"Asbestos Remains Legal Despite Fatal Illnesses Linked To It"

"WASHINGTON — Stephanie Harper of the North Texas city of Bonham was a daddy’s girl. When her father would come home from work — he was a handyman, a jack of all trades, doing auto mechanics, heating and cooling, anything — she’d grab him and hug him as hard as she could. 'I’d sit on his feet and grab his pants legs,' she remembers.

As far as she can tell, that’s how she picked up the asbestos fibers that worked their way from her lungs to the lining of her chest. The fibers that caused the tumor that doctors found when she had her tubes tied at 22, after her daughter was born. The fibers that caused the chain of events that have led her to live in agony for 15 years, time that should have been full of all the joys of young motherhood.

The disease Harper has is mesothelioma, a cancer that is 100 percent preventable and 100 percent attributable to exposure to asbestos."

David McCumber reports for the San Antonio Express-News December 1, 2014.