What is the Upside to killing an Employee?
Sam Hawkins Sr. [CSP, ASP, CHST]
Let's Not Meet By Accident!? |OSHA & DOT Compliance Solutions| |Truck Crash Expert Witness|
Earlier this year OSHA proposed nearly $89,000 in penalties after finding a concrete company again exposed workers to airborne silica. The key word in that sentence is again. See in 2013, OSHA issued this very same company 18 citations totaling $153,900 in penalties. Less than four years later, more citations, many for the same thing!
OSHA cited the repeated violation since the company again failed to conduct annual tests to ensure that respirators fit employees properly while they were cleaning concrete mixers. Silica exposure can cause serious illnesses and damage to the respiratory system.
The failure-to-abate violations involved the company's failure to:
- Develop and implement a written respiratory protection program for employees required to wear respirators during concrete mixer cleaning operations.
- Provide medical evaluations for employees required to wear respirators to determine their ability to use them without their health being compromised.
Quote: "Our follow-up inspection found that two County Concrete employees were exposed to silica above the permissible limit as they cleaned concrete mixers. In 2013, OSHA cited this company for these same hazards," said Kris Hoffman, director of OSHA's Parsippany Area Office. "Employers must bear the responsibility of fully complying with respiratory protection requirements to protect the safety and health of their workers."
I get that some feel safety requirements can slow down a job and/or take a project or job over budget. In this case, we are talking respiratory protection though. Where most of the requirement is met long before walking on the project site or starting the job. I know there is cost and calculated risk taken my companies in every project and job. That said, what is the upside to killing a worker?
Source: www.osha.gov
Let’s Not Meet By Accident!
Owner, Preferred Safety Products, Inc. and Cole-Preferred Safety Consulting, Inc.
7 年i prefer to see it differently. What is the upside of doing what they were doing? They did not kill anyone, and without saying it, i get from the story that no one was alleged to have been injured or sick. There is the problem. Nothing to measure, and nothing tangible to work with. No one, in USA wants to kill EEs. We really don't see that kind of sick perceptions by ERs, ever, in my estimation. We have a culture that doesn't allow that kind of thinking. Assuming that is mostly true, there are certainly some in leadership positions in some companies, that are indifferent to health and overall welfare of EEs assigned to him/her. And no doubt, many, of the country's supervisors are incentivized to get more work and pay less for safety needs - even if the incentive is only a verbal reward, or satisfaction. Therein lies another problem - even in our culture we do NOT reward anyone for staying safe - that's a given. We are in awe and respect of X-games daredevils, football players that play tough - knowing that they can die prematurely of brain injury, and trades that take great risks - like ironworkers, firemen and policemen. I have for decades argued that the intangibles and abstract nature of health laws, written by lawyers and IH and epidimiologists is the problem. Amazingly, some of my (and hopefully many others') comments came home to roost in the NEW silica standard. Do not tell ERs that they must minimize airborne concentrations, to a smaller than can be seen amount of dust that can't be measured by that ER or his EEs. Tell them to use water when cutting any concrete, breaking any concrete, or moving and storing or feeding the machinery with sand and aggegate. And wear a respirator if any visible dust is being seen. At lease a P95. Some would say the standard went backwards, but no, I say, OSHA owes these people their money back if they ever were using the current best standards. As for respirator cleanliness, and base line medical exams, I am certainly open to hear any experts tell me that it is significantly better for silicosis diagnosis - but i will assume it may be a long wait. I am not unsympathetic to the EE comforts and rights and proper medical and cleanliness, but in the end as a safety professional i have to do what gets results. No deaths or disability from Silicosis. Once we have that tackled, i say we can then be clean and neat, and get people to doctors every year. End of the problem - give managers tangible and measurable instructive limits. Just like all their other metrics. Work with the level of the trade. Don't complicate things.