McKEAN COUNTY, PA, ASBESTOS LAWYER
Pennsylvania: Hot spot for asbestos-related disease, including mesothelioma

Asbestos injury law firm Weitz & Luxenberg, recognized for achieving record-breaking compensation awards for workers diagnosed with occupational mesothelioma and lung cancer, is pleased to announce that the firm is expanding its practice to Pennsylvania. Our lawyers are now accepting asbestos-injury cases from residents in McKean County, Pa., through the communication form on this page.

Weitz & Luxenberg's 25-year track record for achieving outstanding verdicts and settlements for workers poisoned by asbestos includes a $16-million verdict last year, the first successful asbestos verdict against a dental supply company. In 2007, the firm obtained a $37-million jury verdict for the families of two smokers with lung cancer who died from asbestos exposure.

March 23, 2009 – Pennsylvania has the dubious distinction of being ranked right up there after California, Florida and New York for deaths attributed specifically to asbestos-related mesothelioma and asbestosis, according to a national study conducted by the EWG Action Fund, a non-profit environmental research group headquartered in Washington, D.C.

Ranked fourth state in the nation for asbestos-related mesothelioma mortalities, Pennsylvania recorded at least 3,046 deaths due to asbestos exposure since 1979, according to the detailed report. The authors examined asbestos deaths on three levels – state, county and city – as reported to the federal government via death certificate records from 1979 through 2001.

The state's mortality figure most likely represents less than 20 percent of total asbestos-related deaths during that time, says the study, because the federal government did not track mesothelioma as a cause of death until 1999.

McKean County asbestos lawyer

On the EWG's list of the Top 100 counties in the United States recording deaths due to asbestos, Pennsylvania contains five. They are: Philadelphia County (ranked No. 3), Delaware County (No. 13); Allegheny County (No. 16); Montgomery County (No. 17) and Lancaster County (No. 84).

Philadelphia and Pittsburgh are the state's metropolitan centers that have been hit the hardest by asbestos. Pennsylvania also has two government-listed asbestos-contamination sites; one located in Ellwood City, the other in New Castle, Pa.

The above study projects that in the next decade 35,000 people nationwide will be diagnosed with the deadliest form of asbestos-related cancer, mesothelioma. This disease, fatal in every case, is most often the result of industrial workplace exposure to asbestos, and usually contracted through employers’ emphasis on profits rather than the health and safety of company workers. That’s why people diagnosed with mesothelioma and surviving family members have strong cases in court.

Weitz & Luxenberg, the workers' law firm

If you have been diagnosed with mesothelioma, please complete the form on this page for a free evaluation of your legal right to financial compensation. There is absolutely no cost to you until we achieve a verdict or settlement in your favor.