Some of the most tragic mesothelioma cases involve people who were exposed to asbestos as children — not at any job, but simply by growing up in the home of a parent who worked in an asbestos trade. Because mesothelioma has a latency of 20 to 50 years, a child exposed in the 1960s or 1970s may be diagnosed as an adult today.

How Children Were Exposed

A parent — usually a father — came home from an asbestos job covered in fibers, and children were exposed through everyday family life:

  • Hugging a parent still wearing dusty work clothes
  • Sitting on a parent’s lap or being carried while they wore contaminated clothing
  • Playing in the laundry area or near where work clothes were shaken out and washed
  • Riding in the family car that carried asbestos fibers
  • Living in a home where fibers had settled into carpets, furniture, and dust
  • In some cases, greeting a parent at the plant gate or visiting the workplace

Children breathe faster than adults relative to body size, and their exposure came during years of close physical contact with a parent — a combination that made household exposure a genuine risk.

Diagnosed Decades Later

A person exposed as a child often has no memory of any “asbestos exposure” — they simply grew up in a normal household. When mesothelioma appears in mid-life, the connection to a parent’s long-ago occupation may not be obvious. Identifying that a parent worked in an asbestos trade is often the key to understanding the diagnosis and to any claim.

A Recognized Basis for a Claim

Take-home exposure claims brought by the children of asbestos workers are recognized in asbestos litigation. A person diagnosed with mesothelioma from childhood household exposure may be entitled to compensation, even though the exposure happened decades ago and they never worked with asbestos.

What to Document

  • The parent’s occupation and employer(s) during your childhood
  • The trade (insulation, shipyard, construction, auto, industrial)
  • The years you lived in the household

If you were diagnosed with mesothelioma and were exposed to asbestos as a child through a parent who worked in an asbestos trade, you may be entitled to compensation through asbestos trust funds and civil litigation.

This information is educational and does not constitute legal or medical advice.