“Nobody uses water,” one man in a Dodgers cap said in Spanish when Maria Cabrera approached, holding flyers about silicosis, an incurable and suffocating disease that has devastated dozens of workers across the state and killed men who have barely reached middle age.
…
The disease dates back centuries, but researchers say the booming popularity of countertops made of engineered stone, which has much higher concentrations of silica than many kinds of natural stone, has driven a new epidemic of an accelerated form of the suffocating illness. As the dangerous dust builds up and scars the lungs, the disease can leave workers short of breath, weakened and ultimately suffering from lung failure.
“You can get a transplant,” Cabrera told the man in Spanish, “but it won’t last.”
In California, it has begun to debilitate young workers, largely Latino immigrants who cut and polish slabs of engineered stone. Instead of cropping up in people in their 60s or 70s after decades of exposure, it is now afflicting men in their 20s, 30s or 40s, said Dr. Jane Fazio, a pulmonary critical care physician who became alarmed by cases she saw at Olive View-UCLA Medical Center. Some California patients have died in their 30s.
…
There are a lot of workers in different industries that are at risk of silicosis and don’t know it. The mentality of “it’s just dust, don’t be afraid to get a little dirty” will end up killing people.
You’re absolutely right, all this old timer “Kids these days are so soft…” B. S. When in reality the young just don’t wanna die or be maimed at 30.
Take care of your bodies, kids, it’s the only one you get. Don’t let corporations run you into the ground and then throw you in the trash. We need to demand better working conditions from our bosses and our elected officials.
“The only one looking out for #1 is you.” - My section chief when I was in the Army.
I’ll never forget it and I pass it on every chance I get. I’ve gone as far as shaming some people into wearing knee braces and the like because “what the fuck are you doing, you’re gonna fuck it up even worse”
I try anyways… doesn’t always work…
Keep up the good work, it might not always work, but the times that it does are priceless.
There are a decent amount of teenagers where I work and I try to pass that idea on to as many as I can. Adults too, of course, but it’s really satisfying to be able to catch people while they’re young and still have loads of time to protect themselves… From a lot of things.
When running a fireworks show, safety is by far the most important part of the job.
In the safety briefing before we start working in the morning, the one before we load shells, AND the one before we fire the show we remind them that the person most responsible for their safety is themselves. If they do not feel safe about something, anything, do not do it and come to me. I will never shame someone for wearing PPE. I will always be inspired from whatever device or tool they come up with to make the job safer or more comfortable.
Everything can wait while we sort out safety issues.
My doctor told me recently I should wear a mask everytime I mow the lawn. I was like fuckkkk. It’s true though.
Just you? Or people in general? And, what does the mask block or protect against?
My boss has emphysema and asthma, but refuses to wear a mask when doing demolition because “it makes it too hard to breath.” I don’t understand this mentality.
The answer here is simple- regulations with teeth.
Every saw uses water. Every worker wears a mask. Random inspections.
Inspector sees one person without a mask? $1000 fine. One machine with no water hooked up? $5000 fine. 10 people with no masks and 3 machines with no water hooked up? $25,000 fine. Make it clear that there is no fucking around here.
Job site like described in the article? Shut down until problems fixed.
I’d further add personally liability of all supervisors, managers and executives. You run such an operation and cannot prove without a doubt that you instructed for safety, provided the necessary tools and materials and did regulary inspections yourself? You pay for everyones treatment and damages.
Personal liability (piercing the corporate shield) is a really tough nut to crack. That’d also do some outsized harm- think kids college fund raided for settlement money.
That said, I’d be happy to make it a personal crime to, with knowledge of the law, instruct any worker to use a machine without safety equipment and water hookup, or to work without a mask. THAT should be a personal crime, like criminal charges. And you should have to, when hired for any such supervisory position, sign a one-piece thing that has that law laid out so you can’t claim you didn’t know the law.
In my country (Germany) as an architect or civil engineer you can be held liable, in some cases also as an employee, when deliberately or grossly negligently violating technical rules.
