Beasley, Allen, Crow, Methvin, Portis & Miles, P.C.

According to a report in Risk & Insurance magazine, legislation currently pending in the Texas Senate would make it easier for people with mesothelioma lawsuits to have their day in court. Senate Bill 1123, which is sponsored by Senator Robert Duncan (R-Lubbock) would eliminate the need for mesothelioma victims to prove exactly how much asbestos they had been exposed to as the source of their cancer.

Mesothelioma is a rare but deadly cancer caused by asbestos exposure. It most often affects the lining of the lungs, but can also affect the lining of the abdomen or, more rarely, the heart.

A 2007 Texas Supreme Court ruling in an asbestosis case requires victims of asbestos disease to show exactly how much asbestos they were exposed to in order to prove causation. Asbestosis is a severe scarring of the lungs caused by exposure to asbestos. The standards in this ruling are currently also applied to mesothelioma lawsuits.

Sen. Duncan argues that the same standards of causation cannot be applied to mesothelioma cases, because of the usually long latency period of the disease. It can sometimes take decades from the point of asbestos exposure until the disease manifests with symptoms. As a result, it is often extremely difficult for plaintiffs to trace back to the source of their exposure and secure qualitative proof of the exact amount of exposure.

Senate Bill 1123 would use what is known as the “Lohrmann standard,” which requires a mesothelioma plaintiff to “prove that exposure to asbestos was frequent, regular and proximal.” The bill would not affect the standard for asbestosis cases.

Some argue that the law will be too lenient, but Risk & Insurance quotes Sen. Duncan as saying the rule will only bring Texas in line with the standard used most widely throughout the rest of the country to determine causation in mesothelioma cases.

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