Mesothelioma

Mary Manning, the director of health promotion and chronic disease at the Minnesota Department of Health, says these new cases make it imperative to rule out other possible sources of "People are dying from That is exactly what the first of the new Department of Health studies hopes to do.

The project is a follow up to a 2003 study of Minnesota mine workers.

It will research possible places where workers who now have Officials hope the study will also answer questions about the possible dangers of taconite dust.

"Those fragments get into the air and there's been questions over the years about what the health effects associated with those mineral fragments are," she said.

John Linc Stine, director for environmental health at the Minnesota Department of Health, is studying the effects of breathing taconite dust on lab rats to determine a safe level for humans - that is, how many fibers in how much air is a safe level of exposure.

No such standard now exis...

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