There's a documentary somewhere ( this might be it ) about the town of Asbest, Russia (where like all the asbestos comes from) that interviews people who live there (they mostly mine asbestos). The miners are real macho guys who think asbestos is perfectly safe. The cancer rates in Asbest are really high, unsurprisingly.

Interesting. Though I could see almost any property owner wanting this, too. And also many manufacturers of random things. It used to be everywhere.