Document NEaznO6057YDRODON4VbNr07V

PITTSHL lJII CORNING COKPOI intkh-okfice (:()huehi*onuknck II ON / -/ To Subject: Dr. Lee B. Grant - Medical Director PPG Industries - 14 N. From Date W. J. Farkos August 8, 1972 Dear Dr. Grant: As you may recall, TODAY'S HEALTH MAGAZINE, a publication of the American Medical Association, had contacted us and indicated an article was going to appear in one of their issues on OSHA and that Pittsburgh Corning would be a part of the article. I have enclosed a copy of the article that appeared in a recent issue of that magazine for your information. co iU W. J. Farkos L j'*""" f> .1.. i a. WJF:bm Enclosure op " *# 1 r "* > i ' <f' ^ f'. *k A o % T lirrc is new 1 c'l:t>I H i vtr m.n binrry available to protect worheis from d,macrons chemicals and other hazardous job conditions. But there arc ccs jamming the gears ,,.id, meanwhile, the American wage earner is caught in the middle. Will everyone please try to keep up the cheeileadmg for the Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970. After all. . . It wos, in April uf 1971 when it be came effective, hailed as the first bus passed for the benefit of working people since the Wagner Act of the New Deal era. And . . . It wos. said a union man at the time, "the toughest piece of en\ironmental action ever passed in Ihis counliy," Only today . . . It is but small comfort . . . pre ciously small comfort to the workers of America who need protection from an enormous varielv of chemical emis sions and job conditions thai can en danger their health. Many nT those who held such high hopes for the new legislation are now making gloomy pronouncements "`'out the law ever achieving its pur ses. Not enough money available, not enough inspectors, not enough standards established, they say. All of which, it is said, is just enough soft ness to allow some laxity in industry, some ineitia in Congiess. and some bureaucratic confusion in government. The victims, of course, are the no mil lion wage earners cov ered hy the Act, who seem little better safeguarded than before the law passed. Bxaininc, for example, tlir money and manpower situation. Can you doubt that the Department of Labor's .. \ icnipulum,11 S.dciv mil IIimIiIi Admimxtialmu (OSIIA) uiulri financed when the Depart men' of Labor spent 'U cenls per woikcr to enforce safety anil health standard:, in fiscal 1972whilc the lluicau of Mines avciaged S3U9 per person? And can you ques tion the shortage of manpower after you learn that only 9.900 of nearly four million American workplaces were in spected during the first six months of thu new law? The figures, reported bv Senator Harrison Williams (D., N.J.), co-sponsor of the bill, indicate that only 20'b of the places inspected were violation-free. And as Sen, Williams adds, one OSH A official recently told him, "Some violations take years to get corrected." Getting quick action from any source appears difficult. Assistant La bor Secretary George C. Guenther doesn't seem to be able to act fast enough. And neither do some mcmhers of Congress. The congressional attitude toward the conlrovcisinl sub ject is. especially in th;s election year, rather sour. There are no lulls before Congress to improve tin* Act, but there arc an estimated U0 bills in the hopper to weaken it. As for organized labor's hierarchy, the Ah'L-CIO is lull of crit icism regarding the Act s administra tion. but Ralph Nader counseled Today's Health, "Never mind the rhet oric, The measure of organized lahor's interest is that not one union has a physician, or engineer, or scientist, or lawyer working full time in Washing ton on the problem of safety and health." The key to successful enforcement of OSHA's program is an adequate number of aggressive compliance offi cers (safety inspectors) and industrial hygienists. The latter are especially important because GO percent of work- er1-. impl.unis are about health haz ards It is not the ruhety hamster but the deadly vapor that worries the working man most. Vet, al the end of fiscal 1972, OSIIA had only "about" -100 compliance offi cers and "about" GO hvgienists in the field (OSIIA officials admitted they didn't know for sure how many they hod) to inspect the more than four mil lion business and industrial estab lishments in America. Efforts to increase the inspector force were blocked by Assistant Secre tary Guenther. Congress authorized an additional S3 million for 200 new in spectors. but he refused to spend it on lower-grade technicians. Asked about this, he blamed the White House. He said President Nixon's "employment ceding" had tied his hands. Not that it really mattered, said Guenther, for it was a "fiscal impossibility" to have enough inspectors. Testifying before Congress at the lime the Act was being written, federal officials acknowledged that they would need one industrial hygienist for every 35,000 workers if they were to inspect industry properly. The present number of hygienists means then: is one for every 1.2 million woi kers. Moi roever. there has been great un- - evenness in the effectiveness of OSl lA's inspections. Some unions report prompt, efficient action. On the other hand, compliance officers who in spected the Mobil Oil Corporation plant in Paulsboro. New Jersey, this year disregarded what workers said about propane leakage. Keen though the company had roped off the dan gerous area to prevent the leaking gas from being ignited hy a spark, there had been two fires. Then, months later, there was an c^losron' v> # V *' * '4 mV \' i'Vv r* VV-' i vx \ TO V 'J TKS KEAIL.TM "\ m '.i ,L, vy .k ti ^ iyv- uu I _ / '\k * *l.