Victorian car mechanic Graeme Hamilton still has sleepless nights about a renovation he completed on his home almost 40 years ago.
It was the mid-1980s and he and his wife Vicki had just bought their house, where they still live in Gippsland.
“I tore out the bathroom. There was a cement sheet in there that was made of asbestos,” Hamilton said.
“My wife helped me, and my daughter, who was about three or four years old at the time, used to come in and ask, ‘What you’re doing, Dad?'”
“We were cutting and bashing and destroying asbestos sheets left, right and centre.”
Hamilton had no idea at the time the materials contained the fibrous mineral now responsible for the deaths of around 4,000 Australians every year.
“I did it without realising I was exposing my family to asbestos,” he said.
Australia embraced asbestos in the 20th century, even more so than most countries. Between 1930 and 1983, we imported 1.5 million tonnes of asbestos.
Around a third of Australian houses built or renovated between 1945 and 1990 still contain asbestos.
When the dangers of asbestos became known, Australia gradually began scaling down the amounts it imported, before banning it completely in 2003.
As a young apprentice mechanic in the 1980s, Hamilton said he was also exposed to asbestos every day at work.
“We used to work in clouds of asbestos dust,” he said.
“The brake pads, clutches, head gaskets and exhaust gaskets – they were all made with asbestos.”
Hamilton’s lung problems began last year and he is now under the care of a thoracic surgeon.
He has developed pleural plaques, thickened scar tissue that forms as a reaction to asbestos fibres becoming lodged in the membranes of the respiratory tract.
Hamilton knows many people who have died from asbestos-related illnesses, such as asbestosis, lung cancer or mesothelioma.
“My father-in-law died from asbestos disease when he was 67, my age now,” he said, adding it was the diagnosis he feared the most, for himself and also his family.
“My biggest concern is, have I exposed my daughter to asbestos? That always worries me. It gives me sleepless nights to think that I should have known when we were renovating and I didn’t know.”
Hamilton is sharing his story to mark Asbestos Awareness Week, which began today.
It comes as experts have issued an urgent warning to home renovators about the growing dangers of aging and deteriorating asbestos.
The asbestos in Australian homes is now aged between 30 and 100 years old.
The older the materials become, the more likely they are to break down and release harmful asbestos fibres.
“If your home was built before 1990, there’s a high likelihood it contains asbestos,” Asbestos and Silica Safety and Eradication Agency CEO, Jodie Deakes, said.
“Asbestos was used in over 3,000 building products, and it can show up inside and outside, in floors, walls, ceilings, eaves, pipes and roofs.”
“Asbestos cement roofs are particularly concerning, as they are in the poorest condition, having been directly exposed to years of sun, wind, rain and hail. Heavy rains can wash fibres into guttering, contaminating surrounding areas,” Deakes said.
A vital step for homeowners before starting any renovation or DIY project was to get a professional to test for asbestos, Deakes said.
“By knowing where asbestos is in your home, you will be able to take the right steps to protect yourself and your family from exposure and plan to safely remove it.”
Hamilton said while he and his wife were still renovating their home, decades on, they now knew exactly which parts contained asbestos.
“If it’s got asbestos, we get an asbestos removalist to go in and take it out,” he said.
One key regulatory change Hamilton said he would like to see was mandated asbestos reports incorporated into house sales.
