Episode 2: The Hidden Dangers of Artificial Stone
James Nevin: Hello everyone. Welcome to the second episode of From Dust to Verdict. I'm your host, James Nevin from the law firm of Brayton Purcell, LLP. This podcast is dedicated to the epidemic of accelerated silicosis in artificial stone countertop fabrication workers. In each episode, we explore important topics and issues about this occupational health epidemic as well as the associated lawsuits.
In this episode two, we're going to discuss the hidden dangers of artificial stone. We explore why artificial stone countertops pose significant health risks. We'll discuss the composition of artificial stone and how the fabrication process releases harmful silica when fabricating artificial stone as compared to natural stone.
So, to understand the hidden dangers of artificial stone, we first have to understand what exactly is artificial stone. Artificial stone, also known as quartz or engineered, composite, synthetic, and similar names is essentially a stone slab that looks just like a natural stone slab. So, it might look like granite or marble or slate or porcelain. But artificial stone is very much artificial. It's not a natural stone that's quarried or chiseled out of the ground. Artificial stone slab typically contains 90 to 95% silica. And it's crystalline silica. And unlike natural stone, this is a much higher silica content. So, granite for example, is typically 45%. Silica in slate might be 30% porcelain, for example is only 15% silica or less. Marble is often only 3% silica. Limestone, 2% silica. So most natural stone has significantly less silica than artificial stone. Additionally, the silica that is in natural stone is significantly larger, essentially huge compared to the nano-size silica that's in artificial stone.
The reason for that is the silica in artificial stone comes from quartz, which is a rock. It is mined out of the ground, but it's not added to the artificial stone in its natural mined state before it is added to artificial stone. It is intentionally crushed and pulverized. So that the effect of that is the silica in artificial stone, in addition to being extremely high content of the stone, it's nano-sized. Very, very, very small.
Additionally, the other five to 10% of the constituents of artificial stone, are essentially metals and other toxins that produce VOCs or volatile organic compounds. So essentially the entire, the entire ingredients in artificial stone are all toxic materials. The artificial stone is made into a slab, and so the, the end result of the artificial stone slab manufacturing process is a large rectangular stone slab that looks the same as a natural stone slab that is quarried and chiseled out of the ground. But with both natural stone and artificial stone, the process does not stop there. We don't just take a large rectangular artificial stone slab and put it on the top of our kitchen and bathroom countertops.
So, before the stone can be installed in a kitchen or bathroom, it has to be fabricated. And whether it's natural stone or artificial stone, it has this fabrication step. And so, for many, many decades before artificial stone was even invented, natural stone slabs after they were delivered from the quarries would go to fabrication shops where they would be cut, polished, ground and drilled to the appropriate size and dimension of the, of the eventual countertop that they're going to be installed on. And, um, you know, space for the sink, for example, holes for the plumbing, or nice smooth edges, uh, for all the edges. So that fabrication process has existed for many decades, and it worked fine with natural stone. A typical natural stone fabrication worker might wear, a N95 dust mask, or they might wear no mask at all.
They might use wet equipment, or they might use dry equipment. The end result is most artificial stone, sorry, most natural stone workers could fabricate using any of those methods or not throughout their whole career. And typically, they would not develop any sort of disease.
Because artificial stone was then introduced into the market, into the same existing fabrication process and the artificial stone slab manufacturers and suppliers allegedly introduced this product into the fabrication market without any warnings, without any special training, without any, you know, acknowledgement that artificial stone is in fact different than natural stone.
It's different to the fabricators because of the high content silica, because of the nano-size of the silica and because of the other toxins that are included in the artificial stone. The end result of that is when fabricating artificial stone, rather than natural stone, the fabrication workers are exposed then to an extremely high level of nano-sized silica fibers and other toxins that they then breathe in. Now, studies from OSHA, from NIOSH, which is the scientific wing of OSHA, the organizations that we have federally to protect workers in the workplace. And Cal/OSHA, which is the California version of OSHA. And every state has their version of OSHA.
And say for example, studies at Georgia Tech, studies out of Australia from Safe Work Australia and other organizations. Medical organizations in Australia, essentially studies from all over the world including, actually most recently, studies funded by the Natural Stone Institute and the I- S-F-A, the International Service Fabricators Association. Both of them are lobby organizations funded by the artificial stone manufacturers and suppliers. A recent study from them out of Yale, came to the same conclusion as the studies from NIOSH and Georgia Tech and Australia.