-*ad\r r\ r-1 e " i r*->s ,** v. O' C-J) i. ' a n s. L-a By Robert Sherrill 16 a of TOOAY S HEALTh/AUGUST 1972 r-B-e-ooliroi-T that resulted in one men's death. Mobil Oil Corporation says the fa tality did not involve propane usage 'p ' 'forage but "the ignition of hydro .n liquids which hod spilled os a result of an operating error." It also defended OSffA compliance officials, characterizing the inspection of the Paulsborn refinery, conducted over a two-month period, as "one of the most searching and thorough conducted to date by OSIIA in the petroleum indus try and perhaps all industry" Recently there was an explosion at the Kcnrich Petrochemical plant in New Jersey: one man was killed and one severely burned. The union wired Alfred Darden. OSHA's regional ad ministrator. asking for a plant in spection. Barden responded that he saw no reason for an inspection: later, after considerable urging he did send a man to look things over. OSHA hasn't been idle. To the con trary, during the first nine months of fiscal 1972. inspectors toured 20,003 plants and found 77 percent of them not in compliance with job safely and health standards. However, Guenther issued a press i-p'^asc in which, his critics note, he zed these results backwards. Ig noring the 77 percent who were vio lators. he cited instead the 23 percent who were in compliance. "We find this a most heartening indication of how well our efforts toward voluntary compliance are working." he said. In deed. the fact that even one out of four employers obeyed the law was. he said, "a respectable indication" that management was well-intentioned. When critics uphraided him for the trifling fines levied against some of the worst violators, Guenther said: "Initial penalties are low. We re not in the fund-raising business." In fact, .the new job safety legisla tion does provide for stiff penalties of up to SIO.OCO for each violation plus, in some cases, imprisonment. Senator Williams points out, how ever. that in reality these stringent maximum penalties "arc a far cry from the actual fines that have been im posed against companies found to be in violation." He reports that a plant in [bizelton, fa., which was violating ac- able maximum levels for deadly beryllium dust, was fined a total of $320 for 28 "non-serious" violations. "Included," he says, "was a $6 fine for permitting employees to eat and store food in an area where toxic materials were present." The senator also notes that noise level readings in four separate areas of up to 120 decibels, substantially in ex cess of the permissahlr level of 90 decibels, led to a fine of only S75. "Af ter the first 5.000 inspections con ducted under the law, the average pen alty has been just S18 for more than 19.000 violations that were found." he explained. Nobody knows exactly how many hazardous chemicals are being used in industry, but everyone agrees there arc Senator Ilorrison Williams: "We arc centuries away from catching up will} one of the major problems the law was intended (o correct." at least 15.000. And according to ihe American Industrial Hygiene Associ ation. a new toxic agent is introduced into the workplace every 20 minutes. OSHA has standards covering be tween -lOO and 500 of these chemicals (OSHA says 500. some labor officials say -100). The 100-500 exposure stan dards now in force, incidentally, were adopted from criteria established over the past half century by the American National Standards Institute and the American Conference of Government Industrial Hygienists (ACG111). It's lucky OSHA had these to fall back on, outdated though some of Nobody knows exactly how many hazardous chemicals arc being used in industry, but everyone agrees that there arc at least 15,COO. urJn p r/7 VT LU &<= CO CD iJL. o r u O O cp | BB 0013506 J IS TODAY SHEALTH/AUGUST 1972 tlicm lire (lhe "safe" level for cat ,, monoxide in a working CStjhle-hment, fur example, is exactly lire level at : w Iim h the Environmental Protection | A.mmy can declare an emergency lor .111 enliic community.) Nobody m gov : tmint'iit seems to be ul.'le to come up | quickly with the professional talent to | set standards for the other 1-1.500 or inure hazardous substances. The agency doing the research from which OSHA set health standards is the National Institute of Salety and Health. Everyone acknowledged that NIOSH is doing a courageous, con scientious job. even though it is starved for money. XIOSH is now part of the Depart ment of Health. Education and WeiJ,iie. but the White House talks about transferring the agency into the De partment of Commerce. Until the White House makes up its mind, it doesn't serm likely that HEW is going to spend much on its stepchild. The results are predictable. One of NIOSH's important duties is to make health hazard evaluations upon request. If a worker in Chicago is afraid Ihal the chemicals he is w orking with may be destroying his hair, he can request an evaluation from NIOSH and be sure of getting a solid, objective* one. The only trouble is. as of last June NIUSH had only 10 people in the whole country uho could respond to those requests. An other problem is that most workers don't know that such evaluations arc available. Edwaid Baier. deputy director of NIOSH, sacs his agency's average pay is low. "It's almost impossible to hire an engineer, a toxicologist, a physi cian. an epidemiologist or jn analy tical chemist who