Workers Exposed to Asbestos Highlight Need for Stronger Workplace Safety Rules

http://blog.aflcio.org/2007/04/17/workers-exposed-to-asbestos-highlight-need-for-stronger-workplace-safety-rules/

Workers Exposed to Asbestos Highlight Need for Stronger Workplace Safety Rules

by Mike Hall, Apr 17, 2007



On April 28, 1971, the Occupational Safety and Health Act (OSHA) went into effect. Passed by Congress in 1970, the act was the first comprehensive safety and health law to protect tens of millions of U.S. workers from dangerous and deadly hazards.

But millions more still are not covered by the safety law, including those employed by congressional offices and agencies.

Ten workers who currently are not protected by OSHA are the “tunnel rats” employed by the Architect of the Capitol (AOC). They maintain the five miles of underground utility tunnels that supply heat and cooling to all of Congress and 20 other federal office buildings on Capitol Hill. Earlier this year, it was revealed they have been exposed to high levels of deadly asbestos during the years they’ve worked in the tunnels—and several have developed asbestos-related lung problems.

This year as workers, unions and safety and health activists observe Workers Memorial Day on April 28, one of the many improvements safety advocates seek is inclusion of all workers under the umbrella of OSHA.

At a March 1 hearing, John Thayer, supervisor of the tunnel crew, told the Senate Employment and Workplace Safety Subcommittee:

Just over a year ago, we found out that the AOC had been misleading us for years about the extent of our workplace exposure to asbestos. The Architect knew, but didn’t tell us, that the concentration of airborne asbestos in the tunnels was extremely toxic—30 to 40 times the legal limit. We discovered this when the Office of Compliance filed an unprecedented complaint against the Architect for not fixing safety problems that the OOC had identified seven years earlier. So we asked to see the medical records from our annual employment physicals conducted by the Office of Attending Physician. My own records stated that my lung age was 118 years old. I was 33 at the time. No one ever told me this: On the contrary, every year the doctor gave me a paper saying I was cleared to work in the tunnels. We all got those pieces of paper.

FULL story at link.