Yasay lauds Guingona move versus asbestos

Former Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) Chairman Perfecto R. Yasay, Jr., urged Vice President and Foreign Affairs Secretary Teofisto Guingona "to go one step further in the campaign against asbestos by asking government officials, non-government organizations contractors and architects to identify buildings and other facilities that have been built with asbestos-containing materials, so that these same structures must be removed to become asbestos-free."

At the same time, Yasay said the vice president’s directive to extend health risk benefits to Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) employees is a "heartwarming signal and a positive step toward greater resolve on the part of our leaders to recognize the serious health risks posed by asbestos on our people."

Yasay was reacting to the vice president’s and the DFA’s decision to grant employees health risk allowance of P7,200 each in view of their daily exposure to asbestos-filled ceilings in the DFA building along Roxas Boulevard. In the same vein, the vice president ordered the replacement of ceilings in every floor of the DFA building in Roxas Boulevard with asbestos-free materials.

The vice president earlier said that he ordered the replacement of the ceilings "because we cannot allow our valued personnel of DFA to be exposed to cancer."

In a letter addressed to the vice president, Yasay said that he was "extremely happy" that Guingona "has affirmed what I have always been trying to warn our people about – especially government officials, businessmen, manufacturers, and those in the construction industry."

Asbestos is commonly used as a raw material for construction materials like roofing and siding, walls and ceilings, floors, pipes and boilers. It has been classified by the International Agency for Research on Cancer as a known human carcinogen.

"This example set by Vice President Guingona should spark the banding together of government, civil society and business to work together towards the total ban of asbestos from the local market," Yasay said.

It will be recalled that in 1993, it was reported that some 1,000 Filipino civilian employees at the former American bases of Clark and Subic were reported to have been afflicted with serious ailments caused by asbestos.