knows what he's doing. And then, on top of that, you get a guy all lined up and the While House puts a freeze on hiring." Whatever the reason, NIOSM's recurd for turning out new standards is dismal. "With the personnel and lab resources we have.'1 says Baier. "we re getting five standards out this fisi.d Jear. We hope to have 15 next fiscal ycjr, and may he we can crank out be tween 20 and 30 each fiscal year there after." , At this rate, says Senator Williams, "we aie ci ntiir.es aw.iy fiom c ill lung up w ith otic of the major problems the law was intended to corrci I." for some reuse-i. when the Labor Department adopt'd the -ton-fun) stan dards as the coie lor OSllA's enforce ment program, it left beta-napluhylamiiu; off the list, Sheldon Samuels, directur of Health. Safety and Envi ronmental Affairs for the Industrial Union Department of the Al'L.-ClO. says he has been demanding that OSHA set a standard for beta-naphthyljminc since June 18. 1971. "And there is still no standard for beta," he says. Bcta-naphthylamine is used m the synthesis of dyes for synthetic fibers in the textile industry. It is so toxic the ACGIH ruled the only safe level of ex posure was zero. The chemical, which causes cancer of the bladder, was out lawed long ago in New Jersey and in Pcnnsy Iv ama. Southern slates "were not so squea mish. Thu chemical has been manufac tured by Synalloy Corporation in Ceorgi.i and in South Carolina since the early 1930s. When the .Occupa tional Safety and Health Act wjs im plemented in the summer of 1971. OSHA could have immediately forced Synalloy Corporation to stop manu facturing hcta-nnphtliylemine. but it did nothing. It didn't even include the chemical on its toxic list. NIOSH, which is admirably inde pendent of OSHA. refused to go along with beta, and on January 19 it an nounced that it was beginning an in vestigation. With the (hioat of publi city hanging over its operation. Synalloy said it no lonecr would pro cess the chemical. Throughout this pe riod. OSI1A was silent. Perhaps the best way to measure the failures of OSHA is to go into the files and observe its responses to problems with such industrial hazards as as bestos. mercury vapors and lead. According to a study recently pub lished by the Industrial Union Depart ment (1UD) of APL-CIO, five million American workers must at some lime in their duties come m contact with that newly recognized killer, asbestos. None ill e uuu v awai e ol the i i: i, to Ide and health limn workers employed by Juhns-M.mvdie, New Jersey, the larg est asbestos processing plant in the world. For years the men and women in tin: plant have felt lH.it something foul diul harmful was in the air. Tin \ siispeeted the pioducl they worked with, bill ac- jrduig to lull's Siieldoo Samuels, the company refused to let them look at the records of the dust level in the plant. Tw o years ago, to gain access to the records and for other environmental reasons, they went on strike. This in it self indicates the feeling of crisis. Union officials say that ordinarily it is impossible to drum up a strike for health reasons. (A spokesman for Jolins-Manville. M. Robert Chalom, manager of finan cial/stockholder relations, denies that the stiike vvas called because of em ployee-health problems and maintains it occurred before asbestos became a health issue at the plant. "The com pany has a long-established policy of making employee medical records available to personal physicians." he says, noting that "our environmental control has been singled out as best in the industry.") The workers' suspicions received strong support when Dr. Irving J. Selikolf, a professor at Ml. Sinai Hospital School of Medicine in New York and head of the school's Environmental Medicine Department, recently complctc'd a study of the oldest vvorkers at Johns-Manville and found that they dierl of lung cancer with a frequency eight times higher than the national average anti of stomach cancer at a rale four times higher. Some union officials estimate that at Johns-Manville today there arc 50 eases of mesothelioma--the cancer pe culiar to asbestos workers--and per haps as many as 500 cases of lung can cer. AI L-CIO s national headquarters lias called it "the largest recorded epi demic of occupational cancer." (Tjking issue with these figures, Chalom maintains that the study showed lung cancer among JohnsManville employees to be four times higher thon the national ov'eroge (not eight times, as repotted] and that llm incidence of stomach cancer at the plant was actually shown to be nearly three times higher than t/ie notional m erage -- and not four limes, as re potted. "It is just absurd to say tin-re are 500 cases of lung cancer.'' he soys, "Tli.it would be one case for every nine employees.") Despite the existence of oveiwin luting ev idence pointing to the cancer -producing^ qualities;. -t):f^vai- ... fifuiih tint'd on ixiawbu) ` ' ' ` THIS DOCUMENT WAS NOT A RECORD OF TODAYS HEALTH-AUGUST 107 PPG INDUSTRIES, INC. DID NOT COME FROM rrs FILES AND CANNOT BE AUTHENTICATED BY PPG INDUSTRIES, INC. I BB 001350.7 | for include painful. hot iiml swollen (logs, choculale bins and 1 V snacks. the heart, so these factors too must be joints, a rash, profuse sweatin',', rapid Doctors disagree on whether a II considered Out no parent should heart beat and a loss of appetite. But youngstcis should be snitched to such make a decision about a child's activi often the symptoms are less obvious: a diet, but all agree that no child ties without medical consultation. ''.'' 