Exposure Risk
Asbestos diseases follow a "dose-response" relationship curve. This means that the more asbestos you inhale (dose), the greater your risk of contracting an asbestos-related disease.
Generally, your risk of getting sick increases with each dose. For example, if a person worked around asbestos for 5 years and someone else worked in the same job for 15 years and had an equal concentration of exposure, the person with 15 years of asbestos exposure has higher cumulative dose and therefore higher risk. However, either, neither or both may become ill from that exposure depending on a given person's own susceptibility to asbestos.
Cigarette smoking is one factor that increases susceptibility to asbestos disease.
Latency Period for Asbestos Diseases
If you do develop an asbestos-related disease, you will probably not show any symptoms until many years after you have been first exposed. The time from first exposure to the discovery of illness (symptoms like shortness of breath, chest pain and chronic fatigue) is called the latency period.
The shortest latency period for asbestosis is 5 to 10 years, although often it takes 40 or more years from first exposure before the disease is diagnosed.
There is no maximum latency or time when the risk of developing asbestos related disease disappears because the asbestos fibres that can cause disease remain trapped in the lungs for life. Also, there is no "safe" level of exposure to asbestos; even minimal levels may cause asbestos disease.
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