Does a Collateral Duty Require Less Protection: Workers, Hazardous Materials Emergency Response, and OSHA's Failure to Protect

1998 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 205-219 ◽  
Author(s):  
Craig Slatin ◽  
Eduardo Siqueira
Keyword(s):  
Waste Management ◽  
Emergency Response ◽  
National Level ◽  
Health And Safety ◽  
Hazardous Materials ◽  
Regulatory Requirement ◽  
American Federation ◽  
Industrial Sectors ◽  
Municipal Employees ◽  
Failure To Protect

Waste management activities are widespread throughout most industrial sectors, and hazardous materials are a component of the waste of almost every aspect of industry. Workers with a collateral duty to engage in emergency response activities to a hazardous materials incident require health and safety protection. OSHA has failed to appropriately acknowledge this threat to workers and has been confusing and inconsistent in the interpretation and enforcement of its regulatory requirement for training workers with such a collateral duty. This article will discuss efforts on a national level to secure these protections, and provides an example of the American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) training program for workers with such a collateral duty in Toledo, Ohio. This evidence suggests that the provision of training to a majority of workers and supervisors involved in municipal waste management can greatly improve both worker and community health and safety. OSHA should revise 29 CFR 1910.120 and make its interpretation and enforcement of the standard consistent, in order to better protect workers with a collateral duty to respond to hazardous materials emergency incidents.

scholarly journals The Place and Role of HAZMAT Units with Respect to Increasing Public Safety in Hungary

Hadmérnök ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 16 (3) ◽  
pp. 55-79
Author(s):  
Antal Papp
Keyword(s):  
Emergency Response ◽  
Public Safety ◽  
Health And Safety ◽  
Hazardous Materials ◽  
Industrial Facilities ◽  
Emergency Response Units

The basis of public safety is dependent on the assessment of risk of potential disasters. Furthermore, the term  involves protecting and safeguarding people from disasters and other potential dangers or threats. The increasing  importance of a nation’s preparedness is becoming more  obvious in case of disasters, in order to protect the health  and safety of citizens, properties, material assets, industrial facilities and the environment. This paper offers an outline  review of hazardous materials related emergency response units’ (HAZMAT Units) role in the fields of prevention,  control, communication, identification of hazard impacts,  decontamination and recovery activities.

Policy Recommendations to Reduce Toxic Exposures for Nail Salon Workers

2011 ◽  
Vol 9 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 43-50 ◽  
Author(s):  
Julia Liou ◽  
Catherine Porter ◽  
Thu Quach
Keyword(s):  
National Level ◽  
Safety Information ◽  
Health And Safety ◽  
Policy Recommendations ◽  
Safety Issues ◽  
Government Oversight ◽  
Regulatory Perspective ◽  
Nail Salon ◽  
Health And Safety Issues ◽  
Nail Salon Workers

The nail salon sector is growing rapidly. Nail salon workers are predominantly Vietnamese immigrant women who are exposed to numerous harmful chemicals in nail care products. The situation is exacerbated by limited safety information, language barriers to information, and lack of government oversight. This brief discusses the health and safety issues faced by workers at the nexus of environmental and worker justice and the policy recommendations by which to address these issues from a public health and regulatory perspective. Although these policy recommendations pertain to California where the sector is largest, they also have far-reaching implications at the national level.

scholarly journals Economic burden of work injuries and diseases: a framework and application in five European Union countries

2021 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Emile Tompa ◽  
Amirabbas Mofidi ◽  
Swenneke van den Heuvel ◽  
Thijmen van Bree ◽  
Frithjof Michaelsen ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
European Union ◽  
The Netherlands ◽  
Economic Burden ◽  
National Level ◽  
Health And Safety ◽  
Indirect Costs ◽  
The European Union ◽  
Work Injuries ◽  
European Union Countries ◽  
Related Quality

Abstract Background Estimates of the economic burden of work injuries and diseases can help policymakers prioritize occupational health and safety policies and interventions in order to best allocate scarce resources. Several attempts have been made to estimate these economic burdens at the national level, but most have not included a comprehensive list of cost components, and none have attempted to implement a standard approach across several countries. The aim of our study is to develop a framework for estimating the economic burden of work injuries and diseases and implement it for selected European Union countries. Methods We develop an incidence cost framework using a bottom-up approach to estimate the societal burden of work injuries and diseases and implement it for five European Union countries. Three broad categories of costs are considered—direct healthcare, indirect productivity and intangible health-related quality of life costs. We begin with data on newly diagnosed work injuries and diseases from calendar year 2015. We consider lifetime costs for cases across all categories and incurred by all stakeholders. Sensitivity analysis is undertaken for key parameters. Results Indirect costs are the largest part of the economic burden, then direct costs and intangible costs. As a percentage of GDP, the highest overall costs are for Poland (10.4%), then Italy (6.7%), The Netherlands (3.6%), Germany (3.3%) and Finland (2.7%). The Netherlands has the highest per case costs (€75,342), then Italy (€58,411), Germany (€44,919), Finland (€43,069) and Poland (€38,918). Costs per working-age population are highest for Italy (€4956), then The Netherlands (€2930), Poland (€2793), Germany (€2527) and Finland (€2331). Conclusions Our framework serves as a template for estimating the economic burden of work injuries and diseases across countries in the European Union and elsewhere. Results can assist policymakers with identifying health and safety priority areas based on the magnitude of components, particularly when stratified by key characteristics such as industry, injury/disease, age and sex. Case costing can serve as an input into the economic evaluation of prevention initiatives. Comparisons across countries provide insights into the relevant performance of health and safety systems.

