The Asbestos Disease Awareness Organization (ADAO) is an organization dedicated to serving as the voice of asbestos victims. ADAO, on International Workers Memorial Day, honored and remembered the thousands of workers who have died due to asbestos-caused diseases. Asbestos is the number one carcinogen in workers and causes 54% of all deaths from occupational cancer.

"Given that we are in the 21st century and the hazards of asbestos have been known since the 19th Century, and further revealed in the 20th, it is outrageous that the Congressional tunnel workers were subjected to asbestos exposures over a protracted period of time. Given their exposures and the absence of adequate protection, they have an elevated risk of lung cancer, mesothelioma, and all the other diseases related to asbestos, on top of the asbestosis that has been diagnosed among members of this group" said Arthur L. Frank MD, PhD and Co-Scientific Director of the Asbestos Disease Awareness Organization. "As we pay tribute to former workers on this day of remembrance, we need to take action to protect current workers who are still being abused."

"Asbestos has touched the lives of millions of people, each with names and families, like Nellie Kershaw, the 33 year old factory worker, who was the first case of asbestosis published in medical literature in 1927," said Dr. Richard A. Lemen, Assistant Surgeon General, USPHS (ret.), and Co-Scientific Director of the Asbestos Disease Awareness Organization. "Today we think of the thousands of people, like Nellie Kershaw, who have lost their lives to the highly preventable diseases caused by asbestos."