Which, in short, what the scientists have found, that when a fabrication worker is fabricating artificial stone, if they're using dry methods, the artificial, the levels of dust that they're breathing in are in extreme excess of the OSHA PELs. But also, when using wet methods, which are the dust control methods recommended by the artificial stone slab manufacturers and suppliers. So wet methods being wet equipment, for example, wet saws, and other wet tools. When using wet equipment to fabricate artificial stone, unlike natural stone, all these studies, including the studies out of Yale from the slab manufacturers, have found that the levels are still far above the PEL. Even with wet methods.
The PEL, also known as the permissible exposure level, is a level that OSHA sets and other global organizations have similar levels that they set throughout the world. But the PEL specifically is the level that OSHA sets of allowed level of any toxin or carcinogen in the workplace. They have this for many, many different toxins and carcinogens. So, for example, there's one for asbestos, there's one for beryllium, there's one for benzene. But in focusing on the PEL for silica, just like PELs for other toxins and carcinogens, is not intended to represent a safe level.
It's simply a regulatory level. A compromise between scientists and industry where scientists will say, you know, the level should be zero. And industry says, well, you're going to put us out of business. And so, they compromise at a level and say, well, okay, well the level at least has to be below this.
So, the PEL for silica, first off, is not a safe level. It's also a very old level. It was established long ago based on natural stone. So, it wasn't even designed to address artificial stone. But, even applying this, this out of date level that is still too high and is still not intended to be a safe level when fabricating artificial stone, even with wet methods, the levels are above that.
But the problem is that in, at this point, every geography… so pick a country, pick a state, pick a city. On various different timelines, artificial stone has displaced natural stone in the market. Because, to a consumer wanting a beautiful kitchen or bathroom countertop, artificial stone generally is a little bit better than natural stone.
It's not actually cheaper. However, it's more durable. It's more scratch resistant. It's more uniform. It tends not to crack. And so, consumers, not knowing the risk to fabrication workers by the introduction into their fabrication shop of this artificial stone product instead of natural stone… a consumer doesn't know that it's posing a risk to workers, so the consumer prefers that product.
The end result is that many fabrication shops no longer fabricate any natural stone. Or to the extent that they still fabricate natural stone, it's much less natural stone and, for the most part, they're fabricating this high-silica, nano-size silica and other toxic compound product, artificial stone. So, the end result of that, according to numerous peer reviewed published medical literature from around the globe, is there has been not just an epidemic, but a pandemic of accelerated silicosis among artificial stone fabrication workers. First, in other countries such as Israel, Italy, Spain, China, Australia. But now also in the US. And so, we've seen more recently, as artificial stone has become more popular in the United States, an epidemic. A new epidemic of artificial stone accelerated silicosis in fabrication workers in the US.
And so, for example, in California, the CDPH, which is the California Department of Public Health, now maintains an engineered stone silicosis surveillance dashboard. That's at www.cdph.ca.gov, under their program section, you can get to their surveillance dashboard. Or you could simply just Google CDPH Silicosis dashboard and you'll see this dashboard, and they update it weekly.
And so currently, the California Department of Health of Public Health, for example, has tracked, just in the last few years, 327 confirmed silicosis cases among artificial stone fabrication workers in California. Of those, 17 have died. They are very young workers. The median age is 46. Most of the workers are male. In California, 98% of the workers with silicosis have been Latino. 35 have received lung transplants. 26 are waiting for a lung transplant. And six have been found not eligible for a lung transplant. This is a problem that is especially seen in Los Angeles County. Is seen in in numerous other counties as well.
So, in later episodes of From Dust to Verdict, we will explore in more detail what exactly is artificial stone accelerated silicosis and how is it different from traditional silicosis? And we will explore other diseases that artificial stone fabrication causes. And, we'll explore methods of how to try to prevent the disease, how to treat the disease, and available remedies via lawsuits.
So, once again, I'm your host, James Nevin from the law firm of Brayton Purcell, LLP. I want to thank you for tuning into this episode of From Dust to Verdict, and remember to Like and Subscribe. Thank you.
