Malignant mesothelioma is a latent disease that can take anywhere from thirty to forty years to become fully developed and symptomatic. The average age associated with a diagnosis of mesothelioma is between fifty and seventy years of age. The average post diagnosis survival time of mesothelioma sufferers is between one and two years. Therefore, mesothelioma is commonly a cause of death for people ranging from sixty to eighty years of age. Barry Welch was thirty-two years old.
A father of three, Barry Welch of Leicester, England, considered the youngest victim of malignant mesothelioma on record. Mr. Welch fought long and hard against the cancer can not be cured for eleven months, where the wife and her children were forced to watch him deteriorate from a healthy husband and father worn down victims of malignant mesothelioma. Mr. Welch's battle ended on the 27th of April, 2004, when he finally succumbed to the rare disease.
Even more strange than Mr. Welch's young age was the fact that he had never been faced with direct contact to asbestos. The questions arises on how he could have malignant mesothelioma, a disease who's only known cause is exposure to the carcinogenic micro fibers released by asbestos minerals. It was surmised that Mr. Welch must have been indirectly exposed via fibers brought home by his stepfather, Roger Bugsby, on his work overalls. Throughout the 1970s and prior to widespread asbestos regulation, Mr. Bugsby worked as a scaffolder at a powder station in Kent, England. Faced with asbestos exposure on a daily basis, Mr. Bugsby would return home with layers of the hazardous dust particles lining his clothes, skin and hair.
An inquest revealed that Mr. Bugsby would often return home and relax before changing out of his work clothes. He and stepson Barry would spend time together with Barry often sitting on his stepfather's lap. It is a somewhat common occurrence for indirect contact with asbestos to lead to contraction of mesothelioma by family members, most often with women who were responsible for the washing of their husband's contaminated clothing.
When he died, mesothelioma cancer had ravaged Barry's system. A victim of pleural mesothelioma, a cancer affecting the mesothelial tissue lining of the lung cavity, Barry was further burdened when the aggressive cancer metastasized and spread to his liver. Radical surgical procedures were considered for Barry; however, the mesothelioma's effect on the lymph glands of his chest left the cancer virtually inoperable.
It is believed that Barry Welch contracted pleural malignant mesothelioma as a child through contact with his stepfather's clothes. The disease lay dormant for more than 20 years before reaching its uncontrollable stage. Although a somewhat common occurrence for someone to contract malignant mesothelioma indirectly from a family member, the story of Barry Welch is no less of a tragedy. Asbestos litigation continues to target the negligent parties liable for hundreds of thousands of asbestos-related deaths. www.mesorfa.org
