Table 3

TEM asbestos lung burdens (million asbestos fibres ≥5 µm in length per dry gram) by most hazardous occupation

Panel A: Males born since 1940
Highest occupational exposure category	Asbestos lung burden (million fibres per dry gram)							Meso OR vs population controls*	Mean asbestos lung burden (million fibres per dry gram)
Highest occupational exposure category	0−	0.025−	0.05−	0.2−	0.5−	≥1.0	Total	Meso OR vs population controls*	Amosite	Crocidolite	Other amphiboles	Chrysotile	All asbestos
Non-construction high-risk occupations
Mesothelioma	5	3	11	7	6	4	36	17.5	0.375	0.094	0.014	0.005	0.487
Lung cancer	15	1	9	1	3	0	29		0.100	0.013	0.003	0.005	0.121
Carpenters
Mesothelioma	1	2	5	3	7	5	23	34.2	0.811	0.021	0.016	0.003	0.852
Lung cancer	3	1	3	2	0	0	9		0.088	0.002	0.005	0.000	0.095
Plumbers, electricians and painter/decorators
Mesothelioma	5	3	10	8	2	2	30	15.9	0.148	0.074	0.004	0.002	0.228
Lung cancer	12	4	5	3	1	1	26		0.095	0.040	0.006	0.001	0.143
Other construction or other reported exposure
Mesothelioma	3	0	2	0	0	1	6	5.1	0.056	0.192	0.000	0.000	0.248
Lung cancer	28	3	13	1			45		0.027	0.004	0.002	0.002	0.036
Medium risk industrial
Mesothelioma	3	0	2	3	0		8	4.1	0.069	0.057	0.010	0.001	0.137
Lung cancer	22	5	7	1	0	1†	36		0.078†	0.015†	0.005	0.001	0.098†
Domestic exposure
Mesothelioma	0	0	2				2	2.1	0.035	0.060	0.000	0.000	0.094
Lung cancer	4	4	0				8		0.009	0.004	0.006	0.001	0.020
Low-risk occupations
Mesothelioma	1	0	1				2	1.0 (ref)	0.015	0.018	0.005	0.000	0.038
Lung cancer	21	4	4				29		0.010	0.003	0.007	0.002	0.021
Total
Mesothelioma	18	8	33	21	15	12	107		0.351	0.073	0.010	0.003	0.438
Lung cancer	105	22	41	8	4	2	182		0.058†	0.012†	0.004	0.002	0.077†
High−risk occupations
Mesothelioma	1 (1)	1 (1)	0	0			2 (2)	4.8	0.025	0.000	0.000	0.000	0.025
Lung cancer	3	1	0	0			4		0.010	0.000	0.000	0.003	0.013
Medium risk industrial
Mesothelioma	5 (1)	1 (1)	1	0			7 (2)	2.4	0.004	0.027	0.003	0.000	0.034
Lung cancer	20	1	4	0			25		0.012	0.002	0.003	0.002	0.019
Domestic exposure
Mesothelioma	2 (2)	0	2 (1)	3 (1)			7 (4)	1.9	0.103	0.077	0.004	0.003	0.186
Lung cancer	13	6	0	1			20		0.018	0.006	0.002	0.001	0.027
Low-risk occupations
Mesothelioma	5 (1)	0	4 (1)	1 (1)			10 (3)	1.0 (ref)	0.067	0.017	0.001	0.003	0.087
Lung cancer	26	3	2	0			31		0.009	0.002	0.002	0.001	0.013
Total
Mesothelioma	13 (5)	2 (2)	7 (2)	4 (2)			26 (11)		0.056	0.034	0.002	0.002	0.095
Lung cancer	62	11	6	1			80		0.012	0.003	0.003	0.001	0.019

*Male mesothelioma ORs from the original case–control study.1
†One lung cancer with 22.0 mf/g was recoded as 2.08 mf/g (see table 2 footnote *).
Retaining the original value increases the mean fibre count in lung cancers to 0.555 for amosite, 0.091 for crocidolite and 0.651 for all asbestos in the medium risk group, and to 0.153 for amosite, 0.027 for crocidolite and 0.186 for all asbestos in all male lung cancers.
TEM, transmission electron microscopy.
*Female mesothelioma ORs from the original case–control study.1