Occupational Health & Safety
sb admin | September 8, 2009The New York Times editorial page draws attention to a new report that provides details about just how badly our system of workplace protections is failing workers in low-wage industries. Broken Laws, Unprotected Workers: Violations of Employment and Labor Laws in Americaâs Cities provides the results of extensive research by the Center for Urban Economic Development, the National Employment Law Project and the U.C.L.A. Institute for Research on Labor and Employment. Researchers surveyed 4,387 front-line workers (i.e., excluding managers and professional and technical workers) in low-wage…
sb admin | September 3, 2009We've just learned that Health & Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius will be announcing later this afternoon that John Howard, MD has been selected to lead the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health. Dr. Howard headed NIOSH for six years during George W. Bush's administration, and both the American Society of Safety Engineers and the American Industrial Hygiene Association appealed unusccessfully to then-CDC Director Julie Gerberding to extend his tenure.
An interesting side note is that, assuming David Michaels is confirmed to head OSHA, there will be two George…
sb admin | August 31, 2009In a two-page notice in today's Federal Register, the Department of Labor's acting assistant secretary for policy has officially withdrawn the so-called "secret rule" on occupational health risk assessment. It was exactly this time last summer that the G.W. Bush Administration's Labor Department proposed new requirements for OSHA's and MSHA's preparation of occupational health risk assessments.  The proposal was infamous for both the secretive manner in which it was developed and for its likely adverse impact on the already slow pace of rules to protect workers' from exposure to…
sb admin | August 21, 2009Three physicians and researchers from the Capital University of Medical Sciences (Beijing, China) have published a case report in the European Respiratory Journal describing severe lung disease in seven female workers employed at a shop where they applied polyacrylic coatings to polystyrene boards. The lung disease is just one part of the story---two of the women died (ages 19 and 29)---the other part is that pathology samples from the workers' lungs identified 30 nm (nanometer) in diameter particles. Further investigation found that the coatings used by the workers contained nano…
sb admin | August 19, 2009Our colleague Mark Catlin (SEIU and APHA OHS Section) has done it again, finding another amazing collection of historical films with worker safety themes. The latest were produced by the U.S. Federal Security Agency's Office of Education in 1944, entitled "Problems in Supervision: Instructing Workers on the Job."  They were produced for the federal government by Caravel Films.  Mark's loaded one on YouTube he's called "How not to do safety training" (00:01:06). Â
You'll meet Mary, the new drill press operator, Fred the guy assigned to show her how to do the job, and their boss…
sb admin | August 13, 2009For a lot of us, summer means sitting in air-conditioned offices and complaining to our co-workers about how hot it is outside. For farmworkers, summers mean hours of toil under a hot sun, in conditions that can be fatal. Working in the heat doesnât have to mean death, as long as workers can rest in the shade periodically and drink water.
But, as Kevin OâLeary points out in Time magazine, employers donât always provide these basic necessities. California, whose 650,000 farmworkers are responsible for 44% of our countryâs produce, implemented a standard in 2005 that requires farms and…
sb admin | August 12, 2009I'm reading a wonderful collection of public health success stories, in the collection assembled by John W. Ward and Christian Warren entitled "Silent Victories: The History and Practice of Public Health in 20th Century America"Â (Oxford, 2007.)Â Our colleagues Tony Robbins and Phil Landrigan wrote a chapter on occupational disease and injury prevention, and in it, introduce me to Sir Thomas Legge.Â
He was the UK's first medical Inspector of Factories (appointed in 1897) and he capitalized on his title and training to expose occupational hazards, propose interventions and demonstrate…
sb admin | August 12, 2009In May, the Government Accountability Office issued a critical report assessing OSHA's program for monitoring its designated Voluntary Protection Program (VPP) sites.  There are about 2,200 of these VPP site across the country which have met the written program and on-site evaluation criteria. A VPP designation exempts the worksite from programmed OSHA inspections, and if an inspection is conducted---because of a complaint, referral or fatality/catastrophe----the employer is not cited for violations if they are promptly corrected. This recent GAO report was peppered with…
sb admin | August 11, 2009In a national survey by the Emergency Nurses Association, more than half of emergency-department nurses reported that theyâve been physically assaulted on the job. For many nurses, being assaulted is a recurring problem: Approximately one-fourth of the 3,465 respondents reported experiencing physical violence more than 20 times in the past three years. While all hospital staff are at risk of both physical assault and verbal abuse, the problem is particularly severe in EDs, and against ED nurses in particular.Â
In their article in the July/August Journal of Nursing Administration, the authors…
sb admin | August 10, 2009In the U.S. Senate last week, between the debate and the vote on judge Sonia Sotomayor to serve as a justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, Majority Leader Harry Reid introduced S. 1580, on behalf of Senator Edward Kennedy, a bill to amend the Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970. As far as I can tell, its text is nearly identical to H.R. 2067 , the bill introduced in April by Cong. Lynn Woolsey. The bills' major provisions are:
expanding OSHA coverage to the 8.5 million public sector workers (who are employed by state, county and local governments, and not covered by an OSHA…
sb admin | August 6, 2009Today's New York Times editorials include a ringing endorsement of President Obama's choice of David Michaels to head the Occupational Safety and Health Administration:
David Michaels, a research professor and occupational health expert at the George Washington University School of Public Health, seems just the right man to steer the agency back toward an emphasis on protecting workers after eight years of lax oversight and favoritism to industry under the Bush administration.
