COVID stalks Montana town already saddled with asbestos disease

By Nate Hegyi

Kaiser Health News

LIBBY — Frank Fahland has spent most days since the pandemic began at the site of his dream house, working to finish a 15-year labor of love while keeping away from town and the people closest to him.

Like thousands of people from Libby and Lincoln County in the far northwestern corner of Montana, the 61-year-old Fahland has scarred lungs after years of breathing in asbestos fibers from dust and soil contaminated by the town’s now-defunct plant that produced vermiculite, a mineral used in insulation and gardening.

Fahland recently gave a visitor a to...