideau Institute, is one such person unwilling to shrug her shoulders and lament her lack of power, reminding us that the export of this deadly substance is a question of democracy, saying, "If Harper cannot be budged from his position ... Canadians are nothing but serfs in a dysfunctional democracy.

We need to all get involved. Write to your Member of Parliament, and even if you get, as I did, the official party line about how chrysotile is safe if handled properly, your opposition is on record. To do anything less is to give permission to this Government to continue a practice that, according to The World health Organization, kills as many as 107,000 people annually.