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An Oregon trucker wrongly fired for refusing to drive an unsafe vehicle will get her job back, plus reimbursement for back wages and compensation for fees associated with the case, after an OSHA investigation.

The California agency that’s supposed to help protect workers from on the job hazards and investigate working condition safety issues is doing a lackluster job, the U.S. Department of Labor says.

Millions of people worldwide die each year as a result of work-related accidents and illnesses. But experts at a congress in Frankfurt think that number can be reduced to zero.

“Telltale signs” of microbial activity were found by investigators in a storage tank that exploded earlier this year, killing a contract worker and severely injuring another. The July 28 incident at the the Omega Protein facility in Moss Point, Mississippi involved hot work being done on or near a tank containing eight inches of a slurry of water and fish matter known as “stickwater,” which was thought to be nonhazardous.

OSHA has cited an Illinois sewer and water contractor for one willful and two serious safety violations after two employees were observed working in a 25 foot-deep trench without adequate cave-in protection while installing storm sewers.

The California Nurses Association says new state regulations by the California Occupational Safety and Health Standards Board will result in improved safety for patients, registered nurses, and other staff in lifting and other handling of hospitalized patients.

By ISHN Editor Dave Johnson, reporting from the annual VPPPA conference: Mistakes will happen, it’s human error, people are people working within the context of systems, so GE takes people out of the equation and focuses on risk, the risks of the systems that employees work within, said Ann R. Klee, the VP for Environment, Health and Safety at GE, speaking at the opening session of the 30^th annual meeting of the Voluntary Protection Program Participants’ Association (VPPPA), in National Harbor, MD, outside of Washington DC.

The Association of Equipment Manufacturers (AEM) is expanding its REACH regulatory-compliance training program to help members and the industry comply with the complex Conflict Minerals and Restriction of Hazardous Substances (RoHS) rules.

A global oil and gas industry association has issued a report based on 2013 data on leading indicators related to health management in the industry.

More than a quarter of a million youth who had never smoked a cigarette used electronic cigarettes in 2013, according to a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) study published in the journal Nicotine and Tobacco Research. This number reflects a three-fold increase, from about 79,000 in 2011, to more than 263,000 in 2013.