Asbestos Blues

From the mid-1940s to the mid-1970s, blue asbestos was mined in South Africa for worldwide use. More recently, it has been identified as one of the most dangerous carcinogens to which humans can be exposed. Yet the asbestos mining industry and the South African government have been slow to respond to the health concerns of miners and to the environmental devastation, which has left vast areas of the Northern Cape permanently hazardous. In "Asbestos Blues", Jock McCulloch explores the extent to which the South African government participated in turning company profits at the expense of poor black workers.