Mesothelioma News: New Zealand Asbestos Guide – Nov 2016

 New Zealand has created a new guide for managing and removing asbestos in the workplace. The guide is called the Approved Code of Practices for the Management and Removal of Asbestos or ACOP. Most of all, the guide works with the Health and Safety at Work (asbestos) Regulations 2016. WorkSafe New Zealand is the government agency that released the guide.

The new guide hopes to reduce asbestos related deaths by 2024. The new code took effect on November, 3^rd 2016. Each year about one hundred and seventy people die in New Zealand as a result of asbestos related diseases. Furthermore, asbestos is the single greatest cause of death as a result of work related diseases. This is according to WorkSafe New Zealand.

The guide is meant to be an all-inclusive resource for people in the business of asbestos removal or abatement. In addition it also serves people who remove asbestos in the workplace, at home and for people who do asbestos related work.

New Zealand Asbestos Ban

On October, 1 2016, New Zealand joined the fifty seven other countries that have banned asbestos. These countries and New Zealand made it illegal to import asbestos containing products into the country. New Zealand joins countries like United Kingdom, Austria, Japan, Italy, Ireland and Germany to mention a few.

However, while the efforts of New Zealand are well placed, asbestos exposure deaths are expected to continue. It is expected that there will continue to be these deaths for many decades. This is as a result of the asbestos latency period related to asbestos related diseases. Such a disease is mesothelioma, a rare and aggressive cancer. Mesothelioma has a sixty to seventy year latency period. A latency period is the time between the first asbestos exposure and the start of symptoms.

Finally, while the ban is in place there are a large number of New Zealand buildings that have asbestos materials in them.