Weekly news round-up
A downside of telemedicine visits, a safety coordinator and another manager indicted for obstructing an OSHA workplace fatality investigation and smartphone lessons from GM’s ban on using them while walking. These were among the top stories featured on ISHN.com this week.
Worker severely burned in blast at Georgia factory
April 12, 2019
A worker suffered severe burns in an explosion while he was repairing a semitrailer in DeKalb County, GA. The explosion occurred at a tractor-trailer repair factory in the 4300 block of Old McDonough Road, DeKalb County Fire Rescue spokesman Dion Bentley said from the scene. Initially, officials said the fire started after the semitrailer crashed into the building.
ASSP report on women and safety highlights issues, opportunities
April 12, 2019
The American Society of Safety Professionals (ASSP) has released a report on women and safety in the modern workplace – a follow-up to its Women’s Workplace Safety Summit held last October near Chicago. The report focuses on three main challenges faced by women in the workplace and offers potential solutions. It is just one outcome of ASSP’s ongoing initiative to improve diversity and inclusion throughout the safety industry while ultimately better protecting workers everywhere.
7 fatalities in 5-vehicle Fla. crash – but cause a mystery
April 12, 2019
The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) has been able to re-construct the series of events involved in a January 3, 2019 multi-vehicle crash in Florida, although what set the tragedy in motion remains under investigation. According to the NTSB, at approximately 3:40 p.m., a 2016 Freightliner truck-tractor in combination with a semitrailer was traveling north on Interstate 75 (I-75) in Gainesville, Florida, when it struck a 2016 Acura passenger car that was also traveling north.
A FairWarning Story
Job-related falls should be easy to prevent, but workers are still dying in record numbers
April 11, 2019
Last August, Higinio Romero was working on the roof of a condo in South Florida when he slipped and fell two stories, landing on rocks below. Emergency workers found him unconscious and bleeding from his ears. Romero — a father of two children, 4 months old and 10 years old — died about an hour later. According to a sheriff’s report, he had unclipped his safety harness shortly before the fall.
Company managers indicted for obstructing OSHA investigation
Men threatened to fire workers who didn't change their stories
April 11, 2019
A federal grand jury in the Northern District of Ohio has indicted two managers at Extrudex Aluminum Inc. in Ohio for conspiracy to obstruct justice during a 2012 workplace fatality investigation by OSHA. The agency inspected the aluminum extrusion manufacturer after an employee suffered fatal injuries when a rack containing hot aluminum parts tipped over and pinned him. A second employee suffered severe burns.
New method for evaluating cancer risk of chemicals is quick, precise, inexpensive
April 11, 2019
Researchers from Boston University Schools of Medicine and Public Health have developed and evaluated a fast, accurate and cost-effective approach to assessing the carcinogenicity of chemicals—that is, whether exposure to a chemical increases a person’s long-term cancer risk. As a result, they have generated one of the largest toxicogenomics datasets to date, and have made the data and results publicly accessible through a web portal at carcinogenome.org.
A NIOSH Science Blog post
Construction fall fatalities still highest among all industries: What more can we do?
April 11, 2019
Falls are the leading cause of construction-worker fatalities, accounting for one-third of on-the-job deaths in the industry. In 2017, there were 366 fall fatalities out of 971 total fatalities in construction. According to the CPWR, from 2011-2015, 61% of fatal falls in construction occurred in small businesses with fewer than 10 employees. Almost two-thirds of fatal falls were from roofs, scaffolds, and ladders.
CVS Health honored for efforts to defeat lung cancer
April 10, 2019
CVS Health has been awarded the American Lung Association’s (ALA) Outstanding Corporate Partner of the Year award in recognition of the company’s support over the past five years to advance the ALA’s efforts to defeat lung cancer. "Five years ago the American Lung Association launched LUNG FORCE because lung cancer was not on women's health radar, and we wanted the public to understand that lung cancer is actually the number one cancer killer among women," said ALA National President and CEO Harold Wimmer.
NTSB: CSX workers were walking on tracks when struck, killed
April 10, 2019
The 2017 deaths of two CSX Transportation workers were the result of their decision to walk on an active Amtrak train track in Washington, D.C., the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) said in a report issued Tuesday. Investigators found that while the conductors were likely aware that the two tracks were active, they may have chosen this more comfortable way to walk back to the front of their train because no Amtrak trains had passed through the area for about an hour.