'lie. restlessness and irritability. should be allowed lo become over- Barbara and flank Rene did just / times it follows other infections weight. The National Heart and Lung that after Brian had recuperated at such as that of the middle ear. scarlet Institute has commented that "habits home from his open-heart surgery. fever or a severe strep throat. Imme of activity and eating acquired in Within a few short weeks he was per diate medical attention at the first sus childhood set the pattern for later mitted to do almost everything. Now pected sign is the best preventive. life." If a child is encouraged to count he con do everything--run. jump, even Blood tests and throat cultures help in calorics when young, it will probably ride his bicycle. And his cheeks are al diagnosis. Uncc the disease is identi become part of his life-style as an ways filled with color. fied, treatment must begin at once jnd adult. If, in addition, a parent encour Dr. Ellison, whn will be leaving Bos continue on a long-range basis. Until a ages regular exercise and discourages ton Children's Hospital to take charge definitive cure is found, antibiotics, smoking, particularly by his own ex of Pediatric Cardiology at Georgetown bed rest and attentive medical care ample, that parent has done all that University Hospital at about the lime can help reduce the possibility of can he dune in the light of present Bruin starts school. savs of Brian. "His rheumatic heart disease. knowledge to reduce the risk of an heart sounds arc completely normal. Unlike adults, children's chest pains early heart attack. He has only a very soft murmur which are rarely of cardiac origin. They are Many causes of heart disease in should not bother him in any way. If more likely to result from neuritis, a childhood still remain a mystery. he follows the course of other young respiratory ailment or from the strains Aside from seeing to it that every girl sters with similar cardiac problems, and sprains that often accompany has rubella before pregnancy, and ev we don't expect that he'll have any hard play. Sudden death from heart ery mother-to-be avoids unnecessary limitations on his activities," attacks in the young can usually be drugs and excessive x-ray radiation That's just fine with Brian, who is traced to severe unrecognized or un during pregnancy, there is little one happy about everything except the treated congenital problems involving can do in the way of prevention. Hut fact that he ll be starting first grade. the heart valves (pulmonic and aortic there are danger signals that parents As for his brother. Frankie |r., when stenosis). But the telltale murmur that can alert thcmselvrs to. These include: Brian became well again, big brother identifies these conditions is present in family history of heart disease, diffi began lo do much better in school. But early childhood and is almost always cult pregnancy, breathing problems in that's not bow Brian sees it. O CO oinked up at that time. In the rare shu the newborn baby, rheumatic fever, "l guess he s just getting smarter," he Li | ns when it is missed or disegarded, the heart may be pushed beyond its capacity and suddenly give recurrent respiratory infections, rapid says. heartbeat while resting, shortness of breath in normal play, liglit-hcad- citrii: u_ TlCC. - -- out. The one possible link between child hood and adult heart disease may be premature atherosclerosis, ratty edness. abnormal growth and devel opment and extreme overweight. Continued research oTTcrs the hest hope for future prevention and treat Workers' health uj (Continued from page 19) lVn .mup' bestos. OSIIA took more than a yearCD iX. streaks begin to accumulate along ar ment, and new information is bring before setting an emergency exposurdCD1 CD terial walls in infancy, and it is sus produced almost daily. In N'cw York level--a level that management saidTM) |GC pected that there is a slow, progressive City, for example, researchers at Ml. was acceptable but that labor said wa^ build-up in the arteries that produces Sinai Medical Center me investigating 2'u times too high, and therefore un-"- no symptoms in children, but leads to a simple technique using ultra-sonic safe. t-J-- premature heart attacks in young waves to detect minute changes in the Bo'li MIOS1I and an advisory comf~"'J adults. arterial walls, and New York Hospital- mitten of scientists appointed by thjpj j CD ) Most cardiologists believe that pre Cornell Medical Center is shirking Labor Department recently rccorrfTM. j vention must begin in childhood, espe families with histories of congenital mended that workers should not btfD CD cially among "high-risk" children. heart disease to identify children who allowed lo breathe more than a ni.ii^ These are youngsters whose parents or are genetically disposed to it. imum of five fibers per cubic centime other close relatives have experienced The cardiac child may or may not ter and that this should he cut to two early coronary disease, suffer from have to limit his activities. It depends fiheis per culm: centimeter by 1974. In high blood pressure or have high Irv- on his particular condition, its severity stead. even while acknowledging that cls of cholesterol and ti iyiyccridcs and how active he tends to be. Some "lives of ernplovees arc at Stake," (fatly substances) in their blood. They youngsteis play too hard, especially in OSIIA ruled in June of this year that recommend (hat such children be pul competition. Others