Historical Perspectives on the Uses and Health Risks of Beryllium

Unawareness of the health risks of beryllium resulted in a decade of unmitigated exposure of several thousand workers and numerous cases of beryllium disease in employees and nearby residents. Subsequent adoption of exposure limits and their implementation with effective technical controls reduced the occurrence of new cases, which were mainly due to accidental exposures, to a minimum. The fact that continuously growing production and consumption did not alter this trend demonstrates the effectiveness of the present threshold limit value. It shows that the potential health hazard can be well contained and that beryllium can be produced and fabricated without undue risk to employees or the general public.