Faro has become the latest municipality in the Algarve to declare all its state-run schools “asbestos-free”.
The announcement came after the building component – which has been linked to pulmonary illnesses as well as cancer – was removed from E.B 2,3 D. Afonso III, E.B. 2,3 Dr. José de Jesus Neves Júnior, E.B 2,3 Dr. Joaquim Magalhães and Escola Básica/Jardim de Infância do Montenegro.
Around €4.3 million of EU funding was made available to Algarve boroughs last year to help them remove asbestos from their schools.
In September, Lagoa also announced that it had removed asbestos roofing from its public schools.
According to the World Health Organisation, exposure to asbestos occurs through “inhalation of fibres in air in the working environment, ambient air in the vicinity of point sources such as factories handling asbestos, or indoor air in housing and buildings containing friable (crumbly) asbestos materials.”
Exposure cause lung cancer, mesothelioma, cancer of the larynx and ovary, and asbestosis (fibrosis of the lungs), it adds.
