Respirators Are Not Enough: New Study Examines Worker Exposure to Silica in Hydraulic Fracturing Operations

Today's post was shared by WCBlog and comes from ehstoday.com

A new study, “Occupational Exposures to Respirable Crystalline Silica During Hydraulic Fracturing,” found respirable crystalline silica, a human lung carcinogen, to be an occupational exposure hazard for workers at hydraulic fracturing (fracking) operations. Researchers also found that the most commonly used type of respirator – the half-mask air-purifying respirator – might not provide enough protection for workers.

The study, published in the Journal of Occupational and Environmental Hygiene (JOEH) July issue, is the first systematic investigation of worker exposure to crystalline silica during directional drilling and fracking operations, a process used to stimulate well production in the oil and gas industry.

Field researcher from the NIOSH Western States Office (WSO) and the Division of Applied Research and Technology (DART) collected 111 personal breathing zone samples at 11 sites in five states over a 15-month period to evaluate exposures to respirable crystalline silica during fracking operations.

“Certain work in this industry requires employees to be in areas where respirable silica levels may exceed defined occupational exposure limits like the OSHA Permissible Exposure Limit or the NIOSH Recommended Exposure Limits [RELs],” said researcher Michael Breitenstein, who is with the NIOSH DART in Cincinnati. “However, our study found that in some cases, full shift personal breathing zone exposures exceeded 10 times the...

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Unpaid Intern? You Probably Aren't Protected Against Sexual Harassment

Today's post was shared by Mother Jones and comes from www.motherjones.com

This story first appeared on ProPublica.

In 1994, Bridget O'Connor began an internship at Rockland Psychiatric Center, where one of the doctors allegedly began to refer to her as Miss Sexual Harassment, told her that she should participate in an orgy, and suggested that she remove her clothing before meeting with him. Other women in the office made similar claims.

Yet when O'Connor filed a lawsuit, her sexual harassment claims were dismissed because she was an unpaid intern. A federal appeals court affirmed the decision to throw out the claim.

Unpaid interns miss out on wages and employment benefits, but they can also find themselves in "legal limbo" when it comes to civil rights, according to law professor and intern labor rights advocate David Yamada. The O'Connor decision (the leading ruling on the matter, according to Yamada) held that because they don't get a paycheck, unpaid interns are not "employees" under the Civil Rights Act—and thus, they're not protected.

Federal policies echo court rulings. The laws enforced by the US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, including the Civil Rights Act, don't cover interns unless they receive "significant remuneration," according to commission spokesperson Joseph Olivares.

"At least with respect to the federal law that we enforce, an unpaid intern would not be legally protected by our laws prohibiting sexual harassment," Olivares said in an email to ProPublica.

It's unclear how many interns are sexually harassed at work....

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Walmart Gets Desperate | The Nation

Today's post was shared by Steven Greenhouse and comes from www.thenation.com

Walmart today went on the attack against The Nation for its alleged hypocrisy over the pay of interns, as some kind of excuse for their own failure to pay tens of thousands of Americans a decent wage. 

About the Author

Some background: In the fall of 2012, The Nation Institute—which runs and administers the program—began a campaign to better fund its internship program. In the spring of 2013, interns asked for an increase to their stipend to help attract a more diverse pool of applicants. As of next month, The Nation Institute will be able to pay interns New York City minimum wage. (For more on this read here.) Additionally, The Institute will continue to help interns in need with additional funding for housing and travel, and The Nation pays interns as contributors if they write for the magazine or website.

This afternoon, The Daily Beast repeated Walmart's PR spin that The Nation "live[s] in glass houses," and that somehow the interns’ compensation disqualified The Nation from its vigorous reporting about Walmart's near-poverty wages, including an open letter that asked Wamart—the single largest employer in America—to increase wages to $12 per hour. The Huffington Post reported last year that “a cart pusher who started out at $8 per hour, for instance, can expect to be earning about $10.60 per hour after six years and a...

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Green Job Hazards: Wind Energy

Today's post was shared by US Dept. of Labor and comes from www.osha.gov

<< Back to Green Job Hazards Green Job Hazards: Wind Energy Wind turbines generate electricity from wind, and are being manufactured and installed all across the nation. Wind energy employers need to protect their workers from workplace hazards and workers should be engaged in workplace safety and health and need to understand how to protect themselves from these hazards. While this is a growing industry, the hazards are not unique and OSHA has many standards that cover them. This page provides information about some of the hazards that workers in the wind energy industry may face. Hazards and ControlsFatalities/Incidents Wind Energy workers are exposed to hazards that can result in fatalities and serious injuries. Many incidents involving falls, severe burns from electrical shocks and arc flashes/fires, and crushing injuries have been reported to OSHA. Some examples are given below: On August 29, 2009 at 08:30 hours a 33-year-old male lineman was shocked as he grasped a trailer ramp attached to a low boy trailer containing an excavator. The excavator was being operated in anticipation of being off-loaded from the trailer. The trailer was parked on a rural aggregate road adjacent to an access road for a wind turbine generator. The excavator operator rotated the upper works of the machine prior to moving the machine from the trailer. During the rotation the boom contacted a 7,200 volt primary rural power line. The power line was approximately 12 feet from the road with the trailer... <<