have an easier industry would not have lo meet the on low-fat and polyunsatnralcd-fat style lhal doesn't make as great a de lowered standard until 1970. diets. This means low-fat milk, only mand on their damaged hearts. So a In a prepared slalcmrnt, johns-Man- occasional eggs. Iran meal, more fish great deal depends on how-and how villc responded; "The asbestos dust poultry, polyunsaturatrd marga- long--they play the game. levels which gave rise to the serious inc instead of butter, lots of fresh 1 ligh altitudes and extreme tempera and fatal disease described in the fruit and green vegetables, .yid few hot tures also impose exlra demands on Mount Sinai study were those of years 6< WAS N0T A *EC0RD TODAY'S HEALTH/AUGUST 1972 rrs I?0, 0,0 **T C0ME fRom BVSpprE?NAm^?N0T BE AUTHENTICATED | BB 0013509 | BY PPG INDUSTRIES, INC. past, when conditions were tm worst; Ilian thov arc now. yin no way relied the modern Scientific dust control Icehnirjiips we have in operation at the Manvillc plant today . . . "Whenever we learned of health hazards from authoritative people, we engineered and installed dust control equipment as rapidly an it was techni cally and economically feasible . . . "And we are getting results. A dust survey of the Manvillc plant was com pleted last month by imlustiia! hygien ists of the Occupational Safety and Health Administration of the IVpnitment of I.ahor. Of the 250 samples taken in the survey, only five samples were said to be above the five-fiber standard. These have sie.ee been cor rected."- Nonetheless, critirs continue to la ment that testing and enforcement may mean little when measured against the fad that workers must tol erate a dangerous stand.ud hair more years. Dr, Irving Selikoff says that per mitting the five-fiber standard until 1976 means "letting workers inhale 20 or 30 million fibers a day. I don't call it the five fiber st.indaid, I call it the 20 million-fiber standard." He adds that, because of the shortage of inspectors, even this regulation may not be en forced. The doctor said a survey of 9.400 asbestos workers showed that only one dust count was made for each 20.000 man days worked during 1970-71. Joseph Mnndrone. president of Local BOO, United Papermakers and Paperworkers. AKL-CIO, at Manviile says: "The joh can lie done. Johns-Marmlle here has already done a tremendous job. Eighty-five percent of its plant or better is already under tiro two-fiber count. Uut its competitors. I know, haven't done this. With the Labor De partment ruling, they needn't hurry." For 10 years the Pittsburgh Corning plant in Tyler. Texas, had been pro cessing asbestos. Working conditions were so foul that the prisonin'! turn over was unusually high: although at prak employment the company hired only 02 men. over the years 1.5UU men had worked there and. as public health inspectors had rrported yenis ago. they had been getting asbestos dust in their lunos. The danger was also spread to the community, for Pittsburgh Corning dumped asbestos V,'or>i?'S ,n rrany hazardous cccusj' cna c.,iy iac* addvd risks that could be avoiccd by OS,HA waste in nearby fields (three feet deep in places) and some children played in the dust. As far hack ns 1903, Pittsburgh Corning had been nolilicd that it was endangering lives. The warnings re sulted m few improvements. Tyler is a cheap-labor section of east Texas; if the workers didn't like to eat asbestos dust with their lunch, if they didn't want to breathe asbestos dust all day. and if they thought the company was too stingy with its medical facilities-- which, according to a federal in spector's report, consisted of two firstaid cabinets, one with n broken glass door-then of course they were free to look elsew here for work. Actually, the warnings given by in spectors prior to 1071 were given se cretly. The Labor Department's old bureau of Occupational Safety and He.illh (HOSII) hail done health stud ies at I'yter and oilier asbestos plants. Hut the government refused to tell the employees involved what they had fmind-thnt the workers were being subjected to a deadly level of asbestos dust. Then came the Act of 1970; DOSH w as replaced by XIOSH, mid with the new initials came a new crop of bu reaucrats. They looked through the files of I heir predecessors and were outraged. before long they began passing in formation to outsiders, especially to the Oil. Chemical, and Atomic Work ers Union, which had pirisdiction at the Pittsburgh Corning plant. Steve Wodka. health and safety di rector for the union, savs, "We re pretty sure that half or more of the winkers at Tyler will die because of the levels of asbestos they wcic ex posed to." N'lOSII found that of 130 air sam ples taken in the plant. 