The report of the Royal Commission on Asbestos concludes that regulation of asbestos-containing consumer products, beverages, and food in Canada has been erratic. Some products such as asbestos-insulated hair dryers have been removed from the market although they do not release asbestos fibres above background levels in Canadian city air. Other products, such as free-form asbestos which may release significant levels of asbestos fibres are readily available at hardware stores across the country. Asbestos-cement sheet is available at building supply stores with no indications of the safe practices to use when working with it.
Asbestos has been used in a variety of ways in a large number of consumer products. Asbestos may be contained in ironing board covers, oven gloves, toasters, boilers, ovens, refrigerators, and clothes washers and dryers. In addition, consumers may handle building products such as asbestos floor tiles, asbestos roofing, asbestos-cement sheet, and asbestos-textured paints. Asbestos has been used in these products because of its resistance to heat, its electrical insulating qualities, its performance in friction materials, or because the fibres give strength and durability to the product.
The Commission concludes that breathing airborne asbestos fibres causes a risk of lung cancer that increases in proportion to the quantity of asbestos inhaled. The health hazard faced by consumers depends upon the quantity of asbestos fibres that they may breathe. Asbestos-containing products vary greatly in the quantity of fibres that they might release. This depends on the manner in which the asbestos is contained and on the way the product is used or handled.
The Commission recommends that the Government of Ontario, in collaboration with the federal government, sort consumer products into three categories. The first would be those that can release significant levels of asbestos fibres in normal use, such as loose-fill asbestos insulation. The sale to the general public of products in category one should be banned. The second category would include products that possess the potential of releasing fibres from cutting or sanding or as a result of degradation, such as asbestos-cement sheet or asbestos gloves. Products in category two should be labelled and instructions made available as to their safe use. The third category would include products in which the asbestos is sealed off or encapsulated, such as most appliances and molded plastic products. Products in this third category should not be subject to regulation.
Consumers may also be exposed to asbestos in drinking water, beverages, and food. Concentrations of up to four million fibres per litre of drinking water have been found in southern Ontario municipalities such as Toronto and Sarnia, while up to twenty-two million fibres have been found in northern Ontario municipalities, such as Thunder Bay. Concentrations exceeding one million fibres per litre are found in wine, beer and other beverages. After reviewing all the available medical evidence, the Commission concludes that eating or drinking asbestos in the concentrations currently found in drinking water, beverages, or food in North America is not associated with any significant increase in disease. Many studies have looked for a relationship between oral ingestion and disease, but so far the results are negative. The Commission concludes that regulation of asbestos in drinking water, beverages, and food is unnecessary and unproductive. Special filtering of drinking water to remove asbestos is not required. The Liquor Control Board of Ontario has imposed a ban on the use of asbestos filters in the production of beer, wine and liquor. The Commission recommends that this ban be lifted, noting that it is unnecessary, and was never effectively enforced on imported beverages.