To paraphrase an old Beatles song, it’s been a long, cold, lonely winter budget-wise over the past several years for Cal/OSHA. But here comes the sun: The Division of Occupational Safety and Health is working to refill its ranks and is actively recruiting safety professionals. “In the coming months, Cal/OSHA will be hiring industrial hygienists …
The Division of Occupational Safety and Health is reminding employers to beware of Valley Fever, a potentially serious illness caused by inhaling fungal spores released by disturbing soil. The fungus, which lives in the top two to 12 inches of soil, causes Coccidioidomycosis, and is increasingly found in California. Cal/OSHA notes an average annual increase of …
Tension on the frame of a rack holding three tons of medical cylinder separators caused a corner space bar to give way, shifting and then spilling the load on top of a worker who was helping guide it. California’s Division of Occupational Safety and Health says the fatal incident occurred because the crew did not …
The Bay Area Rapid Transit’s controversial rail-inspection system known as “simple approval” has been abolished by the California Public Utilities Commission. The move comes after the Oct. 19 death of two BART employees who were struck by a train as they investigated a reported dip in a track near Walnut Creek, and follows similar tragedy …
It will to be at least early 2014 before there is a formal proposal, but the Division of Occupational Safety and Health has sent its sister agency, the Cal/OSH Standards Board, draft language on protections for workers in the adult-film industry. The draft, which would be an addition to the bloodborne pathogens standard – General …
California’s Division of Occupational Safety and Health is investigating several workplace fatalities in recent days, including several crushing deaths and two deaths from falls. The latter occurred on Oct. 23 in the Fresno area. An employee of Jesus Cesar Briseno, doing business as Cali Ag, was picking olives when he fell off a ladder and died, …
In our Oct. 25 story, “RAND Study Finds ‘Large-Scale’ Serious Underreporting in California,” we stated that the researchers found a ratio of 3:1 of non-fatal reportable cases to every fatality for Kings County. John Mendeloff, director of the RAND Center for Health and Safety in the Workplace and one of the study’s authors, notes that …
Fed-OSHA readily admits that its permissible exposure limits are “out-of-date and inadequately protective.” There’s little chance that even the most outdated of them will be updated anytime soon. So what’s OSHA’s answer? Use the Cal/OSHA PELs for reference, as well as recommended limits from the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health and threshold limit …