117 cxcei-derl liie maximum "safe" limits. Seven of It) woi kers with more than a decade of TODAY S HEALTH.'AUGUST 1972 THIS DOCUMENT WAS NOT A RECORD OF 5^i?oSTR,ES',NC* NOT COME FROM n-SFILESAND CANNOT BE AUTHENTICATED BY PPG INDUSTRIES* INC. l BB 0013509 | G5 'On New help for swiminers. O. * * * r i ^i;i y ./ The cause of swimmer's ear Infection When you re >n tne water a great deal, your ear wax may become overly soil and moist This ' soh wax condition piovidcs a lavorabie place tor bacteria and lungi to grow. Too often an infected ear canal i$ the result. This mlcclion is '.ailed "External Otitis," better known as swimmer s ear inlection If you develop swimmer s c-ar consult your physician immedi ately Otherwise you might suffer permanent damage to your hearing Of course, as in all matters of safety prevention is the best cure. That s why we make Swim-EAR Cf SA'VN't* \ Swim-EAR' Drys out water-plugged ears. Helps prevent swimmer's ear infection. How to prevent swimmer's car infection Swimmer s ear infection may otten be prevented by using Swim-EAR' regularly alter swimming, bathing or showering Sv.'inEAR' hetpsevaporate moisture that is trapped in your outer ear canal Swim-EAR also has a dual antiseptic action, plus an acid pH to o'lset the alkalinity usually encounteied m swimming pools. Swim-EAR comes m a piashc squeeze bottle you can lake wdh you anywhere Ask lor SwimEAR' at your drug store. Sporting goods store or pool supply store. And while you re there, ask your retailer about his special Swim-EAR' otter on Ampex stereo tapes and cassettes. VSAVAGE LABORATORIES, INC , 5222 ELM ST .HOUSTON. TEXAS 7703G iN|3|A 0 0 L Wonce S.EtmeU You may eat anything you like, here's a list of vm.it ycu re geng to like rm,.ioymrnt at the plant showed clear signs of asbestoses (a nun*m.digit.mt limp disease brought on after in halation of excessive concentrations of asbestos dust over many v t ars). To punish I'ittsbuigh Corning for polluting its workers and the commu nity for 10 years, OSHA at first levied a line of only 5210, but the union com plained so vigorously that OSI1A was forced to take another look. A new in spection in January. 1072, resulted in morr citations and a fine of SO,990. Two weeks later, claiming hardship on the basis of the fine, Pittsburgh Corning closed down its Tyler oper ation. Questioned about this, an exec utive noted that the company has , ceased asbestos production because, he said, despite "efforts and in vestments to reduce the dust levels . . . it became increasingly impossible to meet the increasingly rigid dust level standards established by the federal government." The first citation issued under the Occupational Health anti Safety Act of 1070 was against one of Allied Chemical s plants in Moundsville, West Virginia, for excessive mercury vapors. For six years conditions at this plant had been the cause of bitter complaints fiom the Oil, Chemical and Atomic Workers Union. Now it was protesting again. If this union is more militant than most, it may be because, as WocJka points out: "Our members don't get black lung like the miners or brown lung like the textile workers. Our members get rainbow lung, they are exposed to so many toxic chem icals." The union filed an'*`immincnt dan ger" complaint tv ith the Labor Depart ment on April 2fl, 1971. and, adds Wodk.i angrily, "It took them two weeks to get into the goddamn plant." The federal inspectors took urine samples from 12 workers and found that seven were above the "threshold limits value"--the safety limit--of 250 micrograms of mercury per liter. Three of the samples were above 800 mierograms. Accotdtne to tlie citation, they found "visible pools and droplets of mercury" throughout the working ar'eu. treating such hazards as arc "likely to cause death or serious physi cal harm to emplovees. " I he citation noted that Allied Chemical had been THIS DOCUMENT WAS NOT A RECORD OF 66 PPG INDUSTRIES, INC. DID NOT COME FROM IT'S FILES AND CANNOT BE AUTHENTICATED BY PPG INDUSTRIES, INC. VfVjT. ; VU 4 L. -- rtj ve^ rax ntr rSTM i~ i ErviN 7 > mCOME 1 KUitf 7~BB"o<>73?io" : (continued from pjgt, C6) nrd in primitive fashion. It period action and pay fines. previously told of (lie hazards liy fed eral inspi'olors. Fur all this the comc -v was gently slapped with a Sl.OOU and oiderr.'rl to clean up by Novemher. Workers report that condi tions are better. Hut. according to the union, as of June 1 federal inspectors hail not returned to the plant to see il their cleanup order was obeyed. ically tested its winkers and when their systems were In.mil to be over loaded with lead, tiny were simply shifted to a 'safer" section of the plant--until their lead levels dropped. OSH.'Vs compliance officers fined American Smelting S000. Uut to avoid potential fines uf SI.OCX) a day. the company was told to build a much 'This is a conscious effort on the part of big industry to srrew up the Act. anil wlial happened in Omaha is a good example. You can't change the attitudes of employers like American Smelling, so the only solution is lo add enough judges lo the Review Commis sion." The Review Commission may not When asked to respond, A11i* I betler ventilation system. It claims this agree with Samuels' ch,'racier judg Chemical chose nut to comment on the would cost S20 million. ASARCO has ment, hut it apparently goes along federal inspectois' charge of mercury spillage in working areas. However. Warien Keigusuii, director of occupa tional health and safety, insists there were inspections subsequent to the ci tation and that when employees were "reevaluated for their health status during; the months of February and appealed OSHA's 5HH0 fine to the Re view Commission. Until the Commis sion hands down its decision, the workers at ASARCO will have leg.illy progressed exactly one step beyond the point they were more than a year ago. If the company loses.at the Review- with his estimation of the bottleneck. The Commission si.uluil off wilh uni.,,t'^ judge: at the end ol focal '72 it had -ItT-TT judges--and a backlog of more than OHO cases. Even if OSHA finally gets an effec tive program operating for unions irr the big industries, the Occupational- C/i r- March 1U72 by the Public Health Ser vice . . . there was no evidence that anybody's health was being im paired." Ferguson