On Monday morning, the National Safety Council honored five individuals with Distinguished Service to Safety Awards, the highest award the Council presents to safety professionals. This year’s five recipients were honored at the opening session of the NSC Congress & Expo in Indianapolis.
An unexpected move from a cigarette manufacturer, emergency preparedness and worker safety during extreme weather were among the top stories featured on ISHN.com this week.
Taxi and limo drivers face a greater risk of violent death at work compared to other workers, and the risk is even higher among certain groups of drivers, according to new NIOSH research published in the Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine.
Four workers were severely burned at the ExxonMobil refinery in Baton Rouge, Louisiana last year because the facility operators failed to conduct a safety hazard analysis, according to the U.S. Chemical Safety Board (CSB), which investigated the incident.
What workers are at increased risk of injury during hurricanes or tornados?
While most workers can stay inside during such a storm, some workers may be required to go into the storm. This may include utility workers, law enforcement personnel, firefighters, emergency medical personnel, federal, state and local government personnel (such as sanitation and highway workers), and military personnel.
A Michigan company that couldn’t purchase workers’ compensation insurance because its injury rates were so high has radically changed its approach to safety, resulting in a significant reduction in its accident and incident rates and cost savings of about $30,000 a year.
A couple of comments before we get to this week’s list. We’ve written about OSHA’s unfortunate decision to remove the names of workers killed on the job from their webpage. Jennifer Gollan of Reveal News interviewed a number of family members of workers killed on the job who felt that OSHA’s decision was wrong and reduces their loved ones’ deaths to a statistic.
President Trump choses a former coal company executive to head up the MSHA, Hurricane Harvey poses health and safety hazards for recovery workers in Texas and Louisiana and a new worldwide agreement defines skills and qualifications for safety professionals. These were among the top stories featured on ISHN.com this week.
Today the full Senate Appropriations Committee reported out the FY 2018 Labor-HHS Funding Bill. The bill maintains OSHA, MSHA and NIOSH funding at the FY 2017 levels. That means that there are no cuts from the agencies’ current (FY 2017) budgets.
Hometown Foods USA – a commercial bakery doing business as Bagelmania Inc. – faces $129,145 in proposed penalties from OSHA after investigators found workers at its Medley facility exposed to amputation, fire, and noise hazards.