At the end of the day no college fund is more important than peoples lifes, but there exist liability insurance specific to certain jobs. It is similiar to doctors malpractice insurance. Expanding the concept to site supervisors seems reasonable to me.
And of course that must not except the company from liability. It should mainly take effect, when the companies liability cannot cover anymore.
This is well reasoned.
All injuries arising out of employment should fall under workers’ comp., except if the injury is caused intentionally.
Even recklessness, I think, it best suited for workers’ comp. I would make workers’ comp. benefits more robust.
I would support criminal liability for wanton or reckless conduct by coworkers.
Unlike with asbestos, the companies that mine and make the raw countertops have clearly labeled their products and warned of the risks of silicosis.
Set up a monitored tip line where supervisors can tell the govt that management isn’t giving them the proper PPE to protect their workers. That way if management isn’t giving them PPE, supervisors have a place to go turn to instead of being squeezed from both ends. Get an OSHA inspector out on a surprise trip and get upper management fined.
Supervisors need to care about their direct reports first and foremost, over any company demands. One of the best supervisors I’ve ever had gave me therapist recommendations when I mentioned having a tough time with mental health, and she told me she sometimes took personal days for her own mental health. Another supervisor, when I was going through an even more rough period of mental health, told me that his wife had bipolar and they put a lot of time and effort in, together, for her to feel alright.
I felt like I had those guys in my corner, and I knew that if push came to shove, they’d have my back. They may have ultimately been powerless to internal HR policies, but they reaffirmed to me that my health should be my top priority and I needed to put it first.
That’s what it means to have a workplace as a family. The leader truly cares about everyone on the team and has their back.
gonna need higher fines than that. Its not some rinky dinky small outfits that are handling fancy counter tops like that.
The fucked up part of this is how preventable it is. Very few folks will take to wearing a mask though, when that’s all they need.
Here’s the full set of measures recommended:
Workplace safety regulators have recommended a suite of measures including water spraying systems, ventilation and vacuum systems to clear dust, in addition to protective respirators for workers — ones covering the entire face if silica levels in the air are high.
Considering these are likely illegal immigrants working on these countertops, I wouldn’t be shocked if their employers refused to supply masks.
False, read the article?
Its more than just masks that are needed and the article makes that very clear.
You get “serious creep vibes” from someone saying “false read the article”? Christ what world do you live in
No, respirator is a type of mask, thats not what I was referring to.
The article mentions multiple times that masks are just one piece of the puzzle, and goes into a fair bit of detail about how its way more than that, that is needed.
Read the article, it’s gone over in detail multiple times.
Right, it’s the ventilation hose built into every piece of cutting equipment ever made that they neglected to use.
I have had countertops put in two different times. The first time the crew had a water saw and masks. The second time I was horrified to see the guys cutting the stuff raw without even a paper mask on.
I worked for a few spray-foam insulation companies in my early 20’s. I’m just waiting to hear the same thing from spray foam. Half the guys I worked with didn’t wear masks most of the time and were just covered in foam all day breathing in the off gassing of fire retardents and blowing agents and other nasty chemicals. I quit because I saw the writing on the wall and my boss hated me for quitting before training my replacement. I told him it wasn’t worth my health.
The dumbest thing is the mentality between workers sometimes. “Don’t be a pussy” some will say when you ask for masks/goggles/ear plugs/etc but none of them will be there when you eventually get injured or sick. None of them will congratulate you, hand you a tough-guy-trophy and pay your medical bills + pension.
Good call. Hed probably be the type to make fun of you for wearing a mask too, huh?
Nah he was my boss and I was a decent sprayer, and a very very good helper. So to make fun of me wouldn’t have worked well for him. He understood my concerns. My other coworkers were not like that though, like someone in a comment above me said. They’d all crack jokes at me because I took safety very seriously. I would like to see how they are all doing now and I wonder about their health sometimes. I didn’t keep in touch with any of them though and live far away now.
