Document 6Rzq4DBq9Me22r7BOrq2VN7e9

an oh editorial . Occupational Hazards MAY 1975 Occupational disease sends shock waves throughout industry Ask the average businessman for developments that standard (See, "The Steel Industry's Response to an send shock, waves through an entire industry and Occupational Health Crisis" on page 38). Though it's chances are he'll reel off international monetary fluc far too early for precise calculation--no standard tuations, tumbling stock exchange prices, stockholders' has been proposed as yet--the bill for control of suits, perhaps new pollution control legislation. coke oven emissions by the steel industry is sure to Few would mention occupational disease, but we run into seven figures. In the coming months, OSHA submit that if you really want to see that seismograph's plans to unveil proposed standards covering cotton dust, needle jump, you announce that a substancd widely used crystalline, silica, and ammpnia. And you can be sure in a given industry appears to have cancer-causing that in the future that list will continue to lengthen. properties. If you're skeptical, just ask your colleagues Meanwhile, public hearings are to be held this month in the asbestos, rubber, or plastic industries. preparatory to OSHA's adoption of a new noise stand Several years ago when Dr. Irving J. Selikoff of Mt. ard. (See OSHA Communique: A Special Report on Sinai School of Medicine disclosed the results of a Noise Control on page 31.) . study indicating that 1 in 10 asbestos workers died of asbestosis, that 2 in IQ--5 times the rate of the popula As new health standards toil through the bureaucrat tion at large--died of lung cancer, and that 1 in 10 ic mill and then take the necessary procedural route died of mesothelioma, a rare cancer of the pleura, the toward formal adoption, you can be sure OSHA will be disclosure set off a chain of events that revolutionized excoriated for moving too slowly or too hastily. asbestos production methods at an estimated cost to the NIOSH will be criticized for being "too ivory-tower" industry, projected through 1976, of $100 million. or sorely understaffed, and law briefs will be prepared , Little more than two years ago, B. F. Goodrich to invalidate the new standard the moment it is offic Chemical Co. disclosed that several deaths due to an-,. ially promulgated, but OSHA-NIOSHyvill continue tb, giosarcoma,' a' rare liver cancer, had occurred among ? grind those standards oub| _ _____ ' workers, in their vinyl chloride operations' In XouisviIle`i$SW Clearly, OSHA-NIOSH ^rbhere'Tbstayr asare the^~ ` and asked NIOSH to investigate. After NlOSH's in- ' health activists of the Ralph Nader stripe, and the med-'tf itial investigation. Dr. Marcus Key, then director of ical scientists of the Dr. Selikoff stripe, both prominent ' NIOSH, said: , . It would appear that a new occupa-.. in the movement to expand and intensify occupational - tional cancer has been discovered: angiosarcoma of the : health research. Moreover, organized labor is showing 5 liver. It is associated with the polymerization of vinyL a n$w sophistication and an increased concern for oo-^i. chloride in the manufacture of polyvinyl chloride.. cupational health. In the past 5 years, several unions Vinyl chloride is the chief suspect among the more "; have included joint management-labor occupational i than 50 chemicals used, in the plant." That announce-- health research project provisions ih labor contracts,'^ ment set off. a chain of events that ultimately resulted r and more unions will be following suit in the future. in OSHA's adoption of a new standard, setting the ex-j;iS posure limit at 1 part per million (ppm)i" which took^ In this special issue of Occupational Hazards,- effect April 1, 1975. When NIOSH was responding to* bur message is clear: Anyone who underrates .the vi-^ Goodrich's call, the threshold limit value for VC was ' tality of the occupational health movement or deludes " 500 ppm. OSHA originally proposed a "no-detectable- - himself into believing that its effects will be confined level" standard which an Arthur D. Little, Inc. study to two or three industries, does so at his own peril. undertaken for the Society of the Plastics Industry, Inc. . What's worsej at the peril of the workers he's pledged , estimated would cost industry 1.6 million jobs and $65': professionally to protect. Because after all the argu billion in loss of production and ^ ments about economic feasibility and interpretation of ; , As this issue of Occupational Hazards revealsT^X data are in, after all the fine legal distinctions have been ? there's more to come. OSHA has formed a committee?^ made, one inescapable fact remains: We're talking Here'. to prepare a draft of a proposed coke oven emissions j|j22!!LlhJi!5JUlsL^ll^liil_2L2!li2ILWirkIii UCC 000558