also notes that the stan Commission level and wishes to take its case to court, it can do so. This would probably mean that everything will he up in the air--including the lead vapors-for a cuuple more years. Safety and Health Act of 1970 willlikely remain a sham for HO percent of the work foice coveted hy the Act -- that is. the non-unien workers and the' millions of small businessmen of dard of 230 microgrnms of mercury per For its part. American Smelting says America. liter is "Allied Chemical's voluntarily it is spending S410.0U0 on impiove- "The Labor Department has made- imposed control point for removing ments to the ventilation system whieh. only a token eflnrt to inform non workers from exposure," which "is when completed hy the end of this union workers ol llu-ir rights under the four times more stringent than the year, will briny the company "into Jii.l." notes |o-;eph A. Rage, associate M t.-.sarhusolts standard that is unoffi- compliance with the (KillA standards professor at Georgetown Law Center. Iv followed In the federal people." to HO to 90 pel cent." The icmainmy 10 ' and it has done almost nothing to On another front, the Public Health to 20 percent compliance will be educate small husmessinen in the new Service financed a community survey achieved by "administijtivc means'-- law. Mm cover, ollii ;,ds of OSHA jd- of how much lead the people of respirators, good housekeeping, etc. mit these shortcomings." Omaha, Nebraska, were carrying in Compliance by strictly engineering Without conrentrated help from their bodies. Nut surprisingly, the sur means, it says, would mean a new OSII A. the small businessman is out of vey pinpointed those men who worked plant and could cost as much as S20 luck. OSHA's health and safety stan at llu: American Smelting and Refining million. dards fill 2-IU pages ol the F -il-'ral Reg Company (ASARCO)--where lead William K. Murray, director of ad ister--a piihlica*ion that the proprietor plays a key commercial role. vertising and public relations for of a small husincss never heard of. With that sampling in hand, the American Smelting, maintains that in Even i| he did have a copy of these United Steelworkers of America, the past five years the company has standards, it is unlikely that he would which lias union jurisdiction at only had to rotate one poison to a "sa understanl them. Man-.- oificials in ASARCO, asked the Occupational fer" section and that biological moni OSllA admit they don't understand / Safety and Health Administration to toring is done routinely. them either. send safely inspectors and hygienists "In all our industrial hygiene history Hut OSHA has neither supplied the to do a study. at the Omaha plant, then: has never small businessmen with these stan They strapped portable air sampling devices oil seven employees working in the most suspect plant area. Five of the seven samples showed that the lead vapors were almv c I lie "tin eshold limit value" of .2 milligrams of lead per cubic meter of air. based on a weighted eight-hour day. Three sam ples were dramatically in excess of the safe limits. One was 2.70 milligrams, her 2.05 and another .75. Although ASARCO had long been aware of the tlangeis from lead poi soning. thi.* company had met the haz- 68 been anyone who has shown symp dards nor sent out explanatory mate toms of lead poisoning," said Murray. rial. Nonetheless, labor suspects that ap As a result, millions of small busi pealing to tlu- Review Commission is nessmen ate frighl'-ned. They have pait of management s scheme to de heard dire reports --totally false --about stroy the Act, Speaking for the AFL- safety inspectors driving businesses CIO, Sheldon Samuels says, "The Re into hankrupirv. (ip; ononl; of the Act view Commission is becoming a arc making good use of the confusion bottle-neck because the large Irade as as it spreads among farmers and sociations are tiainiiiy their mcditim- ranchers. si/rd and large employers to appeal. Tin- irony is that few small busi Keen when llicy have no reason lo ap nesses have even been inspected, peal, thrv do it to pul off the time mndi less burdened with fines. And trte WW Wfetcim a norbf;uomfs PPG INDUSTRIES, INC. DID NOT COME FROM or ranches 1 liner I ti'nn in, 00135ll BB IT'S FILES, AND CANNOT BE AUTHENTICATED TODAY! 1 BY PPG INDUSTRIES, INC. spectcd. Another uony brought abo, "The degree of the individuals )f course, individuals ddh r. Many by this failute lo pass on inlormation alienation from his a ork depends on employees arc passivc and only want is that, as Joseph Pape points out. ' his philosophy of life." Dr. Warren to do what they are told to do. Others "Many small bn.-iinc'.smen are simply points out, "'1 lie tune-server simply are ambitious and w dl tend to do their unaware of the fact that loans are turns off his mind while he's on the jobs in their own way. It is important vailahlc under ttic Act to help them job. The ovcr-qualif'ed skilled worker, to t.ike the difference between the pas .omply," or executive cannot do the same." sive and aggressive type of employee Joseph Pape is concerned, too. about What can such a worker do? "He into account when evaluating and the "hysteria" generated by "blatant can do what he can to enrich himself vvutking to alleviate ]ob boredom." attempts to cripple the bill." He is crit within the setting of the job." The individual and his supervisor ical of union complacency, and says. The answer in many cases of job en are encouraged to sit dewn and dis "Unions