SVEP by OSHA now in effect

Effective on the 18^th of this month (06/18/2010) OSHA has begun the Severe Violator Enforcement Program (SVEP) to protect workers whose employer willfully disregards OSHA regulations.

From the OSHA Website:

“OSHA’s SVEP focuses enforcement efforts on employers who willfully and repeatedly endanger workers by exposing them to serious hazards. The directive establishes procedures and enforcement actions for the severe violator program, including increased inspections, such as mandatory follow-up inspections of a workplace found in violation and inspections of other worksites of the same company where similar hazards or deficiencies may be present.

The directive explains that the SVEP is intended to focus enforcement efforts on employers who have demonstrated recalcitrance or indifference to their OSH Act obligations by committing willful, repeated or failure-to-abate violations in one or more of the following circumstances: a fatality or catastrophe situation; in industry operations or processes that expose workers to severe occupational hazards; exposing workers to hazards related to the potential releases of highly hazardous chemicals; and all egregious enforcement actions.”

In other words “Do something about the unsafe practices and conditions or else…”

Read the complete directive online here.

Sleep-deprived workers put everyone at risk

You have random drug tests to ensure a drug-free workplace because a worker on drugs is a danger, not only to himself but to everyone else.

You wouldn’t dream of allowing an employee to come to work smelling of alcohol.

Problem is there’s one performance inhibitor that you can’t test for and for which there are no laws. We’re speaking, of course, of sleep-deprivation.

Just going to bed 1.5 hrs later than normal for a single night can reduce your employees’ alertness by up to 32% (Check out these and other stats on Webmd.com)

Most adults require between 7 and 9 hours of sleep each night but studies have shown that most of us try to function on a lot less. Here’s where things get murky… because most of us don’t get enough sleep, we get used to functioning at sub-par levels and make our reduced state the norm. Because our mental state has been compromised by lack of sleep we don’t even think that we aren’t functioning properly and so believe that we are actually doing fine. Contrary to what you may believe your body does not “get use to” less sleep, it’s just your impaired function that believes it does.

What are some of the other results of not getting enough sleep?

• Increased risk of depression
• A weakened immune system
• Memory problems
• Morning Headaches
• Trouble focusing and concentrating
• Elevated blood pressure
• Mood swings and irritability
• Weight gain
• Hindered eyesight/ability to focus
• Decreased physical ability and lack of energy

Sounds like the side effects of most illicit drugs that you are testing your employees for doesn’t it? The scary thing is that, according to statistics, this problem affects more than half of your work force.

So what can be done? You obviously can’t go tuck your employees in every night to make sure that they are getting to bed at a decent hour so what can you do?

• Pay attention for how your employees are acting. Talk to employees who are constantly yawning, looking lethargic, dragging and nodding off during the work day.
• Make sure that the lighting is adequate. Low lighting tends to accentuate the problem. Our bodies respond by slowing down in low light and waking up with increased light.
• Use the buddy system. Having two people work together helps both of them stay awake and alert.
• Break up the monotony of repetitive tasks. When the brain isn’t engaged the body tends to follow. Rotate personnel, switch up jobs, etc…
• Allow naps. A 10-15 minute nap has been shown to be very effective in helping the body recoup. Allow employees to combine breaks if they feel that they need a longer nap.

Finally, you need to sit down and have a talk with employees who continually come to work tired. Often, just knowing that their employer notices when they aren’t getting enough sleep, is enough to motivate some to change their habits. Many have no idea that they aren’t getting enough sleep, much less that others have noticed it. Let them know that it is affecting their ability to do their job properly and potentially a safety issue as well. A confrontation now could make a huge difference, not only in increased productivity, increased safety but also in increased long range health to the employee.

 

 

 

Ergonomic Tip of the Week # 26

Certain medications (diuretics, antihistamines) can reduce the production of lubricating tears. If experiencing dry eyes at work and taking medication, check with your doctor to see if the medication may be contributing to the dry eyes. Besides remembering to blink more, dry eyes at work can be relieved through eye drops. Select eye drops that are strictly lubricants. Don’t get drops containing decongestants or vasoconstrictors.

The ergonomic tip of the day is provided by Ken Oswald at SafetyCommunity.com

Is that safe?

More photos of situations that LNI inspectors would have a field day with

Better hope that the guy holding your ankles isn’t mad at you for any reason!

Apparently these guys saw the last photo and thought it was a good idea!

(Photos taken from http://izismile.com/)

Oil Spill affecting supply chain

If you use coveralls and have a few cases in the warehouse consider yourself fortunate. If you don’t, you might need to find an alternate way of doing what you need to do because coveralls are getting more and more difficult to come by.

The problem, of course, is that the normal inventory is being shipped down to workers trying to clean up the oil spill. Other shortages include boot covers, gloves, oil pads and orange vests, all of which are used by BP Oil Spill cleanup workers.

Manufacturers are, of course, doing all they can to step up production to make sure that the needed supplies are available, not only for those working on the clean up but for their regular customers as well, but it takes time to increase production.

Meanwhile, coveralls are just plain hard to come by with lead times dipping into the 2 month time frame.

Low inventory, because of the economic situation have only made matters worse. Most companies just don’t keep the same inventory supplies they kept a couple of years ago. This means that they usually need their supplies faster than they would have back then because they don’t have a buffer.

There is no easy solution. Ultimately, the truth is that the oil spill has and will continue to affect all of us to so degree or other and we are going to have to adapt to meet the demands that this environmental crisis is imposing on us all.

