Three years after Japan’s earthquake and tsunami led to the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster, concerns persist about health effects while the cleanup poses ongoing health and safety challenges; workers in three states sue McDonald’s over wage theft; and the Senate passes a bill altering how the military addresses sexual assault allegations.
Poultry workers travel to Washington, DC to ask the Obama administration to rescind a proposed rule that would allow for faster processing-line speeds; a camera assistant is killed during a railway film shoot; and a Tennessee lawmaker has introduced bills to improve worker health safety in that state.
Anniversaries of two deadly workplace disasters remind us of the hazards of combustible dust and gas blows; a former Cal/OSHA employee warns that the agency is dangerously understaffed; and CDC uses sugar-industry money to fund studies into the epidemic of chronic kidney disease striking Central American sugarcane workers.
A judge questions whether the NFL’s proposed settlement will be enough to meet the needs of former football players suffering from neurological problems; the collapse of two cell towers in West Virginia kills two communications workers and one firefighter; and the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health publicizes resources for preventing musculoskeletal disorders.
Workers at a Walmart-contracted warehouse walk off the job in sub-zero temperatures and demand heaters, while Walmart faces a federal complaint for retaliating against striking workers; lobbyists mount campaigns against worker centers; and OSHA offers new resources for hospital safety.
ProPublica investigates the hazards of temporary work, while the death of a temp worker at an Amazon warehouse underscores the severity of the problem; three California counties are recognizing nail salons with worker-friendly practices; and Bangladesh charges the owners of Tazreen Fashions factory, where 112 workers died in a fire, with culpable homicide.
Fast-food workers walk off their jobs and demand higher wages; workers from a Niagara Falls Goodyear plant have a bladder cancer rate nearly three times that of the general New York state population; and increased pork-plant production comes with more reports of worker injuries.
The owner of a factory where an explosion killed two workers is convicted of manslaughter and sentenced to 10-20 years in prison; a reporter investigates deaths of young farmworkers since the Obama administration withdrew its proposed rule on child agricultural workers; and retailers have improved their Black Friday crowd control in the five years since Jdimytai Damour was trampled to death at a Long Island Walmart.
The Occupational Safety and Health Administration proposes a rule that would make large companies’ injury and illness reports publicly available; Johns Hopkins Medicine suspends its black lung program after its activities are highlighted in a Center for Public Integrity report on miners denied black lung benefits; and an explosion at a Ciudad Juarez candy factory kills four workers.
EHS Today tackles Bangladesh factory safety; federal employees get paid for shutdown days, but thousands of contractors don’t; and health ministers from across the Americas pledge funds to address chronic kidney disease that’s killing agricultural workers.