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Rachel Lee, a Korean asbestos victim, came to Quebec in December 2010 as a member of the Asia-Quebec Solidarity delegation to ask that Quebec stop exporting asbestos. Her one desire was to save others from dying from asbestos.

Rachel herself died from mesothelioma yesterday. She had been exposed to asbestos when she lived for a period in an apartment building close to a chrysotile asbestos-cement factory in Korea. Korea has since banned asbestos, but in the past most of its asbestos came from Quebec.

Around the world, victims of asbestos and the international labour movement are paying homage to her courage and selflessness.

While in Quebec, Rachel met with Quebec Minister Clément Gignac and asked him face to face to stop exporting asbestos death. Here is the letter just sent to Minister Gignac, asking him to honour Rachel’s appeal that his government not fund the asbestos traders who want to relaunch the Jeffrey asbestos mine and that Quebec permanently stop exporting asbestos.

Rachel speaking out at Quebec press conference

Rachel Lee demonstrating outside Quebec Premier Charest's office with banner: "Are our dead not enough?"

December 22, 2011

Clément Gignac, Minister of Natural Resources

National Assembly, Québec

Dear Minister Gignac:

On December 9, 2010, you met Ms. Rachel Lee in the National Assembly. Ms. Lee was suffering from cancer caused by asbestos (mesothelioma). She was part of the Asia-Quebec Solidarity Delegation. She came to Quebec to request that your government not fund the re-opening of the Jeffrey mine and stop exporting asbestos.

We wish to inform you that Ms. Lee died of mesothelioma yesterday. Below are two photos taken when she was in Quebec last December and a photo taken yesterday while she was dying. Her young son is beside her.

While she was in Quebec, she was taking powerful medication to deal with the excruciating pain she was experiencing. Despite her personal suffering, she came to Quebec in the middle of winter, motivated by courage and altruism, seeking to prevent others from suffering the tragedy that she and her family were suffering as victims of asbestos. It is hard to forget and even harder to forgive that during her stay in Quebec, Ms. Lee was attacked by Jacques Dunnigan, PhD, of the asbestos lobby, who accused her and the Asian delegation of trickery, falsely saying that she was not really suffering from mesothelioma. This attack caused Ms. Lee much pain.

We think that you will agree that this attack showed extreme callousness and cruelty, that dishonours Quebec.

Ms. Lee had never worked in a factory using asbestos,. She simply lived in an apartment building near a large Korean factory manufacturing chrysotile asbestos cement products. Other residents of the building have also died or are suffering from mesothelioma. Most of the asbestos imported into Korea came from Quebec.

When Ms. Lee spoke at a press conference at the Quebec National Assembly last December, she could not help crying when speaking of her two children who would become orphans and her husband, who would become a widower. The tragic outcome she foresaw became reality yesterday.

Mr. Minister, you met and you heard the appeal that Ms. Lee made that to you personally that your government not fund the re-opening of the Jeffrey mine and not create more asbestos victims. She asked you the question: “Are our dead not enough?”

We ask you, and the new Minister of Economic Development, Sam Hamad, and Premier Charest, to restore the honour of Quebec, to honour the appeal made to you by Rachel Lee on behalf of asbestos victims around the world and not fund the Jeffrey mine. In this way, the tragedy of Rachel Lee’s death, and the deaths of thousands of other asbestos victims every year, will have served some purpose.

We await your response with hope.

DR FERNAND TURCOTTE, MD, Professor Emeritus, Department of Social & Preventive Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, Université Laval *

KATHLEEN RUFF, author, Exporting Harm: How Canada markets asbestos to the developing world; coordinator, Asia-Québec Solidarity delegation

ÉRIC DARIER, Ph.D., Director of Greenpeace Québec *

MICHELINE BEAUDRY, Ph.D., retired professor of public nutrition, Université Laval *

NOTE: We, the signers, had the great privilege of knowing Rachel Lee when she came to Québec in December 2010

* Institutions named for identification purposes only

Copy: Minister of Economic Development, Sam Hamad

December 4, 2011

Dear Roshi Chadha:

I applaud your commitment to protecting people’s health, as evidenced by your role as a member of the Board of Governors of the Canadian Red Cross, a member of the Board of Directors of St. Mary’s Hospital Foundation and a member of the Board of Directors of McGill University Health Centre. I note that at St Mary’s Hospital, you have championed the Chrysalis program, which links “women who share a belief that Knowledge is Power and pivotal to the decision-making process regarding health-related issues through regular seminars with leading medical practitioners.”

At the same time as promoting health, you are an executive of Seja Trade Ltd, a company registered at your home address that exports asbestos from the Jeffrey asbestos mine to factories in India that make asbestos-cement construction materials, factories that make asbestos friction parts for automobiles and a factory that, apparently, makes inflatable balloons. The managing director of Seja’s prime client in India, Hyderabad Industries Ltd, states that “this particular asbestos has not been known to give cancer, so far”. Hyderabad Industries Ltd. informs its customers in India that “asbestos cement products present no known risk on health”. Video: Foreign Correspondent examines the trade in asbestos between the developed and developing world. (ABC News)

As you surely know, this is false information that will cause loss of life. It is indisputable that all asbestos causes cancer and the asbestos industry itself admits that cutting asbestos-cement construction materials with a mechanical saw (a typical activity) releases dangerous high levels of asbestos fibres into the air for workers and surrounding people to breathe in. The attached photo shows this activity in India, with the smiling worker and the nearby child being exposed to harm. You will note that the worker’s hair is covered in white dust. This situation would be illegal in Canada, but is common in India, where the population is not even aware that it is hazardous to their health.

