An Italian study concerning the case histories of workers who were exposed to asbestos or other hazardous materials and the symptoms they subsequently developed. Asbestos exposure is known to caused a number of serious diseases, including mesothelioma, asbestosis, lung cancer, and pleural diseases. Although it may take decades after asbestos exposure for a worker to receive a mesothelioma diagnosis, the disease is almost always fatal even with mesothelioma treatments.