Ryan Hoy, Jane Bourke: Monash University | 8 August 2019

Safe Work Australia recently announced that in three years’ time it will cut the silica dust exposure limit from 0.1 milligrams per cubic metre over an eight-hour shift to 0.05 milligrams.

Monash University’s Dr Ryan Hoy – a research fellow and respiratory physician – first heard of the alarming new silicosis outbreak in Australia in 2015 through the case of a Vietnamese stonemason in New South Wales. Now, just four years later, the incurable disease is at epidemic levels, with young tradespeople either dying or having lung transplants. Both outcomes, Dr Hoy says, death or usually terminal illness, are “unnecessary”.