Occupational Health & Safety
lborkowski | November 11, 2010While Veterans Day is an opportunity to thank veterans for their service, it should also be a time to consider how well we're doing at taking care of veterans who've suffered physical or mental damage as a result of their service.
Our country wasn't sufficiently prepared to handle the toll that operations in Iraq and Afghanistan would take on our servicemembers. We can be grateful that battlefield medicine has improved, and that those like Marine Cpl. Todd Nicely can survive severe injuries (requiring a quadruple amputation in his case) and get advanced prosthetic limbs and extensive…
lborkowski | November 9, 2010This month marks the 10th anniversary of the Needlestick Safety and Prevention Act, which was passed in response to the problem of healthcare workers being exposed to bloodborne pathogens (HIV, hepatitis, etc.) via sharps injuries. The Act directed OSHA to modify its existing bloodborne pathogen standard to require that employers update their exposure control plans to reflect advances in technology (e.g., needleless systems and sharps with injury protection); maintain sharps injury logs; and solicit input from non-managerial employees potentially exposed to contaminated sharps. (View the…
lborkowski | November 5, 2010Researchers from the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health analyzed data on nursing-home employees from the 2004 National Nursing Assistant Survey and learned the following about on-the-job violence:
Thirty-four percent of nursing assistants surveyed reported experiencing physical injuries from residents' aggression in the previous year. Mandatory overtime (odds ratio [OR] = 1.65; 95% confidence interval [CI] = 1.22, 2.24) and not having enough time to assist residents with their activities of daily living (OR = 1.49; 95% CI = 1.25, 1.78) were strongly associated with…
cmonforton | November 3, 2010For the first time in the agency's history, the Labor Department's Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA) went to federal court to ask that a dangerous coal mine be shut down until it fixes its safety problems once and for all. In its official complaint to the U.S.district court for the eastern district of Kentucky, the agency refers to Section 108(a)(2) saying:
Massey Energy's Freedom Mine #1 is "engaged in a pattern of violation of mandatory health and safety standards that, in the Secretary's judgment, constitute a continuing hazard to the health or safety of miners."
MSHA's new…
cmonforton | November 3, 2010It's that time of year, when the Secretary of Labor is supposed to outline her rulemaking priorities for next 12 months. This would include new proposal to protect mine workers, like the 64 killed already this year, and the tens of thousands made ill by inadequate OSHA standards on exposure to chemicals. The Presidential Executive Order governing this process dictates that agencies' regulatory plans be published in October. Last year the Obama Administration didn't release its plan until December, but I chalked that delay to the stalled Senate confirmation of the President's reg czar,…
lborkowski | November 1, 2010Because electronics contain hazardous materials like lead and cadmium, workers who recycle e-waste need to be protected from harmful exposures. All too often, we hear of children in developing countries breaking down old computers with little or no protection. Here in the US, concerns also exist about the health and safety of prison employees and inmate laborers involved with recycling operations. Myron Levin reported for Fair Warning on October 6 that inmates at some federal facilities were demanding hazardous duty pay from Federal Prison Industries (also known as Unicor), a for-profit,…
egrossman | October 29, 2010by Elizabeth Grossman
Batam, one of Indonesia's Riau Islands, sits across the smog-choked strait from Singapore, just one degree north of the equator. On October 21 and 22, the days that I'm there, newspaper headlines announce that Singapore is experiencing its worst air pollution since 2006 due to fires, most likely from illegal forest clearing in Sumatra. From a high point above the harbor where we go to see the view, the ship traffic below is mostly obscured by gray haze. A tourist brochure extols the island's natural features, but what's most evident is rampant development. Enormous gaudy…
cmonforton | October 29, 2010I recently logged 1,300 miles in a rented white PT Cruiser traveling on I-94 from Chicago to Milwaukee and Madison, WI, down I-65 and I-74 to Cincinnati and up I-75 to Detroit. Along the way I saw dozens of road construction projects to expand traffic lanes, repair overpasses, and repave the road surface. Workers were dutifully wearing hard hats and reflective vests, but these protections seemed completely inadequate for the deadly hazards in their midst. Vehicles were zipping past within a few feet of the workers, with only a line of plastic barrels as a barrier. At one site near…
lborkowski | October 28, 2010At the Millennium Development Goal summit last month, one of the sessions addressed the issue of the global healthcare workforce. We don't have enough healthcare workers to deliver needed care to the world's population, and until we address this problem it'll be next to impossible to meet the goals of reducing child mortality, improving maternal health, and combating diseases like AIDS and malaria.
One major challenge is simply that there aren't enough trained healthcare professionals, but the distribution of the existing healthcare workforce is also a pressing issue. At the global level,…
lborkowski | October 27, 2010by Elizabeth Grossman
I'm on my way home from Indonesia, where I spent part of the past week attending the annual meeting of the Asian Network for Occupational Accident Victims (ANROAV), an organization that brings together NGOs working on occupational health, safety, and labor issues all across Asia. The meeting was held in Bandung, in West Java -- the most densely populated part of Indonesia -- about a three-hour drive (or six, depending on traffic) east from Jakarta. When, thanks to North American jetlag, I woke before dawn as the day's first motorcycles began to zip along the palm-lined…
cmonforton | October 26, 2010Melissa Lee's life changed forever on May 20, 2006 when her husband Jimmy, 33 was killed, along with four other workers, in an explosion at the Kentucky Darby coal mine. Afterwards, she not only had four sons to raise without a dad, but as soon as Melissa started speaking up to demand mine safety improvements, she was harassed and threatened by defenders of coal mine operators. Four years since her husband's death, Melissa is still speaking up, this time in a campaign ad running in Kentucky's 6th district in support of Congressman Ben Chandler (D-KY). The incumbent is in a tight race…
lborkowski | October 25, 2010The "Brazilian Blowout" is a popular treatment administered by salons to smooth their clients' hair. The Oregonian's Katy Muldoon explores the experience of one hairstylist who worried about the effects of the chemicals contained in the treatment.
