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Mourning our dead and injured workers

In Canada, one worker dies, on average, every two hours from workplace accidents. Around the world, the equivalent of three workers die every minute, according to the Geneva-based International Labour Organization.

The ILO's assessment of these same accidents makes the facts even more painful. The organization states that at least half of the deaths from accidents could be prevented by safe working practices and all accidents are avoidable and preventable.

The Day of Mourning, on April 28, is an effort to remember both. It is the day singled out in more than 100 countries to call attention to the extent of workplace death and injury and to promote awareness of health and safety issues to help prevent them.

Next Monday marks the 19th annual Day of Mourning in Canada. It's known as Workers Memorial Day in the United States. First established by the Canadian Labour Congress, support for the workers' remembrance has spread throughout the world's union movements. The International Confederation of Free Trade Unions (ICFTU) formally endorsed it in 1995. Following the Canadian government's example in 1991, several countries are in the process of formally recognizing the Day.

April 28 was chosen to coincide with the date that Canada's first comprehensive Workers Compensation Act (Ontario 1914) was passed.

Companies and individuals can use email to order a new, free poster, (pictured above right) designed by CCOHS, to promote the Day of Mourning.

A number of events are also planned. The CLC will again mark the Day with a memorial ceremony in Ottawa. Each year, if the Saskatchewan Legislature is in session, the names of the Saskatchewan workers who have died in the course of their jobs during the past 365 days are read into the record. Perhaps most powerful of all will be when workers take a moment, wherever they are, to remember and recommit to the cause of workplace safety.

Hazard Alerts

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New warnings from provincial governments

Prevention and information are the watchwords again this month as provincial governments attempt to save lives with hazard alerts and safety bulletins.

New Brunswick's Workplace Health, Safety and Compensation Commission (WHSCC) is reminding workplaces that the Occupational Health and Safety Act and its regulations require employers to take all reasonable precautions to ensure the health and safety of employees. The commission is also specifically mentioning requirements for digging and working in trenches.

Earlier this month an Edmundston excavation company was fined $4,800 after a trench collapsed and fatally injured a worker inside.

The company was digging a trench and laying drainpipe in the evening of May 28, 2001. An employee was inside the trench laying pipe as another operated the digging equipment. An investigation by WHSCC officers concluded that the walls of the trench were unstable and the width of the trench was inappropriate for the type of soil it contained.

Full text of this alert HERE.

Risks of skin and lung disease and cancer from beryllium dust and fumes have garnered the attention of the Workers' Compensation Board of B.C. The dangers are present with even low levels of beryllium, a light, hard metal used in high-tech equipment such as weather satellites, airbag sensors, microelectronics and pace makers. The organization is urging workers and managers to follow safe working practices to protect themselves. Processes that can generate beryllium dust and fumes include mining, melting and casting the metal as well as cutting, machining, grinding, polishing and finishing.

The 8-hour exposure limit in BC is 0.002 mg/ m3 but WCBBC notes that the American Conference of Governmental Industrial Hygienists intends to lower its limit to 0.0002 mg/ m3, because new evidence indicates that levels below the current exposure limit may cause chronic beryllium disease, a serious lung disease.

The WCBBC also offers possible substitutions for beryllium-containing products, such as steel or titanium for Beryllium metal and aluminum nitride for Beryllium oxide.

Full text of this bulletin HERE.

OSH Answers

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Protecting health workers from Drug Resistant Organisms

Drug Resistant Organisms were first noted in the 1940s with penicillin resistance to Staphylococcus aureus. But wide spread use of antibiotics, and the natural evolution of bacteria, has brought a number of drug-resistant strains to the fore. VISA, staphylococcus aereus with intermediate resistance to vancomycin, for example, is already present. While not yet found in nature, it is believed that a vancomycin-resistant strain will emerge or evolve from VISA.

Contact with DROs does not necessarily mean you will get infected or colonized. In general, healthy people are at low risk and casual contact, such as hugging and touching a person who has a DRO, is considered okay. But the risks increase in hospital settings and with those who have severe illnesses or previous DRO exposure.

The best defence against spreading DROs remains thorough hand washing - the same advice offered in the current battle with SARS.

Hospital workers are more likely to be exposed to DROs because of the number of patients they help in a single shift. Specific requirements to stop the spread of infection should be available from hospitals' infection control departments.

In general, methods include:

• Patient isolation
  
• Restrictions on patient movement
  
• Gloves and Hand washing - including washing between procedures to prevent cross-contamination to different body sites on the patient
  
• Protective clothing
  
• Cleaning and disinfecting equipment
  
• Dedicating equipment such as stethoscopes, bedside commodes or thermometers, to one patient or one group of patients
  

Partner News

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Harmonizing chemical classifications across the globe

People who work with chemicals, exporters and importers, and the environment are the big beneficiaries of a new Globally Harmonized System of Classification and Labelling of Chemicals (GHS). After more than a decade of work, the system was adopted in December 2002 in Geneva under the umbrella of the Interorganization Programme for the Sound Management of Chemicals (IMOC).

The goal of GHS is to protect people from the mismanagement of chemicals by classifying them according to their hazards and communicating their hazards via a labeling system based on pictograms and safety data sheets.

Under GHS, the target audience will be much broader than the current audience of Canada's WHMIS and will include workers, emergency responders, transport workers and consumers. GHS will cover pharmaceuticals, pesticides and consumer chemicals in addition to workplace chemicals. The target implementation date is 2008.

Globalized management of chemicals is expected to lead to safer conditions for people and lessen chemical impacts on the environment, while allowing the benefits of chemical use to continue. Harmonization should also facilitate international trade by promoting greater consistency in the national requirements for chemical hazard classification that companies engaged in international trade must meet. Although the system does allow for some differences in implementation between countries, the ultimate goal is to have one chemical hazard communication system used throughout the world.

GHS will form the basis for national programs for the safe management of chemicals worldwide. Canada's existing national occupational health and safety program, Workplace Hazardous Materials Information System (WHMIS) was one of the many international programs studied to create the Globally Harmonized System. It is expected that the Canadian WHMIS requirements established under the Hazardous Products Act and associated Controlled Products Regulations will be amended to incorporate the new harmonized criteria for Safety Data Sheets and labels.

Additional information on GHS in Canada is available at:

• Transport Canada
• Health Canada - WHMIS division
• Environment Canada

CCOHS News

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Customized chemical collection of MSDSs coming for hospitals

Hospitals and healthcare facilities will soon have another alternative to sourcing, maintaining, retrieving and updating information on the hundreds of chemicals in regular use. A new, customized system will provide health establishments instant, electronic access to Material Safety Data Sheets, specific to the chemicals in use at that facility. The data sheets are automatically refreshed as changes occur to arm healthcare workers with the most current, relevant information when they need it.

The Healplex Information Service for the Safe Handling of Hospital Chemicals is the result of a partnership between the Canadian Centre for Occupational Health and Safety and Healplex Learning Centre, a joint, e-learning initiative from the Ontario Hospital Association and The Change Foundation. The goal is to help healthcare organizations manage their health and safety responsibilities as well as help ensure the health and safety of their employees.

The Healplex system relies on CCOHS' extensive collection of MSDSs supplied by more than 1200 chemical suppliers in North America. In addition to the instant, easy access of chemicals used at the facility, managers can further refine collections specifically to departments, units or even individual employees.

The service is being launched initially in a pilot program with a few select hospitals prior to being rolled out to all Ontario hospitals.

To learn more, email CCOHS' client services department at clientservices@ccohs.ca