Robust Hazardous Materials Closed-Loop Supply Chain Network Design with Emergency Response Teams Location

2021 ◽  
pp. 036119812199207
Author(s):  
Nasrin Mohabbati-Kalejahi ◽  
Alexander Vinel
Keyword(s):  
Supply Chain ◽  
Network Design ◽  
Emergency Response ◽  
Closed Loop ◽  
Hazardous Materials ◽  
Risk Exposure ◽  
Supply Chain Network Design ◽  
Supply Chain Network ◽  
Distribution Centers ◽  
Closed Loop Supply Chain

Hazardous materials (hazmat) storage and transportation pose threats to people’s safety and the environment, which creates a need for governments and local authorities to regulate such shipments. This paper proposes a novel mathematical model for what is termed the hazmat closed-loop supply chain network design problem. The model, which can be viewed as a way to combine several directions previously considered in the literature, includes two echelons in the forward direction (production and distribution centers), three echelons in the backward direction (collection, recovery, and disposal centers), and emergency response team positioning. The two objectives of minimizing the strategic, tactical, and operational costs as well as the risk exposure on road networks are considered in this model. Since the forward flow of hazmat is directly related to the reverse flow, and since hazmat accidents can occur at all stages of the lifecycle (storage, shipment, loading, and unloading, etc.), it is argued that such a unified framework is essential. A robust framework is also presented to hedge the optimization model in case of demand and return uncertainty. The performance of both models is evaluated based on a standard dataset from Albany, NY. Considering the trade-offs between cost and risk, the results demonstrate the design of efficient hazmat closed-loop supply chain networks where the risk exposure can be reduced significantly by employing the proposed models.

scholarly journals Ageing Organisations and the Extension of Working Lives: A Case Study Approach

2014 ◽  
Vol 43 (4) ◽  
pp. 773-792 ◽  
Author(s):  
WIETEKE CONEN ◽  
KÈNE HENKENS ◽  
JOOP SCHIPPERS
Keyword(s):  
Older Workers ◽  
National Level ◽  
Health And Safety ◽  
Drop Out ◽  
Physical Work ◽  
Policy Changes ◽  
Study Approach ◽  
Working Lives ◽  
Economic Climate ◽  
Health Related

AbstractThis paper examines how the economic climate and policy changes at national level have been affecting organisational practices, aimed at the extension of working lives of older workers, over the last decade. We analyse case studies conducted among Dutch organisations. Our findings show that personnel policies are typically short-term oriented and vary in their existence and content congruous to the economic climate. Policy changes in retirement arrangements, and the debate about raising the official retirement age, have made both employees and employers realise that the extension of working lives has become an unavoidable fact, although both parties still seem intrinsically opposed to it. Changes to safety regulations and the increase in costs for employers if employees drop out of work due to ill health have led to an increasing focus on health-related measures in professions with intense physical work over the last decade. We conclude that, while national level policy changes in areas like health and safety do percolate down and begin to affect organisational practice, it is at the organisational level that they still need to be worked through.

Polish Approach to Sharing Resources Deployable for the EU Civil Protection Mechanism

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 143-158
Author(s):  
Tomasz Zwęgliński
Keyword(s):  
Emergency Response ◽  
Forest Fires ◽  
International System ◽  
National Level ◽  
Civil Protection ◽  
The European Union ◽  
Internal Security ◽  
Protection Mechanism ◽  
European Dimension ◽  
The Eu

Poles are highly aware of the fact that Polish civil protection assets are being deployed abroad in order to assist other disaster- and crisis-stricken countries around the world. Such a type of urgent assistance provided from one country to another in an emergency response situation is regulated and organised by the European Union. Poland, as a state participating in the EU international system, is very active in sharing its civil protection assets, such as in the Beirut explosion case in Lebanon (2020), and during forest fires in Sweden (2018). Using its civil protection resources to assist other countries poses a question on the potential influence of such activities on the homeland’s internal security. Solving the problem has to be preceded by answering the following question — How is the process of international civil protection deployment organised in Poland? Responding to this question required utilising such methods as a review and analysis of literature sources on the European dimension of civil protection, EU legal regulations, statistics, reports as well as Polish standard operating procedures and internal regulations on the national level and was the key method applied in the research. Furthermore, semi-formal interviews with Polish and EU experts were done. The findings prove that operational planning in the researched area is well organised, which significantly diminishes the identified risk for internal security.

scholarly journals The role of health and safety experts in the management of hazardous and toxic wastes in Indonesia

2018 ◽  
Vol 31 ◽  
pp. 07011
Author(s):  
Supriyadi ◽  
Hadiyanto
Keyword(s):  
Waste Management ◽  
Hazardous Waste ◽  
Occupational Safety ◽  
Management Practices ◽  
Health And Safety ◽  
Occupational Safety And Health ◽  
Toxic Waste ◽  
Hazardous Waste Management ◽  
Safety And Health ◽  
Health Experts

Occupational Safety and Health Experts in Indonesia have an important role in integrating environmental health and safety factors, including in this regard as human resources assigned to undertake hazardous waste management. Comprehensive knowledge and competence skills need to be carried out responsibly, as an inherent professional occupational safety and health profession. Management leaders should continue to provide training in external agencies responsible for science in the management of toxic waste to enable occupational safety and health experts to improve their performance in the hierarchy of control over the presence of hazardous materials. This paper provides an overview of what strategies and competencies the Occupational Safety and Health expert needs to have in embracing hazardous waste management practices.

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