CPH MODULE 7 LEC

• Nguyen Thi Linh, "Lynn" to her friends, had been working at her new summer job in a nail salon business for 6 weeks now. With the money she earned as a manicurist, Linh planned to eventually continue her college education. Linh worked quickly and accurately, and enjoyed her work. Now, though, she had begun to worry about the safety of the chemicals in the various nail products used in the salon—products such as polishes, strengtheners, removers, and artificial nail liquids. Sometimes, after a long day in the salon, Linh would experience headaches. Once, when she was there alone, she read the list of contents of some of the products: acetone, acetonitrile, butyle acetate, dibutyl phthalate, ethyl acetate, ethyl methacrylate, formaldehyde, isopropyl acetate, methacrilic acid, methyl methacrylate, quaternary ammonium compounds, toluene. . . Linh wrote down the names of some of the chemicals. When she returned home, she searched the Internet to learn whether any of them could be responsible for her headaches. She learned that some of these chemicals irritate the skin and nose and cause asthma. Others cause headaches, dizziness, and irritated eyes, nose, and throat; still others can damage liver and kidneys, and can even harm to unborn children. Linh began to wonder whether she should continue to work as a nail technician.
• Occupational safety and health (OSH)

  Also commonly referred to as occupational health and safety (OHS), occupational health, or occupational safety, is a multidisciplinary field concerned with the safety, health, and welfare of people at occupation
• Goal of OSH


  To foster a safe and healthy occupational environment and to protect all the general public who may be affected by the occupational environment
• The Global workforce exceeds 3.3 billion workers and is continuously growing. 85% of these workers are in less developed countries, where working conditions are more hazardous than in more developed countries
• 317 million workers experience nonfatal occupational injuries and 321,000 workers are fatally injured. Nearly 1 million workplace injuries and 1000 injury deaths every day

  
• Each year diseases acquired in the workplace sicken 160 million and kill an estimated 2.02 million workers. 440,000 people are sickened and 5,500 workers die each day from a workplace exposure
• $1.25 trillion are lost annually from the global gross domestic product by direct and indirect costs of occupational injuries and diseases
• Occupational injury


  Any injury, such as a cut, fracture, sprain, or amputation, which results from a work-related event or from a single, instantaneous exposure in the work environment
• Hazardous agents in the workplace affect not only workers but also those outside the worksite. This can occur through soil and groundwater contamination with solids and liquids or air pollution with industrial gases and dusts and even through clothing and vehicle contamination
• The risk of exposure to a chemical or nuclear energy source, which was originally limited to the workplace, now become a community-wide risk
• The failure to recognize the community nature of occupational groups and to monitor chronic conditions such as dermatitis, headaches, blood pressure, or blood chemistries has been a major weakness in our conventional approach to occupational health problems
• Occupational risks undoubtedly occurred even in prehistoric times, not only during hunting and warfare, but also in more peaceful activities such as the preparation of flint by knapping
• George Agricola's treatise on mining in 1561, De Re Metallica, emphasized the need for ventilation of mines
• In 1567, the work of Philippus Aureolus Theophrastus Bombastus von Hohenheim, also known as Paracelsus, was published under the title, On the Miners' Sickness and Other Miners' Diseases
• These were the first significant works describing specific occupational diseases
• OSH highlights around the world

  • 50% of work related deaths occur in Asia
  • Fatality rates are 5-6 times higher in developing countries
  • 170,000 agricultural workers and 320,000 other people die from exposures to biological risks
  • Every 15 seconds, 160 workers or 2.3million people per year die of occupational accidents and diseases
  • There are over 337 million work-related accidents annually, 360,000 fatal accidents and 1.95M fatal diseases
  • The economic burden of poor OSH practices is estimated at 4% of the global Gross Domestic Product each year
  • 10M: Total number of OFWs at any given time (10% of population)
  • 1.47M: Number of OFWs deployed in 2010: 1,123,676 are land based and 347,150 are sea based
  • Fatalities decreased by 31.8% (from 170 in 2003 to 116 in 2007. However, those permanently incapacitated increased by 23.7 % (from 131 in 2003 to 162 in 2007)
• Growing challenges include psychosocial risks, work-related stress and non-communicable diseases, notably circulatory and respiratory diseases, and cancers
• Currently, more than 374 million people are injured or made ill every year through work-related accidents
• It is estimated that work days lost to OSH-related causes represent almost 4% of global GDP, in some countries as much as 6%
• Economic cost to the immeasurable human suffering such illnesses and accidents cause should be recognized
• These are all-the-more tragic because they are largely preventable
• Factors to consider


