For the record: Doing asbestos I can under the circumstances

For more on why you should be worried.

For the record:

The EPA has only received 1984 comments on its new asbestos regs so far. That's way low (especially since the deadline is midnight), and will probably encourage people who want to loosen regs on toxic substances.

You can submit your comment here:https://t.co/9nuNTI2MSo

— hilzoy (@hilzoy) August 11, 2018

I submitted the following text.

I'm very worried about this change in policy toward a highly carcinogenic substance that has devastated so many lives with mesothelioma and other diseases, and has finally begun coming under control in recent years. I can't help thinking that allowing new uses of asbestos to escape government review if they don't belong to the basic list of 15 uses is reckless, especially in an environment where the EPA has increasingly disregarded all kinds of dangers, rejecting the science, from former secretary Pruitt's refusal to follow scientists' recommendations on the use of the dangerous insecticide chlorpyrifos, in March 2017, which I believe the courts have recently ruled on, to ongoing refusal to enforce regulations on filthy glider truck engines.

It's hard to feel comfortable with EPA assurances when we're hearing from a Russian asbestos company how pleased they are (at a time when our president is suspected of having made his own personal secret business arrangements with the Russian government) and when we hear that, once again, EPA professional staff have asked for the rule to be reconsidered and political staff haven't been willing to do it, as described at https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/10/climate/epa-asbestos-rule.html:

"The internal E.P.A. emails indicate that, this year, top E.P.A. officials sought a last-minute change in the language of the rule.

“'Upper management asked us to take a different approach,' wrote Robert T. Courtnage, an associate chief in E.P.A.’s Office of Pollution Prevention and Toxics, in an April 25 email sent to 13 members of an agency group working on the then-forthcoming proposal. Specifically: Rather than call for all new uses of asbestos to come before the E.P.A. for a risk review, the rule would include just 15 specific uses that would trigger a federal assessment."

Please don't push this rule through.

I know it's late, but please do what you can.