Although we here at GW were pleasantly surprised to see this editorial today, it's not really so surprising. The New…
sb admin | August 5, 2009Exactly 2-years after the disaster, the five-member U.S. Chemical Safety Board voted unanimously to adopt its final investigation report on the March 2005 catatrophic explosion at the BP Texas City. Fifteen workers were killed and 180 others were injured from the blast. Among the many disturbing findings from the CSB's investigation, was data showing that equipment operators had worked way too many shifts in a row and were fatigued, seriously fatigued.
Our investigators determined that operators involved in the startup likely were fatigued, having worked 29 straight days of 12-hour…
sb admin | August 4, 2009by Richard Denison, cross-posted from EDF Blogs
Today, the American Chemistry Council (ACC) unveiled its "10 Principles for Modernizing TSCA."Â Â Also today, the Safer Chemicals, Healthy Families coalition - of which EDF is a member - issued a news release and unveiled its 9-point "Platform for Reform of TSCA."Â How do they line up?
I'll leave to you readers to decide just how much alignment (or lack thereof) there is between these dueling manifestos. To get the ball rolling, I'll use this post to single out three key differences.
First, however, let me say I welcome the fact that ACC is…
sb admin | August 3, 2009Labor Secretary Hilda Solis will tour the Federal No. 2 mine on Tuesday, Aug 4, one of a couple dozen mines operated by Patriot Coal. DOL's press announcement said she'd be joined by officials from MSHA, the UMWA, WV Governor Joe Manchin and Congressman Alan B. Mollohan. The event includes the tour, examining a rescue chamber on the surface and meeting:
"with miners employed by Federal # 2 for a roundtable discussion."
The Charleston Gazette's Ken Ward is reporting that journalists will not be allowed on the mine tour and canât attend the meeting with miners, but the Secretary …
sb admin | August 3, 2009This morning, I read MSHA's fatality report for the April 7 electrocution death of Tadd M. Bainum, 36. Mr. Bainum was a supervisor, and was doing electrical-related work, but had NOT received appropriate training in electrical tasks. MSHA's investigators noted:
"Failure to train [him] in performing the task constituted more than ordinary negligence and is an unwarrantable failure to comply with a mandatory safety standard."
Mr. Bainum's work-related death left behind his wife April and three children, Tristan, 12, Holly, 6 and Lacy, 3.Â
At first glance, the dredging pits where Mr.…
sb admin | July 31, 2009by Sidney Shapiro, cross-posted from CPR Blog
On Tuesday, the White House announced the appointment of Dr. David Michaels to head the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA). An epidemiologist and a professor at George Washington Universityâs School of Public Health and Health Services, Michaels will bring substantial expertise and experience to the job. Besides being an active health research â he studies the health effects of occupational exposure to toxic chemicals â he has also written impressively on science and regulatory policy. His book, Doubt Is Their Product: How…
sb admin | July 28, 2009President Obama has just announced his intent to nominate our own David Michaels to be Assistant Secretary for the Occupational Safety and Health Administration.
Congratulations, David! All of us at George Washington University and The Pump Handle will miss working with you, but our loss is the country's gain. U.S. workers can look forward to an OSHA dedicated to realizing the vision of safe and healthy workplaces for all.
sb admin | July 23, 2009by Garrett Brown
On June 5th, 200 babies and small children were dropped off at a private, government-subsidized day care center in Hermosillo, the capital of Sonora state in northern Mexico. A fire broke out next door and soon smoke and fire filled the day care center killing 48 babies and children, and severely burning two dozen more.Â
It turns out that the owners of the day care center included the wives of two top state officials and a businessman with close links to Eduardo Bours, governor of the state of Sonora. It also turns out the building was a fire trap that had repeatedly…
sb admin | July 21, 2009Steven Cain, 32, reported to work at Massey Energy's Justice No. 1 coal mine at about 3:30 pm on Wednesday, October 8, 2008.   He never returned to his family. At about 11:00 pm that night, he died inside the mine when he was crushed between a loaded supply car and a coal rib (vertical coal wall). The Charleston Gazette's Ken Ward reports at Coal Tattoo on the results of MSHA's investigation, including how
"...Massey and the contractor that employed Cain, Mountaineer Labor Solution, received just a tiny slap on the wrist from MSHA. Federal regulators did not cite either company.…
sb admin | July 21, 2009by Kas
On July 16, 2009, Wal-Mart announced that it will develop a sustainable product rating system that can be used to evaluate the sustainability of the products they sell in their stores. As a reminder, Wal-Mart sells a lot of products to a lot of people. According to its website, Wal-Mart âserves customers and members more than 200 million times per week at more than 7,900 retail units under 62 different banners in 15 countries.â Wal-Martâs sustainability initiatives are diverse and plentiful (a curious dichotomy given the stigma created by their propensity for union busing and low…