must be more aggressive, in nui may be to drop out. "Sometimes the cuss his job. The employee is asked to meeting criticisms against the Act that loss of income, of fringe benefits, the consider and decide what is the most are not backed by facts." insecurity about finding another job. critical area of his work in tcims of If OSUA, by failing to educate the even a possible readjustment of one's getting top results. The supervisor, in public, permits opponents of the Act way of life to a lower economic scale, his turn, tells the employee what he to exempt small firms and faims from arc worth it if they lead to job satisfac hupcs lo accomplish, the Act--there arc dozens of bills in tion." says the psychologist. Again it "This is called management by ob Congress right now to do just that-it depends on the individual's philoso jectives." says Mr. Parent. "Under will be a tragic step backward her the phy. If he is unhappy at his work and such a program of job enrichment a protection of the Act is needed in he is making his lamtlv unhappy, then task is never assigned to an employee those places more than anywhere else. finding a career winch will make him until he and the supervisor sit down In plains that employ fewer th in 300 feel that what he is doing is worth and discuss this job. The supervisor persons the injury and illness rate is while will restore human values not listens to the employee's telcos of how two and a half times that of larger in only to himself but also to his family. the objective can best be accom dustries. Farm workers have the third- If a person sees his job each day as plished. When I'm Ihe supervisor, the highest injuiy rate and the highest just another day's drudgery, he finds it employee may end up doing it my death rate in industry. increasingly difficult to face his family way, hut l will have considered his When the failure of OSHA's educa each morning. "Workers in general way. It takes longer but it results in a tion program was pul to Don Pcrry- want to avoid jobs that are monoto better quality of work," the public infotmation officer assigned nous. repetitive, over-controlled and Another means of alleviating job by Assistant Secr-tary Guenther to an isolabd from interaction with others," boredom. Mr. Parent points out. is to swer Today's J/ea/lh s tpiestions--he comments Michael Maccobv of Har modify jobs by allotting special re jplied in a wav to indicate he thought vard's Inst'tute of Policy Studies. sponsibility outside of the regularly that anyone who knows anything As Manhattan psychologist Dr. Har jssigned responsibilities. This gives about the bureaucracy should under old Creenwald suggests about many the employee a change of pace. stand. "These arc things were still union grievances--ty[lit.ally a long re Employees* attitudes toward work- working on," he said. "Jesus, we re cital of niggling complaints--they rep even the same kind of work--arc as only a year old.' 01 resent, he says "a cry tor recognition variable as the surjilus of dull jobs that the complaincr is a man and nut a now available. A clerk with a Bronx machine." drug distribution company reacted lo Do redo m on the job (continue} from page 45) Here the fault probably lies with Too often, vvoiker gripes are mis directed because the indiv iduals them selves do not understand the root of their discontent. a newspaper article about job bore dom with immediate recollection of a former employer. One of his clerk's duties was to sweep the center aisle of company policy. Also, not only this Lee A. Parent, director of personnel the company vv alehouse. The first corporate executive, but many types and office services ot the American time his boss glanced at the clean of employees suffer from the loss of Medical Association, agrees with Dr. flour, he excldimcd. "Hey! Nice job the sente el accomplishment. An auto Clrecnwald. "Often personnel knows yon did there." assembly-line worker queried ahout before the employee's supervisor that " I hat s all, nothing else, but every the scandalous list of new-enr defects the individual is bored on tho job. We day or every time I swept the lloor he that have caused cvrrv major com will receive comjilainls that there is would say something nice about it. pany to recoil hundreds of thousands too much noise in the office. Or a sec the cleik remembered. Once, the lues of autos, replies: "Sure, we read how- retary wilt come in and say she doesn't ela Ihh a ted. "If it weren t for you the wui kirn: man today has no oride m like her ty pew liter and needs a new swiepmg the flnor. it would lie a lot his work, and it's true, hut wind you one of this or that kind. Oi sometimes tougher vv orkmg here." don't read is how the company has an employee w ill say 'My supervisor The sweeper's reaction' "Sim|i|i- broken flown the work into smaller duesri t like me.' woids like these can make a |misoii and smaller units, so that no man can "These complaints are indications feel that he or she has jchh ved some feel pndr in '.hat lie's doing. If ihcy'b that the employee is completely tm- thing Somebody < aio about " hut st let me build a ear occasionally. rliallenged m the pi'.iilion. Ihe ^/lo you ate doing and that wlial von .m Just one." tion is a promotion or a iesign.ilinn doing is impoitant So. rvriv lime Von ' NOTEim DocuTMjjj? rrNoT comrfro , TUJf* -vlfH is . h - ? ;jv . :.. , TODAY S HEALTH, S3 ISSSSeUom authenticaveo -> I - j T ? ' ,,,, _ 4. IV -x . ;'j J i' J : ' <* ' ' BY PPG INDUSTRIES, INC- I BB 0013512 1