Making Sense of the new Eye/Face Protection Standard

In case you hadn’t heard, ANSI (American National Standards Institute) approved a new Z87.1 standard.

The new standard, Z87.1-2010 attempts to cover more ground, extending the standard to cover more in the nature of hazards that relate to eye and face protection. The changes are pretty broad and change the nature of the standard substantially. Because of this, the markings on protective eyewear has also changed.

Need help understanding and deciphering the new standard? Fortunately for us, MSA has done a great job doing just that with a new whitepaper entitled “ANSI/ISEA Z87.1-2010: Frequently Asked

Questions about the New Standard”

You can download the whitepaper for free from the MSA assetlibrary by clicking here.

If everyone’s a teacher than most of us are bad teachers

The title of my post this morning refers to a previous post “Everyone’s a teacher” in which I talked about the importance of being a good example to teens concerning not texting while driving.

Turns out most of us aren’t concerned about being a good example. According to an article in Bloomberg Businessweek “Adults out-text teens while driving“.

The article states:

“About 47 percent of adults who use the text-messaging function on their cell phones said they have read or sent messages while driving. That compares with 34 percent of texting teens, ages 16 and 17.”

“Focus groups have shown that many teens have seen their parents and older siblings send or read messages while piloting a vehicle”

At what point do we understand the importance of what our children see us doing as opposed to what they hear us saying? The old adage of “Do what I say not as I do” isn’t going to, and never has, cut it.

Don’t make your next text be one that’s sent on the way back from some teenagers’ funeral.

Ergonomic Tip of the Week # 25

A wrist rest at the keyboard is recommended in order to reduce pressure on the wrist, and to keep the wrist in a straight posture.

The ergonomic tip of the day is provided by Ken Oswald at SafetyCommunity.com

Knowing the category of your hazard

The lessons that we learn when we first start learning are often the ones that we tend to forget over time. Robert Fulgrum wrote a book entitled “Everything I needed to learn I learned in Kindergarten” that turned into a bestseller. It was essentially a reminder of the important lessons that we have forgotten over the years such as “Play nice” and “Everything is better with milk and cookies”.

In the world of safety, I have found the same principle to be true. One of the basic lessons that you learn first, when you first start to realize that the world is not essentially a safe place is that there are different types of risks. The nature of the risk determines how we learn to protect ourselves against it. We learn to wear protective gear when we ride our bike or play sports but we don’t walk around the house that way. There are other, more efficient ways to protect against the hot stove or the hazard of falling down stairs.

The same principle applies in the workplace. There are different types of hazards and learning which category the hazard falls in will help us determine how to protect against it.

The 6 different types of hazards are as follows:

1. Mechanical – This type of hazard relates to any type of machinery, vehicle or moving part. This includes trucks and trailers as well as tools (power tools or hand tools).
2. Chemical – Solids, liquids, Gases, mists or vapors that are potentially harmful to the body.
3. Physical – Slips, trips, pipes that you might bump against, etc… anything physical that needs to be identified and protected against.
4. Biological – Viruses and germs fall into this category. This includes such issues as the recent Swine Flu scare as well as proper hygiene to prevent infections from cuts and scrapes
5. Environmental – Heat, cold, sun, oxygen deficiencies, poor lighting, etc…. This category can include such things as insects, poison ivy and other hazards of nature.
6. Organizational – These hazards have to do with “the way we do things here”. Unsafe practices and methods fall into this category. A work shift that is too long, for example, would be an organizational hazard.

As we look over this list it becomes obvious that they can, at times, overlap. An environmental hazard, for example can be caused by a biological hazard or a physical hazard (steps) can be compounded by environmental ones (poor lighting).

Understanding these different types of hazards, however, allow us to make sure that we aren’t overlooking anything in our quest for a safe workplace. At each work station, every location and every situation, it is essential to run down this list and identify the hazards for each of these categories. Not every category will have hazards associated with it but you will be surprised, when you stop to ask the question, at the hazards that you might otherwise have overlooked.

Should other States follow Oregon on the AED mandate?

“On January 1, 2010 a new Oregon law goes into effect mandating placement of Automated External Defibrillators (AED defibrillator) in “places of public assembly” throughout the state.
Under this law, virtually every public and commercial building of 50,000 square feet or more of floor space in the state is required to have at least one AED. The Bill affects most asset classes, including: retail, industrial, hospitality (including hotels) and residential building types. Schools and places of worship are exempted from the AED mandate.” (quoted from “Free-Press-Release.com” here.)

So far, Oregon is blazing a new trail with respect to AEDs with the “broadest mandate for the placement of AEDs in the United States thus far“.

So here are a few questions I need answers to:

1. Should other states follow suit? Why, why not?
2. Should mandates include churches? Why, why not?
3. Should there be a mandate concerning all public schools across the nations (so far, only 16 states mandate that AEDs be present in schools and athletic events)? Why, why not?
4. Should it be left up to the individual states or should it be a federal mandate? Why, why not?

Seems to me that with a cardiac arrest survival rate of less than 5% and studies that show that we could save more than 50,000 lives every year with properly placed AEDs (think “3 minute rule” which states that a person walking at a moderately rapid pace should be able to get and bring the AED back to the victim within 3 minutes) and proper training (at least 10% of the workforce) this is a no-brainer.

Am I missing something here? It can’t be the cost as the price of AEDs has dropped considerably. They are now extremely affordable (most companies spend a whole lot more than that on coffee each year in order to make sure their employees are able to wake up properly in the morning).

Why is this taking so long to mandate? Seems to me that the longer we delay the more lives are lost.

Kudos to Oregon for leading the way.

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