A school district in Michigan ran afoul of federal laws protecting whistleblowers when it fired an employee who reported unsafe working conditions. That determination against the Dearborn Heights School District – made last week by OSHA - carries with it a $102,905.78 penalty, for back wages, damages and other compensation.
Manufacturing leaders know that people and processes are most productive when safety, compliance and operational objectives align. Some people used to fear that focusing too much on environment, health and safety would undermine productivity.
One sweeping glance across the Seattle skyline is enough to see that something is happening in the area. If a region’s tower crane count is any indication of economic growth, then companies should pay attention to the Pacific Northwest.
Accidents happen for millions of reasons, but the truth is, they are all preventable. Three major causes are common in almost all accidents; not using the right tool for the job; using a damaged tool that hasn’t been inspected; and not following the basic safety guideline for that tool.
ISHN Magazine sat down with Joe Boyle, CEO of TRUCE, to discuss strategies for eliminating workplace distractions. The following are excerpts from that conversation.
Workplace toxins that are inadvertently tracked by employees into their homes serve “as an intriguing example of how occupational conditions can have broader public health consequences,” according to scientists who’ve studied the problem.
In Eliminating Take-Home Exposures: Recognizing the Role of Occupational Health and Safety in Broader Community Health, researchers reframe the problem as one arising from unsanitary worker behavior – the current thinking – to a larger issue that needs to be viewed through an ecosocial lens in order to institute effective prevention.
Employers grapple with the coronavirus, flight attendants cheer a proposed comfort animals on planes rule and indoor air quality affects construction workers, too. These were among the top occupational safety and health, environmental health and safety and regulatory stories featured on ISHN.com this week.
OSHA stayed busy in fiscal year 2019. The agency trained a record 1,392,611 workers on safety and health requirements through its various educational programs. OSHA also helped small employers identify 137,885 workplace hazards through its On-Site Consultation Program, which OSHA estimates protected 3.2 million workers from potential harm.
Most American workers are not at significant risk of contracting the new coronavirus (2019-nCoV ) – but there are certain categories of employees who may be in danger of exposure, according to OSHA, which has published a webpage about rapidly-evolving outbreak.
Chinese health officials have reported thousands of infections with 2019-nCoV in that country, with the virus reportedly spreading from person-to-person in many parts of that country.
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