Document jBpbyRVvGKOkBEnZvdmenx9gN

FILE NAME Newspaper & Magazine Articles NMA DATE 1970 Nov 15 DOC NMA050 DOCUMENT DESCRIPTION NYT - Nader Unit Backs Job Safety Bills New York Times Currfe ilen Novt 15 1970 ProQuest Historical News ThepNewaYop rk e Timer s 18s 51 - 2002 Pg.31 NADER BACKS JOBSAFETY BILLS ! Assails Efforts to Change Measures Labor Seeks Special to The New York Times WASHINGTON Nov. As- serting that elk and deer are better protected than working men and women a group of environmentalists led by Ralph Nader threw their support today behind two job health and safety bills now before Con gress They called the bills the minimum legislation Congress should approve They de nounced industry and Adminis tration efforts to change the measures which are supported by organized labor and the Democrats The Senate bill sponsored by Harrison A. Williams Jr. Demo- crat of New Jersey is among the pending business when that body reconvenes Monday A similar House bill sponsored Representative Dominick . Daniels Democrat of New Jer sey is scheduled for early ac- tion Both bills place broad rule- making inspection and enforce ment of Labor powers in the Secretary and grant expanded employe rights Segments of industry led by the Chamber of Commerce and the Nixon ad- ministration want making and enforcement to be done by independent panels Industry sources have also complained about the expanded workers rights At a news conference called physicist by the environmentalists a New York City said that New York and New Jersey asbestos workers were dying of cancer at much higher rates than the general population according to a study he had conducted The majority of them will die from asbestosis from inhalation of the dust and it is completely preventable said Dr. William J. Nicholson assist- ant professor of community medicine at the Mount Sinai School of Medicine 400 Deaths Studied Dr. Nicholson said his study of asbestos workers in New York Local 12 and New Jersey Local 32. showed that since more than 400 had died Accidents were the dominant cause of death in the early years he said but now 10 cent were dying of as- bestosis over 20 per cent were dying of lung cancer 10 per cent of cancer of the digestive tract 10 per cent of nasal mesothelioma a cancer and per cent miscellaneous cancers interelationship An interrelationship between consumer problems and oc- cupational hazards was pointed out by Glenn Paulson of Rockefeller University who said workers packaging enzyme detergents were beginning to contact chronic respiratory dis- eases And a Boston cancer special- ist said reports were beginning to trickle in that housewives were suffering from skin probjams because of the enzymes Birth Defect Warning Dr. Samuel S. Epstein of the Children's Cancer Research Foundation in Boston issued a warning about increased dan- gers of birth defects and damages to the genetic pool He said the sources of danger to workers came from accidents noise dust irradiation and toxic chemicals Absent from the news con- ference but listed as signers of a statement of support for the health and safety legislation were a number of men promi- nent in science such as Barry Commoner of Washington Uni- versity Paul Erlich of Stanford and George Wald of Harvard Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner Further reproduction