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Democrats Jump on the 'Death Panel' Bandwagon

Many workers' compenssation systems strickly control medicsl care.Will workers' compensation insurace companies buy into the "death panel" consequence just to cut costs? Today's post was shared by Mother Jones and comes from www.motherjones.com

Rod Lamkey Jr./ZUMAPress

In 2009, Sarah Palin claimed Obamacare would create "death panels," or bands of bureaucrats who would decide whether old or disabled Americans were worthy of medical care. That notion turned out to be a figment of her imagination. But now, a growing cohort of Democratic lawmakers is cozying up to the idea, charging that the cost-cutting board that Obama's health care law creates will indeed hurt people on Medicare, The Hill reports.

Sen. Mark Pryor (D-Ark.) and Reps. Ron Barber (D-Ariz.), Ann Kirkpatrick (D-Ariz.), Kyrsten Sinema (D-Ariz.) and Elizabeth Esty (D-Conn.) have all signed onto bills repealing the powers of the Independent Payment Advisory Board, a panel created by the Affordable Care Act that will make recommendations on how to reduce Medicare spending once Medicare cost growth reaches a certain level.

The lawmakers have said they oppose the board because it would limit care for Medicare patients, even though the health care law says that any cuts would have to affect doctor reimbursement rates or the prices for certain drugs, not patient care.

All five lawmakers are worried about losing their seats in 2014. Barber, Kirkpatrick, Sinema and Esty have also voted with Republicans to delay the law's individual and employer mandates—the requirements that Americans purchase insurance and that employers of a certain size offer coverage, respectively.

The Democratic death panel fear-mongering follows an editorial that former Democratic...

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Why unions are turning on Obamacare

The Affordable Care Act continues to generate controversy. There are obviously many paths to the same destination. Today's post was shared by Steven Greenhouse and comes from tv.msnbc.com

 (Photo by David Kohl/AP)

President Barack Obama speaks at the AFL-CIO Labor Day picnic at Coney Island in Cincinnati Sept. 7, 2009. Some labor unions that initially backed Obama’s health care overhaul are now frustrated and angry about what they say are unexpected consequences of the plan that could hurt their members.

“Repeal and replace” is the Grand Old Party’s oft-repeated mantra regarding Obamacare, which House Republicans voted to repeal for the 40th time on Friday. But in April, an organization in the president’s base echoed the refrain.

On April 24, the United Union of Roofers, Waterproofers, and Allied Workers released a statement demanding “repeal or complete reform of the Affordable Care Act.” While no other union has yet called for an outright repeal of the health care law, a growing number of them argue that serious reform is needed.

“We continue to stand behind real health care reform, but the law as it stands will hurt millions of Americans including the members of our respective unions,” wrote the presidents of three major labor unions in a July letter to Congressional Democratic leadership. The subsequent three and a half weeks have not assuaged their fears.

“There are members of Congress who have met with us who have been somewhat responsive and concerned about the situation,” said a spokesperson for the hospitality union UNITE HERE, whose president signed the letter. “But...

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Physician Payments Sunshine Act Goes Into Effect Without Initial Concerns

Today's post was shared by Kaiser Health News and comes from capsules.kaiserhealthnews.org

The Physician Payments Sunshine Act, an Affordable Care Act provision requiring doctors and medical companies to disclose their financial relationships, went into effect Aug. 1. Physicians say they are now working to find a balance between necessary transparency and what some perceive to be burdensome filing.

“We want to spend our time seeing patients, not doing paperwork,” said Dr. Jason Mitchell the director of the Center for Health IT at the American Academy for Family Physicians.

The Sunshine Act requires drug companies and medical device makers to report payments, gifts and investments to Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. Though the act is now in effect, a complete set of records are not due until March 2014 and will not be made public until September 2014.

Consumer advocates and other stakeholders favor openness when it comes to the large amounts of money medical and pharmaceutical companies spend to influence a doctor’s choices, according to a Pew Health Center statement from 2012. Holding both parties accountable with a clear reporting system would allow consumers to spot potential bias.

Mitchell, who is also a practicing family medical physician in Missouri, does not anticipate many immediate changes for doctors – aside from fewer lunches with pharmaceutical representatives.

He predicts that because of the increased attention placed on these small meetings that make up a majority of the reportable interactions,...

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