17:00 - 19:30, International Conference Hall
Plenary Session 3
Empowerment of Victims and Their Families
Chairs: Natori Yuji and Annie Debaud-Mony
 |
Annie Thebaud-Mony
Institut National de la Sante et de la Recherche Medicale (INSERM), France
ABSTRACT:
For many decades French society lived the drama of an epidemic of mesothelioma and other asbestos related diseases without any consciousness of it. The asbestos industry strategy was to hide from the public the health consequences of asbestos manufacture and use. The industry was aided in this strategy of deception by experts- scientists, physicians, and lawyers - until the emergence of a strong social movement of victims of asbestos exposure brought to light the epidemic. France banned all manufacture and use of asbestos in 1997.This social movement of the victims of asbestos exposure in France played an important role in the evolution of the asbestos politics in the nineties. Actually the National Association of Defense of the Asbestos Victims (ANDEVA) is coordinating the action of more than twenty five local or regional groups.While victims of asbestos exposure rarely received compensation for asbestos-related diseases before 1995, after that time France saw a spectacular growth in asbestos compensation claims and awards in the civil courts, finally recognizing the fault of the employers. The paper will emphasize on the strategies of two victims' local groups in France. One of them is the first workers' group - basically women - who was engaged since more than twenty years in a fight for justice for asbestos victims in France, not only about individual compensation but also by the way of criminal claims against the last employer of the textile factory where they worked. The second one is the history of a collective fight for the responsible management of a polluted site, leaded by the family of a victim who died of mesothelioma.