What are the risk factors, or who gets mesothelioma?

What are the risk factors, or who gets mesothelioma? 

Anyone can get mesothelioma; it occurs across all races and genders and is found in young and old alike. The dominating risk factor in developing mesothelioma is exposure to asbestos. The risk is greatly increased in people who have had repeated exposure to asbestos for prolonged periods of time. The majority of people who develop this disease can trace their exposure back to jobs where they encountered asbestos. Thirty percent of all mesothelioma patients are navy veterans having been exposed in the boiler room of the ships or working in the shipyards. Other highrisk professions include brake repair workers, construction workers, those who worked with or manufactured insulation materials, and people who work in asbestos abatement (removal of asbestos). 

We often talk of "secondhand" exposure, which would affect those who came into contact with mesothelioma through asbestos fibers brought home on workers' clothing and equipment. Many people are exposed at home, schools, or office buildings during renovation projects.

It has been reported that the Simian virus 40 (SV40), a virus that contaminated the polio vaccine between 1954 and 1963, may increase the risk of developing mesothelioma in asbestos-exposed individuals who harbor this virus. This virus was first found in rhesus monkeys and is now found in the human population. Though the vaccine no longer contains the virus, an unknown proportion of the population is infected with the virus despite not having received a contaminated strain of the vaccine. It is thought that it may be spread through human feces, breast milk, and semen. The virus alone has not demonstrated the ability to cause mesothelioma but one hypothesis is that it can act along with asbestos to increase the risk of mesothelioma in humans. This has been demonstrated in cell and animal tissue experiments. The relevance of this finding is still under investigation.

Patients who previously received high doses of radiation therapy for prior malignancies can develop mesothelioma and other more common cancers. Usually patients have been treated for lymphoma in the chest. Nevertheless, there are very few reports in the medical literature of mesothelioma developing after radiation therapy and with asbestos being so widely used and so many people unknowingly exposed, it is difficult to tell whether these people were also exposed to asbestos at some time in their lives. 

Lastly, there are data that a person's own genes can play an important role in determining who is susceptible to these mineral fibers and will then develop mesothelioma. Recently a genetic mutation has been found that makes an individual more susceptible to mesothelioma and melanoma of the eye. Hopefully this finding will benefit patients suffering from these diseases not only for the development of new treatment options, but also in developing early detection strategies in highrisk individuals who carry this mutation and who are exposed to asbestos. It is anticipated that more genes with similar properties will be discovered in studies that will uncover all the known mutations in mesothelioma.

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