Environmental asbestotic pleural plaques in northeast Corsica: correlations with airborne and pleural mineralogic analysis.

We report a prevalence study of environmental pleural plaques in subjects over 50 years old from the northeastern Corsican village of Murato, built on asbestos surface deposits. The percentage of plaques was 41%, versus 7.5% in the control village of Vezzani. Although surface deposits contain both chrysotile and tremolite, airborne pollution and asbestos lung burden of exposed inhabitants consist essentially of tremolite as assessed by transmission electron microscopy (TEM). However, TEM analysis of the parietal pleura of three animals bred in exposed areas showed a predominance of short fibers of chrysotile. The respective roles of tremolite and chrysotile in inducing pleural plaques in Corsica should thus be considered.