I believe that your role in exporting asbestos as an executive of Seja Trade Ltd is in conflict with your role as a board member of the Canadian Red Cross, St Mary’s Hospital Foundation and the McGill University Health Centre.

The Canadian Medical Association, the Canadian Cancer Society, the Canadian Public Health Association, the Quebec government’s own sixteen Directors of Public Health, as well as numerous other medical authorities, have strongly and unanimously called for the export of asbestos to end and have opposed the re-opening of the Jeffrey mine, saying that it would lead to loss of life.

You have a duty, I believe, to listen to reputable medical experts, not to the discredited asbestos lobby, which makes profit from asbestos sales and is in a conflict of interest position.

Please, Roshi Chadha, listen to the voice of Quebec’s and Canada’s medical authorities to stop exporting asbestos. Please meet with the leaders of the Canadian Cancer Society and the Canadian Medical Association. Please put health ahead of profits. Please stop exporting asbestos.

If you are determined to keep exporting asbestos, along with the deadly misinformation that it will not cause harm, then I ask that you resign from the boards of the Canadian Red Cross, St. Mary’s Hospital Foundation and the McGill University Health Centre, since your role as an asbestos trader is causing harm to health overseas and directly conflicts with the goals and values of these organisations.

I deeply hope that you will take a stand to support health and look forward to receiving your response.

Sincerely,

Kathleen Ruff, author, Exporting Harm: How Canada markets asbestos to the developing world; recipient, National Public Health Hero award, 2011, Canadian Public Health Association

Baljit Singh Chadha and his consortium of anonymous investors have not yet succeeded in signing an agreement to invest $25 million to open up the Jeffrey underground asbestos mine in Asbestos, Quebec.

Bernard Coulombe, president of the Jeffrey mine, says that he is convinced that he can get a financial document signed by the investors before Christmas. Coulombe was in Dubai last week for an important meeting of the members of the consortium. He also met major customers to assure them with regard to supplying them with chrysotile asbestos. Coulombe said that he expects that the Quebec government will make an immediate decision regarding the $58 million loan guarantee immediately after receiving the signed financial document.

The Quebec government has repeatedly extended the deadline for the consortium to come up with its $25 million financing.

Chadha and his consortium made a purchase offer for the Jeffrey mine in October 2010. Their offer was accepted in November 2010. In December last year, the mayor of Asbestos said that he hoped for a Christmas present of the $58 million loan guarantee from the government. A year later, the media state that “Asbestos will not have its present for Christmas”.

Around the world, asbestos victims and health defenders, as well as all the government of Quebec’s Public Health directors, have expressed their deep opposition to this heartless project, which will contribute to suffering and asbestos-related disease and death in developing countries.

Kathleen Ruff, RightOnCanada

                                                                                                                                                Baljit and Roshi Chadha

 Roshi Chadha is a member of the Board of Governors of the Canadian Red Cross. She is also an asbestos exporter.

Since 1981, she has been an executive of Seja Trade Ltd., a Montreal company that has for years been exporting asbestos from the open-pit Jeffrey asbestos mine in Quebec to India. Her husband, Baljit Singh Chadha, who is seeking to revive the dying Quebec asbestos industry, is not publicly identified with Seja Trade Ltd.

The Jeffrey open-pit mine has closed down, but Baljit Chadha is lobbying the Quebec government for a $58 million loan guarantee in order to open a new underground Jeffrey mine, which would export of millions of tonnes of asbestos to Asia for the next 25 to 50 years. He states that his project will be financially profitable.

The mandate of the Canadian Red Cross, however, is to promote human health, not financial profits. On its website, the Red Cross states that “All Red Cross programs and activities are guided by the fundamental principles of humanity, impartiality, neutrality, independence, voluntary service, unity and universality. These principles allow us to provide help immediately to whoever needs it, wherever they are, whatever their race, political beliefs, religion, social status or culture. We are a leading humanitarian organization through which people voluntarily demonstrate their caring for others in need.”

As an asbestos exporter, Roshi Chadha is violating the values and standards of the Red Cross. She is contributing to harming people overseas and contributing to a double standard under which asbestos is being removed from schools in Canada to protect Canadian children, while being placed in schools in India, where there are no safety protections and children will be exposed to asbestos harm.

When the Red Cross is involved in relief efforts after a natural disaster, such as the earthquake in Indonesia, asbestos-contaminated rubble is an additional health risk threatening survivors and Red Cross relief workers. For this reason, the World Bank has stated that no asbestos should be used in regions prone to earthquakes and other natural disasters.

Roshi Chadha is also a member of the Board of Directors of the St. Mary’s Hospital Foundation and a member of the Board of Directors of the McGill University Health Centre in Montreal.

At St Mary’s Hospital, she has championed the Chrysalis program, which links “women who share a belief that Knowledge is Power and pivotal to the decision-making process regarding health-related issues through regular seminars with leading medical practitioners.”

But when it comes to the asbestos she exports, Roshi Chadha has a different standard and refuses to heed reputable medical information. The Canadian Medical Association, the Canadian Cancer Society, the Canadian Public Health Association, the Quebec government’s own sixteen Directors of Public Health, as well as numerous other medical authorities, have strongly and unanimously called for the export of asbestos to end and have opposed the re-opening of the Jeffrey mine, saying that asbestos from the mine would lead to loss of life.

Roshi Chadha’s role in exporting asbestos as an executive of Seja Trade Ltd is in direct conflict with her role as a board member of the Canadian Red Cross, St Mary’s Hospital Foundation and the McGill University Health Centre.

Asbestos victims have written to Roshi Chadha and to the Canadian Red Cross, St Mary’s Hospital Foundation and the McGill University Health Centre, asking that she support health and stop exporting asbestos harm or that otherwise she be asked to resign. To date, they have received no reply.