  • Technology (digitization, robotics, and nanotechology) affect psychosocial health and introduce new materials with unmeasured health hazards
  • Demographic shifts. Young workers have significantly high occupational injury rates, while older workers need adaptive practices and equipment to work safely. Women – who are entering the workforce in increasing numbers – are more likely to have non-standard work arrangements and have a higher risk of musculoskeletal disorders
  • Development and climate change give rise to risks such as air pollution, heat stress, emerging diseases, shifting weather and temperature patterns that can bring job losses. Equally, new jobs will be created through sustainable development and the green economy
  • Changes in the organization of work can bring not only flexibility that allows more people to enter the labor force, but may also lead to psychosocial issues (for example, insecurity, compromised privacy and rest time, or inadequate OSH and social protections) and excessive work hours. Approximately 36% of the world's workforce currently works excessive hours (more than 48 hours per week)
• Areas on which policy makers and other stakeholders should focus

  • More work on anticipating new and emerging OSH risks
  • Adopting a more multidisciplinary approach
  • Building stronger links to public health work
  • Better public understanding of OSH issues is also needed
  • International labor standards and national legislation need to be strengthened, something which will require stronger collaboration between Governments, workers and employers
• By far the greatest proportion of current work-related deaths – 86%– come from disease

  
• Greatest causes of mortality

  • Circulatory Diseases (31%)
  • Work-related Cancers (26%)
  • Respiratory Diseases (17%)
• The Philippine Government estimates that 2.2 million Filipino workers in medium and large enterprises enjoy effective occupational safety and health (OSH) protection and services
• In other words, 17 of 18 persons in the nation's workforce of 38.8 million do not benefit from acceptable working conditions
• Studies substantiate that OSH conditions in micro-firms and the informal sector pose risks and hazards
• National occupational safety and health culture

  One in which the right to a safe and healthy working environment is respected at all levels, where governments, employers and workers actively participate in securing a safe and healthy working environment through a system of defined rights, responsibilities and duties, and where the highest priority is accorded to the principle of prevention
• The first official responses to new hazards in the workplace did not occur until 1835, when Massachusetts passed the first Child Labor Law, and later in 1867, when it created a Department of Factory Inspection to enforce it
• In 1877, Massachusetts passed the first worker safety law, aimed at protecting textile workers from hazardous spinning machinery
• In 1902, Maryland became the first state to pass any kind of workers' compensation legislation
• In 1908, the U.S. Congress, at the insistence of President Theodore Roosevelt, finally enacted the first of several workers' compensation laws; this first law covered certain federal employees

  
• Over the next 40 years, all states and territories eventually enacted some type of workers' compensation legislation, beginning with New York in 1910 and ending with Mississippi in 1948
• Alice Hamilton (1869-1970) was a strong proponent of occupational health and a true pioneer in this field. Over her 40-year career in occupational health, she led crusades to reduce poisonings from heavy metals such as lead and mercury
• In 1884, the federal government created a Bureau of Labor, in 1910 the Federal Bureau of Mines, and in 1914 the Office of Industrial Hygiene and Sanitation in the Public Health Service
• In 1916, Congress passed the Federal Employees' Compensation Act, which provided federal employees compensation if injured while on the job
• The two most comprehensive laws were the Coal Mine Health and Safety Act of 1969 and the Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970 (OSH Act), also known as the Williams-Steiger Act in honor of Senator Harrison A. Williams, Jr., and Congressman William A. Steiger, who worked for passage of the Act
• At the time the act was passed, 14,000 workers died each year on the job
• Since its passage, the Act has served to raise the consciousness of both management and labor to the problems of health and safety in the workplace