Coloured sand products linked to an asbestos contamination scare have so far been identified at more than 100 sites in South Australia following checks at schools and preschools, the state’s education department has confirmed.<\/p>\n
The SA Department of Education said loose sand had been detected at “about 20 sites” and sand in containers at a further 88, and that it was helping to “manage the removal of it”.<\/p>\n
Earlier this week, the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) issued a national recall notice for various coloured sand products after testing detected traces of asbestos.<\/p>\n
More than a dozen schools in Canberra and one school in Brisbane were closed on Friday due to potential asbestos exposure.<\/p>\n
In South Australia, the state’s education department said no schools had been closed, but it had issued a hazard alert to “all schools, preschools and OSHC sites”.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The alert advised “how to check for the product, what to do if they have it on site, and how to communicate with families”.<\/p>\n
“About 130 sites in South Australia have reported to the department \u2014 with contained sand at about 88 sites and loose sand at about 20 sites,” a department spokesperson said.<\/p>\n
“The department is helping to manage the removal of it in a safe and secure way through a licensed contractor.”<\/p>\n
The spokesperson said the department’s approach was consistent with actions taken interstate, including in Victoria and New South Wales.<\/p>\n
“The safety of students and staff remains the department’s highest priority,” the spokesperson said.<\/p>\n
“The risk is low and is being managed in line with national standards and expert advice from SafeWork SA.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Coloured sand products linked to an asbestos contamination scare have so far been identified at more than 100…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":285521,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[11275,40659,64,63,99,164880,6012,6016,164932,164931,80988,20637,4211],"class_list":["post-285520","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-accc","tag-asbestos","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-business","tag-coloured-sand","tag-commission","tag-consumer","tag-couloured","tag-pre-school","tag-sand","tag-school","tag-schools"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/285520","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=285520"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/285520\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/285521"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=285520"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=285520"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=285520"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}