Inhalation and injection studies in rats using dust samples from chrysotile asbestos prepared by a wet dispersion process

Long term inhalation studies and intraperitoneal injection studies in rats were undertaken with a series of chrysotile asbestos dusts. Three dust samples were generated from chrysotile modified by the wet dispersion process (WDC) and one was from unmodified chrysotile. Following a 1 year inhalation period, all the chrysotile samples proved extremely fibrogenic and carcinogenic and there were no significant differences between the WDC dusts and normal chrysotile. In all experimental groups approximately 25% of animals developed pulmonary carcinomas and in the oldest rats advanced interstitial fibrosis occupied on average 10% of all lung tissue. In the injection studies all the dust samples produced mesotheliomas in over 90% of animals. Very little chrysotile remained in the lungs of the animals that survived longest following dust inhalation and what there was was present as individual chrysotile fibrils. It is suggested that chrysotile is potentially the most harmful variety of asbestos as shown in these and other animal studies but that it is removed from lung tissue quite rapidly. In the long lived human species this may mean that except where exposure levels are very high and of long duration, chrysotile should be less hazardous than other asbestos types.