Occupational Safety

WASHINGTON -- Maryland has the 12th lowest rate of workplace fatalities among the 50 states, but don't breathe a sigh of relief yet. Maryland's job safety record is favorable only when compared with the troubling number of deaths and injuries at worksites elsewhere in the country.More than 10,000 American workers are killed on the job each year -- one worker for every hour of the day, according to a study released yesterday by the AFL-CIO. Six million workers are injured annually, and 60,000 are permanently disabled due to workplace illnesses and injuries, the report said.

WASHINGTON -- Members of a congressional subcommittee have blasted Occupational Safety and Health Administration officials for allegedly neglecting the safety of 3 million federal workers.The subcommittee said the neglect results in needless deaths and injuries each year.Last year, OSHA spent less than 1 percent of its budget on safety programs. Only 13 OSHA inspectors monitor the safety of the massive federal work force, testimony at the hearing on a proposed federal worker safety bill revealed.

The state's worker safety and health agency has been too easy on Maryland's employers and slow in pursuing discrimination cases, according to a federal audit released yesterday.Launched after a fire killed 25 workers at a North Carolina chicken plant in September, an evaluation by the federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration found that Maryland settled too many safety-violation cases informally and failed to adequately verify that safety problems, once identified, had been remedied.

Nursing can be a real pain in the back."You can feel it in your back after a 12-hour shift, there's so much moving and lifting" of patients, says Marjorie Simpson, a registered nurse at Johns Hopkins Hospital's intermediate care unit. She hurt her back a year ago, trying to move a heavy patient on her own.The lesson: "You practice good body mechanics, and you learn to rely on other nurses to help you with a 'boost.' "Despite the perils of working among deadly germs, disabling chemicals and dangerous equipment, the No. 1 cause of disability for hospital and health care workers remains the injured back.

Enforcing workplace safety standards is expected to become more complicated and expensive in the coming months as fines for violations increase sevenfold and new regulations are issued covering risks such as motor vehicle accidents and AIDS, state experts say.Labor lawyers from the Baltimore firm of Shaw & Rosenthal and representatives from state and federal enforcement agencies told about 120 employers at a Maryland Chamber of Commerce seminar yesterday that...

In 1902, Upton Sinclair published a book of fiction, "The Jungle," which told more truth about the American work place than anybody could stand. Among other things, it described packinghouse workers falling off unprotected catwalks and being cooked into lard. Sinclair's book is widely credited with helping establish the Food and Drug Administration and with accelerating efforts to end child labor. It took another story, the ghastly report of the deaths of 146 women and girls in flames at the Triangle Shirtwaist Co. factory in New York, nine years later, to prompt lawmakers to act on safety, however.

The contractor involved in the bridge collapse over the Baltimore-Washington Parkway near Laurel two years ago has been fined $710 by a state hearing examiner, who threw out the state job safety agency's assessment of over $900,000 for multiple violations.It was by far the largest fine ever sought by the Maryland Occupational Safety and Health office.The Aug. 31, 1989, accident occurred as concrete was poured on the top deck of Route 198. Fourteen people were hurt, including one woman with permanent brain damage whose family has already settled its lawsuit against the contractors for $5.3 million.

Workplace safety bill proposedThe current mechanism established to provide safe and healthy workplaces for federal workers lacks teeth, according to Rep. Gerry Sikorski, D-Minn., who has proposed a measure that would lead to a major overhaul of the existing system."Civil servants perform some of the most hazardous work done in America -- from workers poisoned by toxic cyanide foam to customs inspectors threatened daily by inadequate protection from fleeing criminals," said Sikorski."They have a right to expect that the serious hazards they face will be rectified as quickly as possible," added Sikorski, a member of the House Post Office and Civil Service Committee and author of the Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1991.

WASHINGTON -- Putting an end to striker-replacement practices heads the agenda of hundreds of Steelworkers here this week for their annual legislative conference.Replacing of striking employees by management has become "the most effective union-breaking device" to emerge from the 1980s, when President Reagan demonstrated the practice by firing striking air traffic controllers, said Rep. William D. Ford, D-Mich."It won't be very long before you'll be afraid to face a strike," Ford told members of the United Steelworkers of America.

One on One is a weekly feature offering excerpts of interviews conducted by The Evening Sun with newsworthy government and business leaders. Craig Lowry is chief of enforcement for the Maryland Occupational Safety and Health agency.Q. Can you tell me what MOSH's responsibilities are?MOSH has the responsibility to ensure and assist employers in meeting their obligation under the law. And that obligation is to provide a safe, healthful workplace for their employees.A.Some states use OSHA. Maryland has MOSH.