Many asbestos lawsuits alleging asbestos disease and mesothelioma have also claimed that workplace exposure to asbestos has resulted in a diagnosis of asbestos cancer years and often decades following exposure, due to the fact that asbestos has a long latency period within the human body.

However, a recent asbestos lawsuit claims that a family member of someone exposed to asbestos on the job led to secondhand asbestos exposure.

Plaintiff Cameron D., a California resident, has filed an asbestos cancer lawsuit against the retail home improvement chain, Lowe’s, as well as Stock Building Supply and The Scotts Company alleging that they played a role in the asbestos exposure that directly led to him developing mesothelioma.

Cameron alleges in the asbestos mesothelioma lawsuit that during the course of his father’s employment at various job sites with the defendants, his father was exposed to asbestos particles and equipment and that it was these work activities that caused Cameron to be exposed to asbestos.

Cameron claims that asbestos particles were unknowingly carried home on the clothing and hair of his father, causing Cameron exposure to asbestos which eventually led to his development of malignant pleural mesothelioma.

Cameron is filing the asbestos lawsuit because he alleges that the defendants negligently and knowingly subjected him to exposure to dangerous asbestos and failed to warn individuals working at their job sites, including his own father, about the dangers associated with the use and inhalation of dust and fibers from asbestos and asbestos-containing products or materials.

Cameron’s wife, Krisha, is also suing Lowe’s and the named defendants, alleging loss of consortium (loss of intimacy with a spouse) as a result of her husband’s mesothelioma and the negligence of the defendants.

Secondary Asbestos Exposure

Direct exposure to asbestos in the workplace has long been recognized as a dangerous health hazard. Recently, however, the medical profession has begun to realize that those who did not work directly with the dangerous substance could also be affected by asbestos

More and more cases of so-called secondary asbestos exposure — or second-hand asbestos exposure — have been cropping up, enough so that doctors are beginning to recognize it as a serious concern.

Secondary exposure to asbestos occurs among those who are exposed to dangerous asbestos fibers but not as a direct result of working with the material itself.

Most often, such cases involve women or children who inhaled asbestos fibers that were brought home on the clothing of someone who did have direct daily contact with the material, such as a spouse, father, grandfather, or brother.

Asbestos Mesothelioma

Studies show asbestos causes mesothelioma, a rare cancer that affects the thin, protective membrane surrounding the lungs, heart or abdominal cavity. It is estimated that approximately 3,000 new cases of asbestos mesothelioma are diagnosed each year.

Because the signs of mesothelioma, asbestosis and other asbestos-related diseases often take a long time to manifest, diagnosis of these ailments often comes decades after asbestos exposure.

There is no cure for these asbestos exposure injuries and most of those who are diagnosed with mesothelioma from asbestos often only have a prognosis of one to five years after the illness is diagnosed.

In many cases, industries and employers knew for years that asbestos exposure was dangerous to their workers and their families, but put profits ahead of safety and failed to warn them of the dangers of asbestos exposure.

The Asbestos Mesothelioma Lawsuit is Case No. 5:15-cv-00285-D, U.S. District Court, Eastern District of North Carolina, Western Division.