asbestos concerns to their doctor after he was diagnosed with TWO asbestos-related
diseases.
working with asbestos roofing sheets in the 1960s.
every day – believed he was fit and healthy his whole life.
started getting breathless.
NHS medics and charities like Clydebank Asbestos Group before it’s too late.
strange in itself given Glasgow’s working heritage – so you need to flag it up if they
don’t.
to come home with asbestos on their clothes.
hundreds, if not thousands, more unknowingly suffering worse conditions than me.
for you and pick up the pieces.”
construction firm John Young as a rigger erector in the 1960s.
One of his duties involved removing asbestos roof sheets – or ‘lagging’ – from a
warehouse on South Street in Glasgow city centre.
But as the firm never supplied Iain with safety gloves, breathing masks or boiler suits
the deadly asbestos fibres entered his lungs and skin.
was a wage.
“I had no idea anything bad happened to me until 2017.”
Two years ago worried wife Helen MacKenzie, 67, grew concerned when her
husband became breathless while simply putting on his socks.
The retired shop worker said: “I’d never seen Iain like that before – it was so
“But I was concerned something more serious was going on so we just had to go to
the doctor.”
The local GP referred Iain to an asthma specialist at Gartnavel Hospital but the
specialist raised concerns and sent him to a respiratory expert at the Queen Elizabeth
University Hospital.
After undergoing tests at the QEUH – including a thoracoscopy where medics
examine the lungs with a camera – it was confirmed the retired tradesman had pleural
plaques and pleural thickening.
Iain – who has four kids, five grandkids and one great-grandchild – said: “I was
shocked by the diagnosis because it’s something you think happens to other people – I
know about a dozen men who contracted an asbestos-related illness.
“Over the last few years I’ve been diagnosed with various chest infections or
pneumonia and I wonder if things would be different now if the doctor had simply
spoken to me about asbestos.
“But I’m glad we know about it now because it means me and my family can get the
medical, social and legal support we need.”