Four smartphone safety lessons we can learn from GM
April 10, 2019
Since January 2018, people who work at General Motors (GM) are not allowed to use their smartphones while walking. That rule extends to employees with office jobs, as well as those in the company's factories. Here are four things we can learn from that approach. 1. A single behavior change has substantial effects
A FairWarning Story
Tracking the cost in lives of higher speed limits
April 10, 2019
The federal government’s 1995 decision to allow states to set speed limits higher than 65 mph caused almost 14,000 additional deaths over 25 years on interstates and freeways, according to a new study by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety. That average of 560 deaths a year ”is really a big deal,” said Charles Farmer, the author of the study and a vice president of the Insurance Institute.
Younger Type 2 diabetics at high risk of heart disease
Women at excess risk
April 9, 2019
People under age 40 who are diagnosed with Type 2 diabetes are more likely to have or die from cardiovascular disease than those of similar age without diabetes and the excess risks were more pronounced in younger women, according to new research in the American Heart Association’s journal Circulation. Researchers also found the excess risk for death, regardless of cause, for people diagnosed with Type 2 diabetes at age 80 or older significantly decreased and was the same as those of similar age without diabetes.
Falls, struck-by incidents claim workers lives in recent weeks
April 9, 2019
A worker who was replacing a roof at a Jefferson County, Kentucky high school died March 28 after falling through the roof. News sources say 40-year-old Fredy Godoy-Mendoza died shortly after 5 p.m. at Waggener Traditional High School. Godoy-Mendoza was reportedly employed by a roofing contractor. In Pacoima, California, a forklift operator was killed March 31, when he was struck by a car while making a delivery.
New NIOSH video helps first responders reduce fentanyl exposure danger
April 9, 2019
Recent incidents of law enforcement officers becoming ill from fentanyl exposure during traffic stops – including two in Massachusetts who had to administer the life-saving drug Narcan to themselves – have raised awareness of the dangers faced by first responders. Now, the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) has released a new video to help emergency responders understand the risks and to take steps to protect themselves from exposure to illicit drugs.
FDNY 9/11 fatalities continue, while compensation fund is going broke
April 9, 2019
Three retired New York City Fire Department (FDNY) with 9/11 illnesses died within 48 hours this week, a stark reminder that the death toll from the terrorist attacks continues to climb, going far beyond the 343 members of the FDNY who were killed that day. News sources say the latest victims are retired FDNY Lt. Timothy O’Neill, firefighter Kevin Lennon Fire Marshal Michael Andreachi.
Workplace robotics fuel both safety fear and optimism
April 8, 2019
The construction workers who participated in a recent poll on behalf of Volvo Construction Equipment (Volvo CE) have some very complicated attitudes towards automation and artificial intelligence (AI) in the workplace. Some 31 percent said they fear that their jobs were at risk from automation, but far more – 46 percent – worry that their safety is at risk from their non-human co-workers.
Physicians may overprescribe antibiotics to kids during telemedicine visits
April 8, 2019
Telemedicine is convenient and cost effective, but the newest and fastest growing form of urgent health care has a potential downside. Children are more likely to be overprescribed antibiotics for colds, sinus infections and sore throats during telemedicine visits than during in-person visits to primary care providers or urgent care facilities, suggests a study funded by the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD), part of the National Institutes of Health.
27 violations found at Remington Arms manufacturing facility
April 8, 2019
OSHA has cited Remington Arms Company LLC – based in Madison, North Carolina – for 27 violations of workplace safety and health standards after an employee's fingertip was amputated while working on a broaching machine at its Ilion, New York, manufacturing plant. The arms manufacturer faces $210,132 in penalties.
Heart attack victims over 65 treated differently
-And their outcomes are worse
April 8, 2019
Heart attack victims over age 65 are less likely than younger patients to receive timely percutaneous coronary intervention to open their blocked heart arteries, according to preliminary research presented at the American Heart Association’s Quailty of Care and Outcomes Research Scientific Sessions 2019, a premier global exchange of the latest advances in quality of care and outcomes research in cardiovascular disease and stroke for researchers, healthcare professionals and policymakers.
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