OSHA OSHA standards are game-changers, David Michaels tells American Industrial Hygiene Association members
June 1, 2011 Elizabeth Grossman

by Elizabeth Grossman “With what’s on the table in Washington now, you may think the technical phrase is ‘job-killing OSHA standards’ but standards save lives,” said David Michaels, Assistant Secretary of Labor of Occupational Safety and Health, in his address to the American Industrial Hygiene Association meeting in Portland, Oregon on May 18th. “OSHA doesn’t […]

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Environmental Health Upper Big Branch: Hawk’s Nest Redux
May 31, 2011 The Pump Handle

by Ellen Smith For those who don’t know the history of the Hawk’s Nest Tunnel, from 1930 to 1935, approximately 3,000 workers carved a 3 mile tunnel through the Gauley Mountain in West Virginia in order to divert the New River for an electrical station at a Union Carbide plant. Ventilation was limited at best. […]

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OSHA White House again uses worker safety regulations as a whipping boy
May 26, 2011 Celeste Monforton, DrPH, MPH 11Comment

The White House’s regulatory czar Cass Sunstein announced today agency roadmaps for a 21-century regulatory system, and the results of the Obama Administration’s “unprecedented government-wide review” of existing regulations. I don’t know what history books Mr. Sunstein has been reading, but for at least the last 20 years, every Administration has engaged in these regulatory […]

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Environmental Health Anticipating Labor Dept’s regulatory agenda for new worker safety rules
May 5, 2011 Celeste Monforton, DrPH, MPH

It shouldn’t be long now before Labor Secretary Hilda Solis releases her semi-annual regulatory plan for new worker health and safety rules. This document is required by the Regulatory Flexibility Act and Executive Order 12866, and is supposed to be published every April and October. The Labor Secretary’s most recent regulatory agenda wasn’t issued until […]

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Injury Control & Violence Remembering Dan Middaugh on this Worker Memorial Day
April 28, 2011 Celeste Monforton, DrPH, MPH

“Pray for the dead. Fight like hell for the living” was the rallying cry of community organizer Mother Jones (a.k.a. Mary Harris Jones, 1837-1930) to fire up workers as they demanded better working conditions and labor rights. The motto still resonates today, especially this week when workers, human rights, and public health advocates commemorate International […]

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Cancer CDC’s NIOSH corrects statement about asbestos, a known human carcinogen
April 22, 2011 Celeste Monforton, DrPH, MPH 2Comment

Earlier this month, in my post “CDC’s NIOSH says WHAT about asbestos???” I reported on the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health’s (NIOSH) new treatise on asbestos, and my dismay with the agency’s characterization of the mineral as a “potential occupational carcinogen.” NIOSH’s current intelligence bulletins are supposed to convey the most up-to-date scientific […]

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OSHA Wal-Mart, Crowd Control, and OSHA’s General Duty Clause
April 1, 2011 Liz Borkowski, MPH 1Comment

On Black Friday 2008 at a Wal-Mart store in Valley Stream, Long Island, 34-year-old worker Jdimytai Damour was killed by a stampede of shoppers. In a New Yorker article on crowd disasters, Jon Seabrook reports that the official cause of death was asphyxiation, as it often the case in crowd-related deaths. The crowd’s force pushed […]

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Injury Control & Violence Counting work-related injuries, disease and death among U.S. workers: Part 3
March 30, 2011 Celeste Monforton, DrPH, MPH 3Comment

If you want to keep all your digits and limbs, you probably want to avoid working at Anheuser-Busch’s Metal Container Corp., in Arnold, Missouri. That worksite was recently cited by OSHA for hazards related to incidents last fall in which one worker lost fingers in machinery, and another worker had a foot amputated because of […]

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