According to a report in ABC News Australia, around 700 people came out to pay their respects to 55-year-old Ffloyd Laurie from Casino, New South Wales.
Immigrants from some European countries have higher death rates of mesothelioma in Australia.
Laurie is the first confirmed mesothelioma death due to being exposed to dust as a child from a nearby asbestos mine in his hometown of Baryulgil.
Laurie’s father, along with many of the indigenous members of the community, worked in the mine and the children of the local school regularly played with asbestos tailing from the mine in the 1970s.
The Aboriginal health worker was diagnosed with malignant mesothelioma in July 2016 and died from the disease on January 26, 50 years after exposure to the deadly substance.
The concerns are that because of how long mesothelioma takes to develop, Mr. Laurie is just the start of what could be a major epidemic of mesothelioma in the area.
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