
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: TUESDAY, April 20, 1993                   TAG: 9304200414
SECTION: EDITORIAL                    PAGE: A-4   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

OCCUPATIONAL SAFETY LAW NEEDS AN OVERHAUL

WORK can be a dangerous place. One worker dies every hour of every day every year - 10,000 per year overall. In addition, 6 million workers are injured on the job each year and 60,000 are permanently disabled. Tens of thousands of workers die each year from long-term effects of such occupational diseases as asbestosis and brown lung.

It's obvious that the Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1972, unamended since its inception, is not doing the job to improve safety. Some 156,000 workers were injured on the job in 1990 in Virginia, and 1,803 died between 1980 and 1988. It would take OSHA 64 years to inspect each work place in Virginia, given the current number of inspectors.

You don't have to look very far to see how dangerous jobs are hurting, even killing people in our state. In Virginia's two most publicized industrial accidents last year, 11 workers were killed on the job.

In Arlington, three Roanoke Belt Inc. employees were overcome by fumes and died while working on the Arlington Water Pollution Control Plant. The three men were using toluene, a hazardous chemical, and they were not using respirators. Firefighters were held at bay for more than 12 hours by poisonous and flammable conditions in the tank, which had to be sealed to prevent deadly fumes from escaping after the bodies were removed.

And in Norton, a blast near the entrance of Southmountain Coal Co.'s No. 3 mine killed eight miners in December. Although the coal company had no prior fatalities at that mine, federal mine officials found it to have a serious injury rate, nearly triple the national average.

If we want safe jobs, we're going to have to convince Congress to reform the OSHA law. GERALD W. MEADOWS President Roanoke United Central Labor Council ROANOKE

by CNB