After a few months of administering Brazilian Blowouts, Portland hairstylist Molly Scrutton began experiencing throat and chest pain. When she and salon owner Pauline Steiner called the treatment's distributor, the company refused to tell them what the ingredients were -- so Scrutton decided to stop offering the service. She wrote a memo to her…
cmonforton | October 21, 2010Updated (below) 10/22/2010
Industry trade association are masters of using scare tactics and misinformation about environment, health and safety regulations to recruit and retain members. The latest evidence is the Chamber of Commerce's "This Way to Jobs" propaganda campaign, with the worn out message: regulations on workers' safety and environmental protection hurt the economy and businesses. A video cartoon promoting the campaign says: "
Washington isn't good at everything but recently it's been great at issuing regulations."
The sites features a photo of a small businessman, Ronald…
lborkowski | October 20, 2010After last week's triumphant rescue of 33 miners from Chile's San José mine, attention has turned to mine safety in Chile and worldwide.
The Associated Press reports that President Sebastian Piñera fired the top regulators from Chile's mine safety agency and promised to triple its budget. In the weeks following the San José collapse, at least 18 small mines were shut down for safety violations. Piñera has promised that in the coming days he'll unveil a proposal for more effectively protecting Chilean workers, and a commission is investigating the San José disaster and will recommend…
cmonforton | October 19, 2010Estevan R. Benavidez's family says he was a happy-to-lucky, 20 year old. He graduated from Miami (AZ) High School in 2008, was a talented tattoo artist, liked to fish, eat junk food, and spend time with his young daughter. On January 9, 2010 he was working for Ames Construction as a laborer at the Freeport McMoRan copper mine in his hometown. He reported to work at 6:30 am, but he never made it home alive.
Benavidez was working with several other men to construct a new reservoir at the surface copper mine. The large lined reservoir holds a sulfuric acid mix used to extract the copper…
lborkowski | October 13, 2010All 33 of the miners who were trapped in Chile's San José mine have been safely lifted to the surface, as have the six rescuers who descended into the mine during the operation. Shift supervisor Luis Urzua was the last miner lifted to safety in the specially designed capsule that traversed the more than 2,000 feet between the miners' refuge and the surface.
The miners' survival for 69 days underground and their triumphant rescue is a story of fortitude, ingenuity, and teamwork. Chileans have much to be proud of and celebrate today. Audiences around the world have been watching the rescue…
lborkowski | October 13, 2010Sixty-nine days after an explosion trapped 33 miners 2,000 feet underground in the San José copper and gold mine in Copiapó, Chile, rescuers have begun lifting miners to the surface. As of 6am this morning, eight miners have been pulled to safety: Florencio Avalos, Mario Sepulveda, Juan Illanes, Carlos Mamani, Jimmy Sanchez, Osman Araya, José Ojeda, and Claudio Yañez.
The Associated Press explains that a specially constructed "Phoenix" capsule is raised and lowered, bringing one miner at a time through a 28-inch diameter hole. Each miner is equipped with an oxygen tank, communications…
cmonforton | October 11, 2010The population of Ann Arbor Michigan swelled this past weekend with football fans. It was the annual Michigan vs. Michigan State football game and I was in town to witness some of the fanfare. The sidewalks, parking lots, porches, lawns and frat house balconies were jam-packed with people. Everybody, I mean EVERYBODY was wearing a t-shirt to show their allegiance to either the Wolverines (Michigan) or the Spartans (Michigan State). A few contrarians and oddballs, like me, wore shirts promoting other schools, all in the spirit of fun and camaraderie.
As I took in the football Saturday…
lborkowski | October 6, 2010After 29 miners were killed by an explosion at Massey Energy's Upper Big Branch Mine on April 5, the Mine Safety and Health Administration stepped up inspections at 89 coal mines that had poor safety records. Even so, nine workers have been killed working inside mines, and another four using machinery near mine entrances, in the six months since that disaster. The Washington Post's David Farhrenthold and Kimberly Kindy describe several of the mineworkers' deaths and explore reasons why increased enforcement hasn't translated into safer mines:
Trying to explain why repeated federal citations…
cmonforton | October 4, 2010Ever since the Reagan Administration, the White House's Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA), which is part of the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), has been reviewing rules proposed by federal agencies. These regulations might come from the Dept of Energy (DOE) on efficiency standards for home refrigerators, HHS rule on premarket safety report for drugs or devices, or the Dept of Transportation (DOT) on limiting the use of wireless devices by commercial drivers. Presidential Executive Order (EO) 12866, issued in 1993 by President Clinton, is the instrument that grants…