The public health blog Effect Measure has a post on the difference in asbestos use between the developed countries and the developing countries. Apparently, in the 1980s the Canadian government actively sought new markets for asbestos in the face of declining use in the US and Europe. Of course, the reason for the declining use was that people knew asbestos was toxic. (Asbestos has been known to be a health hazard for decades.) And yet the Canadian government took it upon itself to try to get Third World people to use this hazardous stuff. Wonderful.